No one expected the Washington Commanders to do what it did last year and a big reason why was because of the team’s subtle free agency moves.

Granted, there were a ton of them – 25 players were either extended or brought in from the outside during the first month of the new league year. However, none were “game-changing” moves that stole headlines.

Of course, the Commanders landed Jayden Daniels and more in the draft, but even that wasn’t enough to put Washington on people’s radar, which is understandable considering the state and reputation of the franchise at the time.

Still, Adam Peters and Co. came away with one of free agency’s best hauls. Guys like Bobby Wagner, Dante Fowler Jr., Zach Ertz, Jeremy Chinn, and many others, were key contributors that helped the Commanders pull off an incredible season that included 12 wins and a trip to the NFC Championship Game.

As it turns out, the Commanders are going to need the same diligence and keen eyes during free agency this year, because according to Sports Illustrated’s Albert Breer, some league executives have dubbed this year’s free agent class as a “really bad group overall”:

“It’s a really bad group overall,” one AFC exec says of this year’s free-agent class…

… Rapid growth has left teams with every resource they need to keep the players they want. Forget about just the quarterbacks. If you have a left tackle, receiver, corner, or pass rusher you want to retain, there’s almost no chance he gets to free agency. And if there’s even a hint it could happen? He’ll be traded ahead of time.So that leaves you with a “really bad group overall.”

But that doesn’t mean guys won’t get paid, or there won’t be hidden gems to find. It puts the onus on the coaches and scouts to dig out the difference-makers. Last year, the Washington Commanders did, using good scouting and intel through connections to turn over more than half the roster—just 19 players from the 2023 team were on the 53-man roster that coach Dan Quinn and GM Adam Peters brought to Philadelphia for the NFC championship game. – Albert Breer, Sports Illustrated

This obviously gives the Commanders a big advantage, as they’ve already shown they can efficiently and effectively navigate the rocky terrain that is NFL free agency. A big reason why is because they prioritize the person over the player to a complete and total “t”, which instantly filters out a lot of bad eggs, so to speak.

And they don’t bend from that strategy, either, as Peters recently talked about at the NFL Combine.

“That is a big thing for us – finding the right people,” Peters told reporters. “And that’s not just players, it’s, you know, support staff, coaches, everybody. That’s always going to be at the core of what we do and I’ve been a part of teams that when you start sacrificing that it usually doesn’t work. What’s really cool is, in our exit interviews this year, we talked to a lot of players, and one of the biggest things that they hit on was [they] liked all the people [we] brought in; the players and the Commanders and the competitors, and so don’t lose sight of that.

“We heard that from our players [and] we felt it ourselves. So that’s always going to be at the core of what we do.”

With over $70 million in effective cap space, the Commanders don’t have to shell out the big bucks in order to upgrade the roster and they proved that last year. The team already has a solid process in place, which gives it a big advantage over the rest of the NFL when heading into this specific free agency situation.