In this week’s Reacts survey, we asked two questions, both focused on predicting on-field performance for Washington players who are not currently considered elite or who may not yet be on the Commanders roster.
Question 1: Which WR not named McLaurin will have the most receptions for the Commanders in 2026?
I think the results from this survey question highlight just how unsure fans are about what the Commanders wide receiver group will look like in 2026.
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Five different survey choices got double-digit shares of the votes from survey respondents — with “someone else” pulling in 20% of the vote.
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Treylon Burks
Of the receivers currently on the roster that were listed in survey responses, Treylon Burks got the most votes at 27%. The veteran receiver appeared in 8 games for Washington in 2025, and, though he had only 10 receptions in those eight games, one of them was a spectacular one-handed catch for a touchdown in the Week 9 overtime loss at home against the Broncos.
Burks was shut out of the receiving stats in the two subsequent games in 2025, but he finished the season strong with 5 catches on 11 targets for 150 yards in the final 3 weeks of the season.
Still, Burks hasn’t played in more than 11 games or had more than 16 receptions in a season since his rookie year, and even then — in 2022, his career-best season — he played just 11 games, catching 33 passes for 444 yards and 1 TD. To revive his struggling NFL career, he’ll need to have his healthiest season as a pro, and surpass his best-ever NFL season-long production. More than a quarter of respondents in our survey seem to think he can do both.
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Someone else
It’s unusual for “someone else” to be the choice of 1/5th of voters in any survey, but there are two possible reasons why it polled so highly in this one.
First is that fact that I (rather stupidly) did not include rookie Antonio Williams as a choice in the survey. I think that most of the people who chose this answer were thinking of the former Clemson Tiger when answering Question 1.
As to the second possible thought process, anyone not thinking of Williams probably would have been thinking of a veteran player who might sign with the team before training camp. Since Brandon Aiyuk was listed as a choice in the survey, anyone thinking of a veteran not yet on the team either overlooked Aiyuk’s name in the survey or would have been thinking of players like Stefon Diggs or Deebo Samuel.
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Brandon Aiyuk
It’s a sign of the bizarre situation we find ourselves in that 12% of the respondents in our survey believe that a player on the 49ers roster will be the receptions leader among Commanders WRs not named McLaurin in 2026. The ongoing saga has kept NFL blogs and local talk radio busy since December, and the mess doesn’t appear to have any clear resolution in sight.
McCaffrey, Brown & Jefferson
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Luke McCaffrey has averaged 19 catches per 17-games in his two NFL seasons.
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Dyami’s average is 1 reception per regular season game played in his 5-year career, with his best-ever mark coming in 2024 with Jayden Daniels when he caught 30 passes on 40 targets in the regular season. Of course, he had an outstanding postseason; in 3 games, he caught 14 passes for 229 yards on 18 targets.
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In six seasons, Van Jefferson has caught more than 29 passes in a season only once — but that season (2021 with the Rams) was fairly impressive, with Jefferson hauling in 50 receptions on 89 targets for 802 yards and 6 TDs.
It would be a win for the Commanders and a personal win for any of these players to jump up and be one of the two most prolific pass catchers among Washington’s WR group in 2026.
Question 2: Which listed player will have the BEST season in 2026?
The results of our second survey question indicate a fairly widely-held belief that Mikey Sainristil will thrive in Washington’s defense in 2026 following a change at defensive coordinator and with an anticipated change in defensive philosophy and scheme.
Reports seem to indicate that Sainristil will be aligned wide, opposite Trey Amos, with Amik Robertson taking on the role of the primary slot corner.
Sainristil should thrive under new DC Daronte Jones because of an expected schematic shift that should perfectly maximize his elite read-and-react instincts.
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Jones’ defensive philosophy focuses heavily on “multiplicity” and zone principles that allow DBs to play with their eyes directly on the quarterback, which should heavily favor Sainristil, who excelled during his collegiate career at Michigan as an anticipatory, quick-twitch defender capable of jumping routes and hunting turnovers. Furthermore, with Jones’ focus on positional fluidity, Sainristil’s unique inside-outside versatility should give him the flexibility to manipulate matchups from both the slot & boundary and keep opposing QBs guessing.
The results of a few other Reacts fanbase surveys this week
Here are the results from three other Reacts surveys this week that you may (or, perhaps may not) find interesting:
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