Philly Front Office

It just dawned on me that of the 4 teams in the NFC East, the Eagles are the only one that plays in their namesake location. The New York Giants play in New Jersey, the Dallas Cowboys are in Arlington, and the Washington Commanders come from Maryland. LIES! Have they no decency? Anyway, let’s see how these frauds did in the draft.

New Jersey Giants

Let’s start with the most complicated evaluation first. The Giants, objectively, did great, …with one major caveat. We’ll get to him. Abdul Carter gives the Giants something to hang their hat on, a pass rush. They now feature Carter, Brian Burns, Dexter Lawrence, and Kayvon Thibideaux plus third rounder Darius Alexander. That’s a very good group. Not to mention, the path they rode to two championships over the Patriots was paved in a great pass rush. If you want to beat a good QB, you need to be able to pressure him without bringing up extra guys. The Giants can do that now. Carter should become the best of that group, he’s that good. Alexander was someone I wanted for the Eagles at #64 but went to the Giants one pick later.

Their other picks should help the offense as they got great value deep in the draft. Cam Skattebo was a draft darling thanks to being a white running back who tries hard, has a funny name, and can do a bit of everything. The media eats that up, but he is good (plus Giants fans really want someone to make them forget about what Saquon did last year). Marcus Mbow is a small guard who was supposed to go much earlier than he did. The Eagles had him in for a top-30 visit, but passed on him several times likely due to his unimpressive measurables. That doesn’t mean he can’t play though, and the Giants need all the help they can get on the offensive line.

The big caveat is Jaxson Dart. They didn’t pay too much to move up to get him, giving up two third rounders to move up 9 spots. That’s fine. Dart was seen as a 3rd rounder by most coming into the draft but likely would have been taken by the time the Giants picked at #34. I just don’t think he’s that good. Again, cool name, cool hair, and white are things that the Giants are very much impressed by as a QB.¹ So, they take Dart and are now tied to him for a few years. There probably wasn’t a QB worth taking in this draft as a franchise QB after Cam Ward, but that doesn’t mean they had to take the best one available. What are Dart’s range of outcomes as a QB, Daniel Jones to Baker Mayfield? They probably would have benefited from putting off this decision until next year (especially with Wilson and Winston under contract) or going for a QB in last year’s draft. If Dart (not sorry) hits the mark though, this is an A+ draft. If not, they are non-contenders for another 4 years at least.

Arlington Cowboys

There are two thought processes to making draft selections. You either take the certainty of getting your guy regardless of draft position or gamble and try to take your guy at the appropriate position. The Eagles do the latter while the Cowboys do the former. I’m not saying one is better than the other because if a guy hits then the value doesn’t really matter. First round pick Tyler Booker was projected to go late first round, but the Cowboys picked him at #12. He should be good, but they probably could have traded down. Their second pick was just the opposite. Donovan Ezeiruaku was projected to go in the 1st, but they got him at #44. Either way, they are two solid picks for a team that desperately needed help along both lines. Jerry is pretty good at the draft despite being dreadful at contract negotiation.

Shavon Revel at #76 was another solid pick. The Cowboys have been devastated by injury in the secondary, so getting a guy with Revel’s size 6’2″ in the third round was a pretty good move. Revel is coming off a September ACL injury himself, but guess who performed that surgery? The Cowboys team doctor. If anyone knows how he’s doing injury-wise, it’s him. Assuming he comes back from injury fine, the Cowboys got a steal. Revel was working in a warehouse when he found out he could play for ECU and never looked back from the opportunity, showing out as a junior then declining major transfer offers out of loyalty to the program.

My one knock on their draft is not getting TE Tyler Warren. They may have been smart to draft a lineman, but Booker is a guard only with a high floor but low ceiling due to his terrible athleticism. He likely isn’t getting too much better from Day 1. Warren though would have been a problem for a long time, and they desperately need help from a playmaking standpoint. The offense is Ceedee Lamb but no A, B, or E options (that’s a terrible joke). Whereas the Giants can now hang their hat on something, the same cannot be said for the Cowboys.

Marylandover Commanders

I wish I had more problems with their draft, but Washington did damn well with their limited picks. Maybe they would have been better off taking Josh Simmons in the 1st instead of OT Josh Conerly, but Conerly is one of the more athletic OTs you will find. Drafting to protect Jayden Daniels is simply the right idea, especially in a division with Micah Parsons, Nolan Smith, and now Abdul Carter.

Mid-season acquisition Marshon Lattimore is the only real CB this team had, so getting first round level talent at #61 with Trey Amos was a steal. Though the division only features the Eagles with multiple good receivers, that is an exception to most of the league. Teams need two CBs to be able to compete.

I loved the rest of their draft for simply leaning on hyper-athleticism. Jaylin Lane and Kain Medrano are small for a WR and LB but both lit up the combine. I wanted the Eagles to take Lane as the shifty and fast WR3/4 that I don’t know if we have ever had. Then there is Jacory Croskey-Merritt. He wasn’t invited to the combine, but showed out in his pro day running a 4.45 and jumping 41.5″. He had “eligibility concerns” and only played 1 game this season. This doesn’t mean he’s “troubled” or any other vague character concern you might want to assume, he’s just older. He started college in 2019 and is already 24. Not the worst flyer as one of the last picks in the draft.

Philadelphia Eagles

Not going through our draft here, just looking at the above from our perspective. As a whole, the division just got a little tougher. You’d wish these teams made dumber moves, but they all basically did their jobs and didn’t screw up. We as Eagles fans have been very lucky to not only have an elite decision maker in charge of our team, but complete fools running our rivals for years now. With the exception of maybe Jaxson Dart, I don’t see a bad pick on this list. Thankfully we have a nice head start.

1. Color is very much part of the QB discussion in NY. they have been around for 99 years and played almost 1500 games. Only 6 of those have been started by black QBs. On an individual basis you can probably explain away the decision for each one of those starts, but they aren’t exactly looking either. ↩︎