If we rewind a little over a year ago, Howie Roseman stood at the podium and appeared to take accountability for draft mistakes and an inability to separate personal relationships from logical business decisions. Then came the 2020 offseason. Jason Peters came back (again), the Eagles went all-in on speed, and the draft class, for the most part, as inefficient. One year later and now under a lot of pressure, Howie Roseman looks as though he may finally have learned his lesson.
The Eagles traded up two spots last night in a bid to snag DeVonta Smith before the New York Giants had a chance. It was aggressive, but it made sense given the way that the board had fallen. When talking with the media after making the pick, Howie Roseman didn’t take long to talk about the method behind the madness.
We talked about it through the draft process about getting guys in here who could help us build the type of culture we want.” Roseman said. “We had a plan that we talked about and we had a list of guys that we were really targeting in this draft.”
The first round especially hasn’t been kind to the Eagles. If you are to just look at the years after Carson Wentz was selected, the Eagles have taken Derek Barnett, Andre Dillard, and Jalen Reagor, with their 2018 pick being traded in a move that landed them Dallas Goedert. Every single player mentioned has had questions of some kind and it’s not like the team are in a position to hang their hat on any right now. Roseman didn’t shy away from admitting the error of his ways last night.
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”I think because of how many picks we have over the next two years we really don’t want to get in a position — we’ve made some mistakes forcing picks and positions, so we’ve spent so much time on this draft and process and so much discussions about the players in this draft that we’re not going to reach.”
With a new era of Eagles football being welcomed in, this Draft was absolutely vital. Nick Sirianni needs a stable foundation to build on and Jalen Hurts deserved to be pushed into the best possible position to succeed. With 9 picks left in their arsenal, it looks as though that’s going to remain the game plan.
“We’re going to take the best guys. We know that if we get out of here — I don’t even know who is going. We may have to go back up and see who is still there, because obviously we’re picking high tomorrow.”
What does the rest of the weekend hold? Nobody really knows…other than the Eagles might be playing things a lot safer this time around which should come as a huge breath of fresh air.
Photo by John Jones/Icon Sportswire
