Dan Quinn has a public relations problem right now and at the heart of the issue is some powerful people that are painting him as something of an NFL sideline bungler as the Washington Commanders coach.
That’s exactly how he looked in the second quarter of the Monday Night Football game where his team rallied to lose against the San Francisco 49ers.
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The problem? Quinn seemed to lose track of the downs in a key second-quarter situation. He seemed to think it was fourth down and called for a field goal when, in fact, his offense had just run a fourth-down play and, not only didn’t convert, but also drew a penalty.
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Washington Commanders head coach Dan Quinn is on the sidelines before the start of an NFL football game against the Seattle Seahawks in Landover, Maryland, on Nov. 2, 2025. (Nick Wass/AP Photo)
So, there was the coach on national television, seemingly calling for his field goal unit to get on the field when his offense had surrendered the football.
And we interrupt this coaching nightmare to say Quinn contends that’s not what happened at all. He told reporters a much different version of events after the game.
“No, I definitely knew it was fourth down,” the coach said. “We were going for it, and I was, I think with whatever you’re referring to, I think it was the illegal shift, there’s not a penalty to go for a field goal.
“Like, it’s the turnover on downs. Like, I think somebody asked me, ‘Can we kick a field goal?’ … I knew what happened. I think I was probably just commenting that I remember, at least on the headset, somebody asked me after an illegal shift, um, like, it was a turnover on downs.”
Head coach Dan Quinn of the Washington Commanders looks on against the San Francisco 49ers during the third quarter of the game at Levi’s Stadium on Oct. 19, 2026, in Santa Clara, California.
That’s an explanation most of the country missed because it happened in Quinn’s postgame press conference which wasn’t nationally televised.
What many instead will remember was what they saw on TV, which made the coach look bad.
So, if perception is reality, Quinn is going to have to rehabilitate his increasingly tarnished reputation as a sideline game manager.
That’s because just last week, Quinn’s Commanders utterly embarrassed themselves in how they managed a last-minute situation against the New York Giants, wasting precious seconds, mismanaging the clock and the downs, and settling for a tie when they should have likely won the game.
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That terrible scenario that doesn’t easily fade definitely caused everyone to believe Quinn was at it again on Monday night – messing up again, forgetting that the last play was fourth down instead of third down.
“Field goal,” Quinn seemingly said as ABC’s cameras caught him and lip readers across the world did their thing.
And then he followed with, “Oh, that was fourth down.”
Pat McAfee on the Pat McAfee Show set at the Super Bowl LX media center at the Moscone Center. (Kirby Lee/Imagn Images)
That scene not only played out during the game, but was then discussed at halftime on both the ESPN main broadcast and the Pat McAfee alternate broadcast.
“We found out at halftime Dan Quinn didn’t know what down it was,” McAfee told his audience. “That’s a real problem.”
The McAfee crew that featured Dan Orlovsky had some fun with the issue because the former quarterback was yelling for Quinn to kick a field goal on fourth down instead of going for it.
Quinn, they joked, wanted to kick the field goal Orlovsky wanted on fifth down.
“Dan Quinn did not know it’s fourth down coming off of last week, and then to go for it and get the penalty,” Orlovsky said. “I’m a Dan Quinn guy. But you gotta get the operation better.”
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This leaves Quinn in a rough spot.
He’s probably going to have to explain what happened to Commanders’ owner Josh Harris because last week opened the door to everyone believing the coach is indeed capable of making a boneheaded mistake.
The question now is whether everyone, including Harris, believes Quinn’s explanation or they believe the lip-readers more.
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