PHILADELPHIA — Numbers, at the end of a season, can mean a lot, or nothing at all. The only number that really matters for the Commanders, of course, is 5-12, the inverse of their magical 12-5 season in 2024, which also ended in this stadium. That Washington won its season finale Sunday over the Eagles, playing mostly starters against mostly Eagles backups, could calcify a hardened heart — or, someone hoping the Commanders would rise up from the seventh pick in the first round of April’s draft. But, they didn’t, so seven it is.
Philly decided to rest Saquon Barkley, A.J. Brown and Jalen Hurts and risk losing a chance for the No. 2 seed. They did just that, getting the No. 3 seed and will host the San Francisco 49ers on Sunday in the wild-card round.
For Washington, though, numbers bubbled to the surface in the 24-17 win.
For Bobby Wagner, the number was 2,000 career tackles, making him the third player in NFL history — along with Ray Lewis and London Fletcher — to amass that many.
Von Miller’s number was $500,000, the bonus he reached late in Sunday’s game with his ninth sack of the season.
And, for Josh Johnson, the number was two — his second career victory as a starter, having played 10 NFL seasons for 14 teams since his rookie year in 2009.
Yes, this was a brutally bad season for the Commanders, and there are many questions and problems the organization will have to figure out and solve in the coming weeks. We will start to get some answers Monday, when Adam Peters speaks to the local media. He and Quinn will have to answer for a defense that collapsed this season, and a wide receiver room that never came together, and for not keeping the franchise quarterback in one piece long enough for him or his teammates to develop any chemistry or rhythm. You waste a season in the NFL, it’s like dog years.
But, believe me, we have weeks to discuss this.
Sunday was for numbers for those three vets, all way on the wrong side of 30 when it comes to pro athletics.
Wagner needed five tackles coming into the game to reach the magic number. At halftime, he had zero. His teammates, and coaches, including linebackers coach Ken Norton, let him know about it.
“First half, they was like, ‘man, you’re not doing nothing,’” Wagner said.
He came to life over the last 30 minutes. At 35, and a free agent after this season, his playing future, whether in Washington or somewhere else, isn’t entirely up to him any more. But that number will be there, forever.
“A lot of hard work, consistency, just pushing through injuries that people know about, and people don’t know about,” Wagner said. “Just pushing through good times, bad times. It’s staying committed to your work, staying committed to your craft, no matter what people say outside. Just keep going. And it’s a lot of things that happen behind the scenes that people don’t know about, but you go out there and perform. … None of this would be possible without all of my teammates over the course of a season.”
Dan Quinn made sure that Fletcher, who does color on the team’s radio broadcasts, was in the locker room afterward to present Wagner with the game ball.
Adding to the history books@budlight | #RaiseHail pic.twitter.com/Em3XmzC41O
— Washington Commanders (@Commanders) January 5, 2026
“It’s more than about the number, Fletcher said outside Washington’s locker room. “The number is one thing. But what it represents, and what it took to get to that number. Countless hours, thousands upon thousands of hours of film study. Doing things behind the scenes that nobody knows about. The commitment to excellence, year in and year out. It’s hard. And not everybody’s willing to do that. Not many people are willing or able to do it over a sustained period of time.”
Johnson was distraught last week, after falling just short in his first start of the season, against Dallas. But Marcus Mariota wasn’t quite over his hand and quad injuries, so the 39-year-old Johnson got another shot. As ever, he battled. The passing numbers (14-for-22, 131 yards, one touchdown, one interception) don’t pop. There was also a bad fumble on a snap out of shotgun. But he used his legs when needed to keep plays alive, and three shots downfield to Terry McLaurin, while incomplete on the stat sheet, drew three pass interference penalties.
Josh Johnson has played for 14 teams since starting his career in 2009 (Mitchell Leff/Getty Images).
And, he scored the game-winning touchdown from a yard out with 2:32 left, faking a throw that got Eagles cornerback Kelee Ringo to turn his back just long enough for Johnson to sneak into the end zone. Afterward, Johnson fired the ball into the padding behind the end zone in celebration.
“Like, man, you’ve got to internalize a lot in my position,” Johnson said. “And you’ve got to stay the course, and be disciplined, and you’ve got to be, a little, I guess, crazy is the word. But now, I would use the word faithful. Like, you’ve really got to be faithful. And you’ve got to really listen, I’ve got to listen to the spirit when I talk to Him. When I came here in ’23, I had two concussions. I thought it was over. I thought it was over, and I prayed on it, and I just got closer with God, and He told me, keep going. Don’t waver. Take gratitude in the small victories, whether that be getting a rep, whether that be getting in there and just handing the ball off. Those things mean something in this league. Just focus on those things, and I was able to get this opportunity today, and I just wanted to show my gratitude.”
Maybe Johnson will find a team, at 40. But, maybe he won’t.
“The chance to get him a win, that’s awesome,” said Nick Allegretti, who played center Sunday in place of the injured Tyler Biadasz. “He’s the same dude every day, whether it be as the starter, second team, third, whatever. Great dude. Good leader. Regardless of the season, we got the win today, and that felt good to get one for him.”
Miller is 36. He went to the Bills a few years ago to try and help Buffalo win a Super Bowl, but he tore his ACL on Thanksgiving Day, 2022, against the Lions. “I felt like I let them down,” Miller said Sunday. He came to Washington to try and help Jayden Daniels get over the hump. That, of course, didn’t materialize either. But Miller not only got his payday with his last-drive sack of Eagles backup Tanner McKee, he tied his longtime friend and teammate DeMarcus Ware with 138.5 career sacks. And he made no secret of the fact that he’d like to break that tie next season.
“When you’re a player, the outcome is often our identity,” Miller said. “But I’ve learned that we’re so much better, so much bigger than wins and losses. Of course, when you win, you want to say ‘I’m a winner.’ And when you lose, you’re like, ‘dang, I didn’t cut it.’ But this group of men is, they’re so much better than football players. … We’re pros. We get judged on (wins and losses). But the type of character that we have in that locker room, and the character that we’ve been able to develop, means more than that.”
The Commanders will spend the next few months conducting an autopsy of this awful season. They will have to self-scout, unsentimentally, to determine what went wrong, and who is best equipped to fix it. They may find that getting better means moving on from all of Wagner, Miller and Johnson, and replacing each with younger men with longer runways.
Such is life in the NFL. For one last day, though, those three veterans, who’ve been on football fields their whole lives, could grab at success, one more time, and capture it, and hold onto it, one moment of success amid so much failure.