Don't look now, but the Commanders are D.C.'s most exciting team

It wasn't all that long ago that Washington, D.C.'s NFL team was the goofy-eyed dragon of major professional sports in the nation's capital.

While the Capitals, Nationals and Wizards all had teams set up for annual playoff runs, some of which resulted in championships, the football team was a laughingstock. It couldn't keep its best players, couldn't win big games and its front office was always in the news for the wrong reasons.

Now, the script is flipped. All of D.C.'s three other aforementioned teams are either rebuilding or retooling, with stars Bradley Beal and Juan Soto shipped out of town and the Capitals' nearly decade-long streak of playoff appearances ending this past season. 

So who does that leave as the District's biggest hope moving forward? That's right,  the Commanders.

Washington's football team has an upper-echelon defense, a budding offense that should take a significant step forward under new OC Eric Bieniemy and a young QB in Sam Howell who, while unproven, has high-end potential. 

The Commanders have an identity and a culture under HC Ron Rivera, something that none of the city's other teams can lay claim to right now, and they're set up to compete for the present, not the future. And the best part of all? There's no more drama. 

Dan Snyder is nearly gone, marking the dawn of a new era for D.C.'s once-proud football franchise. There is a palpable buzz surrounding the Commanders for the first time in many years, and if they can string together a winning season this fall, they'll be the talk of the town -- in a good way.

Washington has always been a football city at heart. The Caps and Nats may have become the teams that fans were proudest to cheer for in recent years, but the Commanders will always be the headline franchise. When there's good things to say about them, it's good for D.C.