New Commanders head coach Dan Quinn is already reaping the benefits of his big-three free agent signings as the players took to the field for the first time in May.
Linebacker Bobby Wagner, TE Zach Ertz, and RB Austin Ekeler have made an immediate impact on both their Commanders team mates and their coaches.
“You don’t have to look too far to watch their practice habits, how they do things, follow a process or a routine, that’s what I’m looking for from those guys,” Quinn said. “Just doing what they do also can be a multiplier.”
“They’ve seen the highs and lows,” offensive coordinator Kliff Kingsbury said. “They’ve seen the good teams, the bad teams, and so just talking through what a good team looked like, what their standards were, their practices, how guys worked, and then the teams that could have been good and weren’t, what were the pitfalls with that?”
Commanders stars setting the tone
“They’ve all been really good as far as sharing that, being open and being leaders, which is not easy to do when you come into a new place, but they really embraced it. I think the guys have embraced them,” he added.
“The leadership comes from the top down as far as the culture you’re trying to set,” Commanders new RB Ekeler said. “When you have leadership that can hold that standard and have been around the league and you bring coaches that have the same type of energy, you can really create a special culture that goes and helps win the games. It’s not necessarily the stuff that is measurable, but it’s the stuff that helps you increase the things that are.”
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