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The DiCecco Daily/Positional Preview Series: Big Battle Ahead For Eagles Backup WR Spots · Inside the Birds: A Philadelphia Eagles Podcast

• 0:09
  Speaker 1: Hey, what's going on? Everybody?
• 0:10
  Speaker 2: Welcome into this edition of The check Odaily. This is
• 0:13
  Andrew Dchecko and hope you're enjoying our position preview series
• 0:18
  as we take you through the next couple of weeks.
• 0:20
  We spent Monday talking about the quarterbacks, Yesterday was the
• 0:24
  running backs, and then today Wednesday, if you're listening on
• 0:26
  the day it drops, we're talking wide receivers, one of
• 0:29
  my favorite positions to evaluate, and they Eagles have a
• 0:33
  number of different players vying for depth roles that are
• 0:36
  kind of younger and offer different.
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: Types of skill sets.
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: But we're going to start at the top where there's
• 0:42
  no question who leads the charge. Who's atop the Eagles
• 0:45
  receiver hierarchy, and that's Aj Brown. He's arguably the best
• 0:49
  in the business at his trade.
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: Simply put.
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: He's inspiring and always self motivated. And if you look
• 0:57
  at him and if you see the way that he operates,
• 1:00
  he looks like he's really approaching and attacking this offseason,
• 1:05
  suggesting that he's primed for a really big season this year.
• 1:08
  And when you hear and I keep going back to this,
• 1:11
  the need for the offense to evolve. It doesn't take
• 1:15
  much to think he's probably not talking about the.
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: Running game that is pretty well at hand.
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: When I hear Evolve and I hear jaywen Hurts talk
• 1:26
  about it, I heard AJ Brown talk about it, That
• 1:29
  to me suggests that you're going to see more of
• 1:32
  an uptick in the passing because that is where the
• 1:36
  offense really needs to start to have some alterations and
• 1:41
  better balance to I think, really maximize the skill set
• 1:45
  and keep defenses honest right, Because if you're a run
• 1:49
  centric team with that offensive line in Saquon Barkway, won't
• 1:54
  that makes sense. But you also have the best receiver
• 1:56
  in the NFL and one who's not too far behind
• 1:59
  him in DeVante Smith. You have Dallas Goddard, and you
• 2:02
  have the running backs, which I think should be incorporated
• 2:04
  more in the offense to really, as we talk about,
• 2:07
  maximize the skill sets of everyone involved. And so I
• 2:11
  think that AJ Brown is going to have a really
• 2:13
  big season, maybe maybe somewhere between last year where he
• 2:17
  had one thousand and seventy nine and his first season
• 2:20
  in Philadelphia where he had one four hundred.
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: And fifty six, probably somewhere in the middle there.
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: I really think they're going to start to open things
• 2:28
  up a little bit, not saying there's going to be
• 2:29
  a drastic departure. Please don't misrepresent what I'm saying, because
• 2:33
  Saquon Barkley is still going to have a very heavy
• 2:36
  hand and a prominent role in the offense. But I mean,
• 2:40
  I don't know if I mean they were leaving bread
• 2:44
  crumbs that if you're able to kind of read between
• 2:46
  the lines, you're led to believe that the offense, in
• 2:48
  terms of the passing game, you're going to see a
• 2:51
  little bit more from it this year, and really they
• 2:53
  have to. DeVante Smith, Devonte Smith. Obviously we talk about
• 3:00
  the passing game and how it runs through AJ Brown,
• 3:02
  Devonte Smith and Dallas Goddard.
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: Smith is somebody who could reap the benefits.
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: I love Devonte Smith because watching him work is like
• 3:11
  poetry in motion. His ability to find the soft spots
• 3:15
  in his zonn He runs razor sharp routes. He operates
• 3:19
  like a savvy veteran, and he really has been doing
• 3:21
  so since he was a rookie, even going back.
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: To his days at Alabama, and.
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: I just think that he has a really good flair
• 3:29
  for reading coverages and doing all of those different nuances
• 3:32
  that you see from veteran players in the NFL, and
• 3:36
  I talked about this, but his ability to create separation
• 3:38
  really is a work of art. So last season was
• 3:41
  limited for Devonte. He had thirteen or he played in
• 3:44
  thirteen games, had just eight hundred and thirty three receiving
• 3:47
  yards and eight touchdowns on sixty eight catches. But I
• 3:50
  think this year he eclipses the one thousand yard receiving
• 3:54
  barrier for the third time in his career. He'll be
• 3:58
  the number two, and there's a little question who will
• 4:01
  be the number three. That'll be Johan Dotts, and he
• 4:03
  is entrenched in that role. I always go back to
• 4:07
  let's not forget that when Jehan Dotson joined the Eagles,
• 4:10
  it was a couple of weeks before the team went
• 4:12
  to salth Paalo, Brazil.
