TheWashington Commanders are a professionalAmerican football franchise based in theWashington metropolitan area. They are members of theEast division in theNational Football Conference (NFC) of theNational Football League (NFL). The Commanders were founded in1932 as theBoston Braves, named after thelocal baseball franchise.^[1] The franchise changed its name the following year to the Redskins and moved toWashington, D.C. in1937.^[1] In2020, the team retired the Redskins name aftercontroversies surrounding it and briefly played as the Washington Football Team before becoming the Commanders in2022.^[1] The team's current starting quarterback isJayden Daniels, having started since 2024.

Since 2000, the Commanders have 27 different starting quarterbacks^[2][3] and only two have started entire consecutive seasons:Jason Campbell (2008–2009) andKirk Cousins (2015–2017).^[2] Only two Washington quarterbacks have been inducted into thePro Football Hall of Fame:Sammy Baugh (1937–1952) andSonny Jurgensen (1964–1974).^[4]

The early era of the NFL and American football in general was not conducive to passing the football, with the forward pass not being legalized until the early 1900s and not fully adopted for many more years.^[5] Although thequarterback position has historically been the one to receive the snap and thus handle the football on every offensive play,^[6] the importance of the position during this era was limited by various rules, like having to be five yards behind theline of scrimmage before a forward pass could be attempted.^[7] These rules and the tactical focus on rushing the ball limited the importance of the quarterback position while enhancing the value of different types ofbacks, such as thehalfback and thefullback.^[8] Some of these backs were consideredtriple-threat men, capable of rushing, passing or kicking the football, making it common for multiple players to attempt a pass during a game.^[9]

As rules changed and the NFL began adopting a more pass-centric approach to offensive football, the importance of the quarterback position grew.^[7][8] Beginning in 1950, total wins and losses by a team's starting quarterback were tracked.^[10]

Prior to 1950, the Commanders had numerous players identified as playing the quarterback position. However, the combination of unreliable statistics in the early era of the NFL and the differences in the early quarterback position make tracking starts by quarterbacks impractical for this timeframe.

• History of the Washington Commanders
• List of current NFL starting quarterbacks

• Washington Commanders players
• Lists of NFL quarterbacks by team
• Washington Commanders lists

• Articles with short description
• Short description is different from Wikidata
• Use mdy dates from June 2024