On Monday, Philadelphia Eagles general manager Howie Roseman spoke on a variety of topics at the owners meetings in Palm Beach, Florida. Here are my six biggest takeaways.
Why did the Eagles trade C.J. Gardner-Johnson?
"Well, I think if you're just taking the C.J. move in a vacuum, obviously it's kind of not giving the whole perspective of where we're at," Roseman said. "I think Chauncey did a great job for us both the years that he was with us, obviously making the Super Bowl twice in two years with him as our starting safety. Really when you look at our team and you look at the amount of highly paid players who have earned their contracts, we have eight guys who are making $15 million or more. We have from the 2022 to 2024 drafts, we have eight starters who were on the Super Bowl team. None of those guys have long-term contracts.
"In those drafts, we probably have five or six players that will be competing for starting jobs. So you have a lot of players coming through that aren't under long-term contracts, plus a lot of guys who are on long-term contracts. We never want to be in a situation where we have one year where we're getting rid of 20 guys. We've been very fortunate to be aggressive in keeping our guys and signing guys in free agency.
"It's also got to align with drafting and having young players. Certainly, that's the important thing to do is draft well and then keep your players. So, we've got to make sure that going forward we have an opportunity to do that as well. A lot of those players that we're talking about are good young players that we're excited about.
"So, we have to make some tough decisions here. It seems like the moment to do that from a big picture perspective, not getting any individual decision because I think all those individual decisions can be discussed whether they were right or they were wrong. But I think from our perspective it was just more of this overall philosophy and that's what I was trying to say at the combine. I'm very proud of us being aggressive in the trade market and creating an aggressive market but it wasn't the time for that right now for where we are and the faith that we have in some of the young players. So we're looking forward to those guys stepping up and there will be an opportunity to step up."
#JimmySays: The eight Super Bowl starters from the 2022, 2023, and 2024 drafts are Jordan Davis, Cam Jurgens, Nakobe Dean, Jalen Carter, Nolan Smith, Quinyon Mitchell, and Cooper DeJean.
The "five or six" players competing for starting jobs going forward are Grant Calcaterra (if Dallas Goedert isn't on the roster), Tyler Steen, Sydney Brown, Kelee Ringo, Moro Ojomo, and Jalyx Hunt. You could also maybe add Jeremiah Trotter to that list on the assumption Dean won't be ready for the start of the 2025 regular season.
Because the Eagles have drafted so well in recent years, they have a lot of young players they're going to have to pay pretty soon. They're going to choose home-grown young talent at important positions over good-not-elite veterans at less important positions.
Dallas Goedert's future with the team…
"Yeah, there's no update," Roseman said. "Obviously Dallas has been a tremendous player and person for us. We have a tremendous respect for him in both those regards as a player and a person. You know the opportunities that we got into free agency with Harrison Bryant and Kylen Granson were just opportunities we felt were good for our football team. Certainly Dallas is a unique player. That's kind of where we're standing right now."
#JimmySays: See all the stuff Howie said about the CJGJ trade above? You can apply that to Goedert as well. He's unlikely to be on the roster in 2025, in my view.
The Eagles invested financial resources in a linebacker (Zack Baun) and running back (Saquon Barkley) this offseason because they're elite players.
"I think that when we talk about Zack or Saquon and we put them in the box and we say running back or linebacker or you know, traditionally we haven't done that," Roseman said. "These are our difference-making players. These are guys who are some of the best players on their side of the ball in the league and those guys are impossible to replace."
#JimmySays: The reality is that the Eagles really aren't even paying Baun and Barkley THAT much. The "new money" in Barkley's contract extension is a hair over $20 million/year. There are 21 wide receivers who make more than that.
Baun's contract is $17 million/year. Baun was a Defensive Player of the Year finalist, and by my count, 62 NFL defenders make more than him on an APY basis.
Howie still likes Jordan Davis.
"So Jordan Davis, when you watch these guys perform through the whole body of the season, because that's what you really got to do, and it's going back, watching the earlier part, going back, watching the middle stages of the season, and going back, and watching the end of the season and you just see a guy who elevated in the postseason and really counted on him continuing to develop and that's what this is," Roseman said. "All of us, in all of our professions, you continue to develop and you continue to get better and that's what I think we're seeing from Jordan."
#JimmySays: My guess: They're going to pick up Davis' fifth-year option.
What positions does Howie think are strong in this draft?
"No chance."
#JimmySays: That was one of my questions. I tried, lol. 🤷♂️
Howie also gave us quick scouting reports on a half dozen of the guys they acquired.
• RB A.J. Dillon: "A.J. Dillon from Boston College, Northeast… It's very rare that you find a 250-pound back, but with quick feet. Obviously have a tremendous amount of confidence in Saquon, a tremendous amount of confidence in Will Shipley as well. Just for us, it was an opportunity. He was out of football last year. That came to us and we felt like he was a high character, talented player and a little bit different style."
• EDGE Azeez Ojulari: "Again, it's fairly apparent that we spent a lot of time scouting SEC players and certainly Georgia defensive players. So this is a guy that we felt like we were very familiar with from college, and competing against him in the NFC East. It's a position that we obviously lost a couple of guys that are hugely important to our success."
• CB Adoree' Jackson: "A guy that we spent a lot of time on coming out of college, when he was a free agent we had an interest in him before. Really a guy that is still extremely fast, extremely twitched up, has playmaking ability and I don't think it's a secret that he probably still hasn't really played his best ball yet, but has played well and is similar to some of the guys maybe that we lost from a skill set and trying to replace that."
As for whether Jackson can play in the slot…
"It hasn't really been where he's lined up. I think our defense staff does a good job of giving guys opportunities to move around in the secondary."
• EDGE Josh Uche: "Another guy who we feel like we've been on his track watching him. Pass rush is a huge importance in the National Football League."
• TEs Kylen Granson and Harrison Bryant: "You always look at guys that you've had success with. Granson, I'm reminded a lot of Trey Burton and the things he does as a route runner, where he can separate at the top. His speed, his athleticism, a little bit of a shorter tight end. And then Harrison Bryant, getting to see him here not only in Cleveland, but in Vegas and doing some of the things that we ask our tight ends to do, probably even a better blocker than we projected coming out of FAU."
• OG Kenyon Green: "Kenyon is a guy we did a lot of work on coming out of Texas A&M. I wasn't surprised to see him go in the first round based on his college career and the tools that he has in his body. But again, anything that he's going to develop in Philadelphia is going to be earned."
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