'Best rookie year of all time?'
Jayden Daniels has the Commanders a win away from the Super Bowl
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 [January 23, 2025]
By STEPHEN WHYNO
ASHBURN, Va. (AP) — Jayden Daniels has the Washington Commanders in
the NFC championship game, and his list of admirers around the
league continues to grow.
Just this week, Philadelphia Eagles defensive coordinator Vic Fangio
called Daniels “a young quarterback by birth certificate, not by the
tape.” C.J. Stroud of the Houston Texans believes Daniels has “had
the best rookie year of all time.”
If he and the Commanders beat the Eagles on Sunday, Daniels would
become the first rookie quarterback to lead his team to the Super
Bowl. And even as the hype train picks up speed, Daniels remains the
same laser-focused competitor and down-to-earth person he was when
he walked through the door as the second pick in the draft.
"He stays as even-keeled as any player I’ve ever been around," top
receiver Terry McLaurin said Wednesday. “We’ve played in some of the
most hostile environments, we’ve been playing on some of the biggest
stages and he’s treating it the same each and every week. I love
that about him.”
Daniels is making a strong case to back up Stroud's opinion. The
24-year-old out of LSU is the first player in franchise history to
throw for 25 touchdown passes with fewer than 10 interceptions, and
his 891 yards rushing are the most of any rookie QB in NFL history.
After winning the Heisman Trophy in college and becoming the
overwhelming favorite to win AP Offensive Rookie of the Year,
Daniels said he was “not even thinking that far” about making the
Super Bowl and the trail he would be blazing by facing the Buffalo
Bills or Kansas City Chiefs in New Orleans on Feb. 9.
“It would obviously be a blessing, but I’m just focused on how can I
be better day by day,” Daniels said. “There’s countless teams that
want to be in this position. ... You can’t really take it for
granted, but you also just got to be in the moment.”
No problem there. Coach Dan Quinn likens Daniels on the sideline to
“The Terminator” because of his steely-eyed demeanor and avoidance
of distractions.
On the field, Daniels has led the Commanders to six consecutive
victories — winning the first five on the final play of scrimmage
and beating the 15-win Lions 45-31 in Detroit. He has thrown for 17
TDs during this stretch, and while Washington is an underdog at
Philadelphia, Daniels' magic is the biggest reason to think the
Commanders could pull off another upset.
“He’s got rare, in-the-moment skills that have allowed us to be into
this spot,” Quinn said. “When it’s mental chaos going down and two
minutes (left) and these tight moments where it can feel that tight,
he’s got the experience of somebody that’s played a lot more
football than a first-year player.”
Daniels isn't sure when teammates stopped treating him like a
rookie. It was Week 8 after his Hail Mary pass to Noah Brown when
veteran tight end Zach Ertz asked that everyone outside the
organization stop acting like Daniels is a rookie because he had
seen signs of it for months.
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Washington Commanders quarterback Jayden Daniels (5) throws against
the Detroit Lions during the first half of an NFL football
divisional playoff game, Saturday, Jan. 18, 2025, in Detroit. (AP
Photo/Rey Del Rio)
"He was very proactive in his approach to being
great," said Ertz, who helped the Eagles win the Super Bowl seven
years ago. “A lot of times when you’re young in the league, it’s a
lot of trial and error to see what works for you. And, oftentimes,
you’re reactionary in terms of how your process is. And it’s like,
’Oh, after I failed a couple times, maybe I’ll do X, Y and Z a
little more.' Whereas Jayden, the moment he first got here, he was
the first one in the building studying as much as possible.”
Daniels, who still warms up with a basketball and loves that sport,
too, earned the reputation of being a gym rat during offseason
practices. He showed up early to take part in walkthroughs before
others and stayed late to make sure he got the playbook down pat.
Quinn, himself one win from returning to the Super Bowl eight years
since he and the Atlanta Falcons lost to New England, appreciates
Daniels' competitiveness but respects even more how much stems from
the rookie's preparation.
“There’s a feeling of being a leg up, and doing that type of extra
work sometimes just also provides the right motivation for yourself:
‘I’ve seen that look. I’m ready,’” Quinn said. “You’ve done the work
at it, so when the moment comes, you’re ready to deliver.”
Daniels has delivered Washington's best season-to-season win
improvement from 4-13 to 12-5, and he has been the centerpiece of an
offense that has 10 games with zero turnovers — the most for the
franchise since at least 1940, according to Sportradar.
Each step along the way, Daniels has shown that no situation is too
much pressure for him, something he credits to football being a fun
escape for him.
“I’m not really going out there and stressing about the moment
because at the end of the day I get to do what I love each and every
week win, lose or draw,” Daniels said. "It’s just a blessing to be
one of those kids that are able to fulfill their dream and live out
their dream of playing on Sundays in the NFL.”
___
AP Sports Writers Kristie Rieken in Houston and Dan Gelston in
Philadelphia contributed to this report.
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