The Washington Football Team couldn't donate Dwayne Haskins to a quarterback-needy team at this rate, as the franchise is stuck with the 2019 first-round pick as he continues to ride the pine as the No. 3 signal caller on the depth chart. Haskins had a short leash in Washington, with a head coach that didn't draft him as the organization is in the midst of a culture change.
Whatever Washington's plans are at quarterback going forward, it doesn't seem to involve Haskins. Ron Rivera isn't ready to cut his losses yet, but there's not much he can say considering the franchise failed to find any takers for him.
"It's funny, I benched the guy and it's like everybody thinks his career is over here in Washington. It's not," Rivera said on The Rich Eisen Show this week, via JP Finlay of NBC Sports Washington. "There's potential, there's opportunity. The kid has an NFL arm, it's just a matter of him developing. Everybody forgets he played 12 games of college football and then last year he really didn't get into the swing of things until the end of the year. I did everything I could to give him 11 weeks as the No. 1 (quarterback)."
Haskins was the unquestioned first-team quarterback throughout training camp and the first few weeks of the season. With no normal offseason and OTAs and a preseason to prepare, Haskins' chances of keeping the starting job were slim. His play on the field didn't help, completing 61% of his passes for 939 yards with four touchdowns and three interceptions in four games. Of the 27 quarterbacks with 100+ pass attempts from Weeks 1 to 4, Haskins ranked in the bottom four in completion percentage, touchdown passes and passer rating.
Rivera doesn't see any changes in the depth chart at quarterback in the second half of the season, meaning Haskins is still expected to be an inactive on game day. Since Washington can't receive any value for Haskins, the best bet for Rivera is to continue to develop him in the hopes the former first-round pick can improve.
Rivera doesn't have a choice.
"I do appreciate the way he's been working. I think Dwayne is understanding," Rivera said in his weekly press conference Wednesday. "Again, he and I have talked, and I said: 'Dwayne, this really is about your development and growth.' He's a young, young quarterback.
"I've said this before, he played what—12 games in college or 13 games in college? Then he's in the NFL and he played some games last year, this year we gave him a lot of opportunities and you still see the rawness. To me, it's really about him developing and growing. He's going to have opportunities. But right now, we've got Kyle [Allen] as our one, Alex [Smith] as our two, and he's our three. We'll go from there."
