Position Group Breakdown: Quarterbacks
May 22, 2026
by Steve Thomas
Welcome to another edition of The Hog Sty’s Position Group Breakdown series. This is our annual post-draft, post-free agency attempt to assess every facet of Washington’s roster, with an eye towards their performance in the upcoming season. Here’s what we’ve done so far:
This week, we’re going to cover the quarterbacks group. We scheduled this group early on in our process because, frankly, there aren’t too many questions here. The first and most important one is whether starter Jayden Daniels can rebound from last season’s step back and get back onto the road to becoming a long-term, franchise quarterback. There’s no question that Marcus Mariota is going to remain in his role as Daniels’ primary backup. The only real debate is whether rookie seventh round pick Athan Kaliakmanis can overtake Sam Hartman in the third string role. The latter will play out during training camp. Daniels, of course, will be on a continuous course of improvement throughout the season.
Jayden Daniels
As I previously published in my March 30, 2026, column entitled “Washington’s history at quarterback and Jayden Daniels’ future (click here to read), this is what Jayden Daniels, who is 6’4” and 210 pounds, has accomplished to date (all stats courtesy of Pro Football Reference except as noted:
- 24 games / 24 starts
- 445 completions in 668 attempts, 66.6% completion percentage
- 4830 passing yards
- 33 passing touchdowns, 12 interceptions
- 7 quarterback rating
- 206 rushing attempts for 1169 yards, 5.7 yards per attempt, 8 touchdowns
However, as everyone is probably aware, his stats were dramatically different in 2024 as compared to 2025:
| Yr | Gms/starts | Att/Comp | Yds | Comp % | TDs | Int | QB rating |
| 2024 | 17/17 | 331/480 | 3568 | 69.0% | 25 | 9 | 100.1 |
| 2025 | 7/7 | 114/188 | 1262 | 60.6% | 8 | 3 | 88.1 |
| Yr | Yds/Att | Yds/gm | Int % | On tgt % | Drop % | Press % | Att/gm[1] |
| 2024 | 7.4 | 209.9 | 1.9 | 78.2 | 4.3 | 18.5 | 28.2 |
| 2025 | 6.7 | 180.3 | 1.6 | 76.4 | 6.9 | 16.7 | 26.9 |
| Yr | Rushing att | Yds | Yds/att | TDs | Att/gm[2] |
| 2024 | 148 | 891 | 6.0 | 6 | 8.7 |
| 2025 | 58 | 278 | 4.8 | 2 | 8.3 |
I didn’t include this in the charts, but yards after catch per completion was roughly the same for both years: 5.4 in 2024 and 5.1 in 2025.
Simply put, Daniels’ 2025 season wasn’t nearly as good as his rookie year. Yes, he was injured, and yes, he was both pressured more and had a higher drop rate, likely due to the nonstop flow of street free agent wide receivers who were thrust onto the field due to injuries. However, he also just didn’t perform as well last season at times, either in the quality of his passes or on the ground. Daniels’ mission in 2026 is to get back to elite status, albeit not necessarily in the same way as 2024. His injuries last season proved that he probably can’t sustain being a very mobile quarterback on a long term basis. As a result, under new offensive coordinator David Blough, Daniels is going to need to learn to play under center and in the pocket more than ever, while still getting back to that very high completion percentage and quarterback rating. If he can do that, there’s little doubt that Washington will at a minimum enact the team’s fifth year option. However, if 2026 is a repeat of 2025, the team might just let the decision wait until 2027.
Marcus Mariota
Mariota, who is 6’4” and 222 pounds, was the Tennessee Titans’ first round draft pick, second overall, in 2015. In his career, he has played in 104 games, with 82 starts, and has completed 1500 passes in 2389 attempts, for a completion percentage of 62.8%, 17,879 yards, 107 touchdowns, and 62 interceptions, for an 89.7 quarterback rating. In addition, he’s had 425 carries for 2453 yards, 5.8 yards per attempt, and 19 touchdowns. Mariota has been in Washington since 2024, and in that time, he’s played in 14 games, including 8 starts, and has completed 173 passes in 271 attempts, for a 63.8% completion percentage, 2059 yards, 14 touchdowns, and 7 interceptions, for a 93.4 quarterback rating. In addition, he’s rushed for 389 yards in 68 carries, 5.7 yards per attempt, and 2 touchdowns.
In my view, Mariota is just about the perfect backup for Daniels. His play style is very similar, he still performs at a reasonably high level, and he does it seemingly without ego or causing problems. There’s no question that he’s going to be the primary backup again in 2026.
Sam Hartman
Hartman, who is 6’1” and 211 pounds, spent a total of 6 years in college, including 5 seasons at Wake Forest from 2018 – 2022 and one season at Notre Dame in 2024. In total, he played 60 games, and completed 1135 passes in 1898 attempts, for a 59.8% completion rate, 15,656 yards, 8.2 yards per attempt, 134 touchdowns, and 49 interceptions. In 2024 for Notre Dame, Hartman played 12 games, and completed 191 passes in 301 attempts, for a 63.5% completion percentage, 2689 yards, 24 touchdowns, and 8 interceptions.
Hartman hasn’t yet appeared in a regular season NFL game and therefore has no NFL stats. It’s pretty telling that when both Daniels and Mariota were injured last season, Washington’s leadership chose to go out and sign Josh Johnson, again, rather than let Hartman play. He hasn’t looked good in his preseason appearances so far, either. For these reasons, I think Hartman is facing a tough offseason and training camp and his chances of keeping his job aren’t good.
Athan Kaliakmanis
Kaliakmanis, who is 6’2” and 216 pounds, spent a total of 5 years in college, including 3 seasons at Minnesota from 2021 through 2023 and two years at Rutgers in 2024 and 2025. He redshirted in 2021. During that time, he played in a total of 48 games, including 23 at Minnesota and 25 at Rutgers, and completed 658 passes in 1168 attempts, for a 56.3% completion percentage, 8604 yards, 7.4 yards per attempt, 55 touchdowns, and 27 interceptions. Kaliakmanis started for part of the 2023 season and in all of 2024 and 2025. In 2025, he played in 12 games, and made 229 completions in 368 attempts, for a 62.2% completion percentage, 3124 yards, 8.5 yards per attempt, 20 touchdowns, and 7 interceptions.
I’m not going to pretend that Kaliakmanis has the greatest college film or that he was a tremendous bargain in round 7; however, his short to intermediate passing game is NFL-worthy, and he seems to have a very good, hardworking attitude. For these reasons, I think he has a good shot of replacing Hartman as the team’s third-string quarterback.
The other option here is for the team to retain both Hartman and Kaliakmanis, with one of them on the practice squad. The only way there would be a compelling reason to do that would be because both of them played lights-out in preseason, but that’s obviously unlikely.
[1] Attempts per game is my own calculation based on Pro Football Reference’s data
[2] Rushing attempts per game is my own calculation based on Pro Football Reference’s data