Jayden Daniels dislocated his left elbow again Saturday night on a play where nobody hit him. He took a designed snap from the Cowboys’ one-yard line with three seconds left in the first half, his own left guard stepped on his foot, and Daniels caught his fall with an outstretched left arm. Same elbow. Third time it’s given out in ten months.
This was never a scrambling problem. Daniels wasn’t scrambling and he wasn’t sacked on the play that ended his Saturday. He was running a designed goal-line snap from under center when his left guard, also named Chris Paul, clipped his foot at the worst possible moment. Daniels threw his arm down to catch himself. The elbow took the weight instead of his hand.
That’s the same motion that hurt him in November. Daniels dislocated the same elbow against Seattle last November, brought down on a short scramble and bracing himself the identical way, arm out, body weight landing on the joint. He missed three games. A month later the elbow gave out again, reaggravated when he was shoved to the turf after an interception return, ending his season for good. Two mechanically identical failures out of three says something the Commanders haven’t said out loud: this joint has a specific weakness, and it keeps finding the same way to fail.
Washington is 0-2 either way.
The Commanders lost to Dallas 37-20 with Marcus Mariota finishing it out, and the fuller picture of Daniels’ medical history is not encouraging for anyone hoping this is a short bridge and not a preview. Mariota went 2-6 as the starter last season while Daniels recovered from the same injury he just suffered again. He nearly delivered a highlight Saturday: Mariota appeared to connect with Dyami Brown for a 29-yard touchdown, but replay upheld the on-field ruling after Washington’s own challenge, and the Commanders settled for a field goal and a 17-13 deficit instead. X-rays showed no fracture. Nobody has offered a return timeline, because nobody has one to offer.
Magic Johnson, who owns a piece of this team, posted a public get-well message to Daniels on Saturday night:
https://twitter.com/MagicJohnson/status/2102122184982536536
I’ve read a lot of these ownership statements over the years, and they all land the same way: genuine, well-meaning, and completely beside the point. Nobody in that building has said a word about what actually changes so the same elbow stops giving out the same way.
The elbow doesn’t care how many people are praying for it.
