Philly Front Office

Looks like Nakobe Dean tore his patellar tendon in last night’s playoff win over the Packers. The injury comes with a lengthy recovery that will cause him to miss the rest of the playoffs and likely some of next season. This is bad on many levels.

Dean had come into his own this season, retaking his captaincy of the Georgia Bulldog defense that won a national championship with him leading the way. This was what everyone hoped for when he was drafted in the 3rd round in 2022. It is no coincidence that as he ascended, so did the rest of his Bulldog-turned-Eagle teammates. Dean is the straw the stirs the drink. Getting hurt so severely is devastating to all that he had become on an individual level.

It also hurts the Eagles defense as a unit. Not only was Dean playing at a high level, but he was directing traffic on the defensive end. He was calling out plays and flying all over the field. He was the toughness and leadership that the team fed off of and looked to for inspiration. He is going to be a big hole to fill for this post season ride.

From a team building standpoint, this will have reverberations in the offseason. I speculated previously that because Zack Baun is a free agent and Dean is up for an extension that they would likely only choose to bring back one of them, likely leaning toward the Philadelphia Bulldogs leader. I don’t know if that can happen anymore.

Baun was just named First Team All-Pro. God damn that’s something. An accolade like that for a young free agent means a significant raise. Unfortunately, Howie Roseman has never been keen on earmarking much money for linebackers. It would have been easy to extend Dean and let Baun walk, ensuring that you had at least one high performing linebacker under contract. The Dean injury may change things though.

All of a sudden extending Dean to a deal fair for both sides isn’t possible. Dean probably would have received top-5 LB money from an extension, something in the Patrick Queen range (3 yrs, $41m) plus another year. The Eagles are not going to want to give him guaranteed money with no guarantee he will get back to where he was. Plus, Dean will probably want to prove that he deserves even more money than Queen by coming back healthy. He still has another year on his rookie deal, so this is not a must-do this off season.

With no likely deal for Dean, extending Baun just became priority number 1. They have to do it now even if it means giving him more than they are comfortable with. You simply cannot contend for a championship with a gaping hole in the middle of a defense. Baun just turned 28. He isn’t getting Roquan Smith money (5 years, $100m) but he could get slightly below CJ Mosely (5 years, $85m) or Tremaine Edmunds (4 years, $72m) money.

The Eagles have money to spend this off season and no one outside the team to spend it on. There simply is no defensive free agent inventory out there and we don’t have any needs on offensive that won’t be addressed in the draft (tight end). Not extending Baun would be out of principle rather than team need. I think Howie has learned that lesson though.

Obviously, Dean getting hurt is devastating for everyone. If there is one silver lining though, it significantly raises the odds of a Zack Baun reunion.