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: He wasn't afforded the.
• 4:16
  Speaker 2: Opportunity to immerse himself in the offense and get up
• 4:19
  to speed. Remember, he was just learning and mastering the
• 4:23
  Commander's offense for the whole offseason and now he had
• 4:25
  to learn something completely new, different verbiage. All of that,
• 4:28
  he also didn't have the opportunity to throw at jaywhen
• 4:31
  hurts in the offseason, which we all know he has
• 4:34
  passing all season throwing sessions, that's where a lot of
• 4:38
  those different players are involved in that. He didn't have
• 4:40
  that opportunity, so it seemed like he was shoehorned into
• 4:43
  the offense, didn't feel overly comfortable, and he was able
• 4:47
  to come up with nineteen or thirty three targets two
• 4:51
  sixteen yards. He came up big in the postseason the
• 4:54
  touchdown against the Packers, that twenty seven yarder in the
• 4:57
  Super Bowl that set up the first touchdown, So perhaps
• 5:01
  Johan Dotson can use that as a building block. I
• 5:05
  view him as a pretty obvious bounce back candidate, especially
• 5:09
  with now having that full offseason. And I'm not suggesting
• 5:13
  that he's going to eat into Ajdavonte or Dallas Goddards targets,
• 5:17
  but if anywhere from twenty five or thirty catches is
• 5:21
  a bounce back. But let's take this a step further,
• 5:24
  because what I noticed last year from Dotson the ball
• 5:28
  when the ball did come his way, he was rarely
• 5:29
  in position to take advantage of his run after the catchability.
• 5:32
  And that's something that he can do really well, but
• 5:35
  he hasn't been afforded that opportunity at this point in Philadelphia.
• 5:39
  That's something that I think Kevin Petullo and maybe past
• 5:43
  game courtinator Parks Frasier can really go back to the
• 5:47
  drawing board and find ways to accentuate what Dotson does well.
• 5:50
  Because watching him at Penn State, watching him as a
• 5:53
  rookie with the Commanders, you see that those are different
• 5:55
  qualities he can add to the offense. He's not going
• 5:58
  to be a primary receiving option on most plays. I
• 6:02
  understand that, but he does have more to offer than
• 6:05
  what we've seen, so I do view him as a
• 6:08
  obvious bounce back candidate this season.
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: He'll be You're number three going down the list.
• 6:15
  Speaker 2: Johnny Wilson is a really interesting player because twenty twenty
• 6:19
  four to six round pick played in sixteen games last
• 6:22
  season four stars. He was the number four receiver for
• 6:25
  the Eagles. He called only five of his fifteen pass
• 6:28
  targets for thirty eight yards in the touchdown three hundred
• 6:31
  and sixty nine snaps, which really rounded it came out
• 6:34
  to a thirty four percent of the offensive total. You
• 6:37
  like his size at six foot six, two hundred and
• 6:39
  twenty eight pounds, and it's worth noting that he does
• 6:42
  a lot of the dirty work, the blocking, the freeing
• 6:44
  up teammates that doesn't often show or reveal itself in
• 6:48
  the box score, but he needs to take a step
• 6:51
  forward and showcase signs of development as a receiver, meaning
• 6:57
  prove that you can go up there and come up
• 6:58
  with some contested catches, create separation with sort of regularity,
• 7:04
  and not have every catch look like have a defender
• 7:07
  in your hip pocket. There are certain elements that you
• 7:10
  want to see him take that next step in year two,
• 7:12
  beyond his ability to help as a complimentary piece on
• 7:15
  offense in the blocking department, because there are other players
• 7:19
  that we're going to talk about momentarily that have a
• 7:22
  little bit more.
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: Juice or they've at least shown that they do. So.
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: Johnny Wilson is somebody that I have under the microscope
• 7:30
  because just because he made the fifty three last year
• 7:33
  and served a role doesn't necessarily mean that he's a
• 7:36
  lock to make it this year. He has the inside,
• 7:40
  he has the upper hand because he also does play
• 7:44
  special teams. He played twenty four percent of the snaps
• 7:46
  last season on special teams.
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: And he's a homegrown player.
• 7:51
  Speaker 2: He liked the size, but he has to be able
• 7:53
  to play up to that size and show tangible signs
• 7:56
  of growth in my opinion, to really warrant a rock
• 8:00
  spot this time around.
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: He'll be wanting to keep an eye on, for sure.
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: And there's another player same draft class entering a second season.
