{"id":173186,"date":"2025-07-01T14:43:09","date_gmt":"2025-07-01T14:43:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/173186\/"},"modified":"2025-07-01T14:43:09","modified_gmt":"2025-07-01T14:43:09","slug":"which-commanders-defender-had-a-surprising-offseason","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/173186\/","title":{"rendered":"Which Commanders’ defender had a surprising offseason?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Daron Payne is entering his eighth NFL season in 2025 \u2014 all with the Washington Commanders<\/a>. A former first-round pick, Payne enjoyed a breakout season in 2022, earning a lucrative four-year extension that made him one of the NFL’s highest-paid interior defenders before his production dipped over the last two seasons.<\/p>\n

Payne will man the middle of Washington’s defensive line for the first time in his career without former college teammate Jonathan Allen. The Commanders released Allen in a salary cap move earlier in the offseason. Not only is Payne now Washington’s most senior player outside of punter Tress Way, he’s also assumed more of a leadership role.<\/p>\n

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Earlier this offseason, defensive coordinator Joe Whitt Jr. praised Payne<\/a>. So did head coach Dan Quinn.<\/p>\n

“The guy that, to me, he just looks really good, he looks intentful, Daron Payne, man, like every day this dude is, I’m having to tell him, \u2018Hey man, let\u2019s calm down,'” Whitt said about Payne.<\/p>\n

Quinn said Payne enjoyed a “remarkable” offseason.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou know, it’s funny that you brought him up, but I walked past him today,” Quinn said. “I said, man, you’ve had a remarkable offseason. I felt that way through the drill work, through the skill, and everyone you just see something that jumps out differently, that’s into a new space.”<\/p>\n

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Washington needs Payne. And he understands the team is counting on him. ESPN’s John Keim recently named Payne as his biggest surprise<\/a> for Washington this offseason.<\/p>\n

It’s not so much about his performance on the field — it’s impossible to tell much about linemen because they’re not in pads. But, rather, what stood out with Payne was what others saw from him. Coach Dan Quinn said he had a “laser focus” this spring.<\/p>\n

Washington needs more from Payne this season. After recording 11.5 sacks in a contract year in 2022 he has posted a combined eight the past two seasons. But more than sack totals, Payne needs to be felt more in the pass rush. In 2020-22, he had 96 pass rush wins and a win rate of 11.6 percent. In the past two years he has had 39 wins and a 7.6 percent win rate. Payne isn’t in a contract year but could be cut next offseason for a $16 million savings.<\/p>\n

If Payne can repeat his 2022 production or similar, the Commanders’ defense is guaranteed to improve in 2025. Washington added Javon Kinlaw, Deatrich Wise, and Eddie Goldman this offseason to better defend the run. A refocused Payne is an even bigger addition than any of the newcomers.<\/p>\n

This article originally appeared on Commanders Wire: It was a surprising offseason for Commanders’ DT Daron Payne<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Daron Payne is entering his eighth NFL season in 2025 \u2014 all with the Washington Commanders. A former…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":173187,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2069],"tags":[427,7291,13146,7378,761,7,11172,9085,6,11898,855,111,2480],"class_list":{"0":"post-173186","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-washington-commanders","8":"tag-commanders","9":"tag-dan-quinn","10":"tag-daron-payne","11":"tag-deatrich-wise","12":"tag-eddie-goldman","13":"tag-football","14":"tag-javon-kinlaw","15":"tag-jonathan-allen","16":"tag-nfl","17":"tag-tress-way","18":"tag-washington","19":"tag-washington-commanders","20":"tag-washingtoncommanders"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173186","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=173186"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173186\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/173187"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=173186"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=173186"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=173186"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}