• 8:08
  That's a Naias Smith, who the Eagles took in the
• 8:10
  fifth round last year. Look, his transition to the NFL
• 8:14
  wasn't exactly seamless, and there was that injury that delayed
• 8:17
  the start of his rookie campaign, but he's definitely a
• 8:21
  more confident player. I was able to glean that just
• 8:25
  from talking to him that sometimes setbacks or shortcomings or
• 8:31
  what have you, adversity gives you a different perspective. And
• 8:35
  I think for him, we talk about rookies all the time,
• 8:38
  and I think there's this misconception that if a rookie
• 8:41
  doesn't hit the ground running and they're not operating like
• 8:45
  the player that you saw at college immediately right away,
• 8:48
  that they can't play.
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: I don't think that's fair to the player.
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: Every player progresses at different rates, but for an Ayas,
• 8:55
  it was clear that the game needed to slow down
• 8:57
  for him.
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: He had to build that confidence.
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: He struggled through training camp, He made enough plays in
• 9:03
  the latter stages of camp to show that he could
• 9:06
  play at this level and maybe build off of that.
• 9:09
  And he finished last season with seven catches for forty
• 9:13
  one yards and a touchdown played in seven games.
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: And he is an interesting case.
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: This summer because he's a predominant slot receiver. So if
• 9:24
  you're not going to start at slot receiver, which Johan
• 9:27
  Dotson will be that number three receiver, where does he
• 9:31
  factor in in terms of game day preparation, in terms
• 9:34
  of game day value, And if he's able to prove
• 9:39
  that he can be a punt returner, because he did
• 9:42
  have eight hundred and thirty six yards and two touchdowns
• 9:44
  on eighty two career punt returns at Texas A and M,
• 9:48
  you can maybe see a pathway to him being able
• 9:51
  to hang on for another year. It's tough for me
• 9:53
  to envision the Eagles walking away from both Johnny Wilson
• 9:56
  and Ania Smith, but you have to think of it
• 9:58
  from a value standpoint. If he's on the team, what
• 10:03
  would you activate.
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: Him for on game day?
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: If he's a backup slot receiver and he's not your
• 10:08
  punt returner, there's not a lot of you know you're not.
• 10:13
  That's almost a waste of a game day spot. So
• 10:15
  perhaps an Ias Smith is able to really carve out
• 10:18
  a role as a punt returner as well and make
• 10:20
  it an easy decision for the Eagles to keep him
• 10:22
  around for another season. I've talked about this before. I
• 10:26
  enjoyed my conversation with Annius. Very positive, very optimistic, and
• 10:32
  somebody that I believe will return this summer a more
• 10:36
  refined player. Now it's just about if he has the
• 10:40
  opportunity and where it is that. Where does his skill
• 10:42
  set fit into the Eagles plans in twenty twenty five.
• 10:45
  We'll have to wait and see and another Another primary
• 10:50
  challenger for an Ia Smith was likely to be Avery Williams,
• 10:54
  who of course signed a modest free agent contract in March.
• 10:58
  He generated some buzz coming out of the NFL own
• 11:00
  meetings because Sirianni offered that expansive answer when discussing William's versatility,
• 11:05
  kind of intimating that some offensive touches are likely in
• 11:09
  the plans.
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: So the Eagles list him as a wide receiver.
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: After Williams spent some time as a cornerback and a
• 11:16
  running back with the Falcons.
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: Has a decorated career as a returner.
• 11:20
  Speaker 2: That's likely going to be his focus in Philadelphia. In fact,
• 11:24
  that's likely why he was signed, because the Eagles did
• 11:27
  lose Kenny Gainwell, Isaiah Rodgers, and Britton Covey in free agency.
• 11:32
  Williams can return both kicks and punts. He's returned fifty
• 11:36
  four kicks for two hundred eleven yards had fifty eight
• 11:39
  punts for six hundred and thirty I like his explosive
• 11:43
  and dynamic qualities as a returner, and if you hear
• 11:47
  Nick Sirianni, who was gushing over his versatility, I think
• 11:50
  that he's going to have a really solid opportunity to
• 11:55
  make the Eagles roster. It's also worth noting that he
• 11:58
  was sidelined during spring practices practices with an undisclosed injury.
• 12:02
  Will off to wait and see how this all transpires.
• 12:05
  I think that if you're looking at it and purely
• 12:07
  in terms of punt return, Anniah Smith and Avery Williams
• 12:10
  are the Eagles' best options on the roster right now
• 12:14
  outside of Cooper Degen, of course, because Cooper Degen has
• 12:18
  too critical of a role for this football team to
• 12:21
  risk putting him back there, and exposing him to unnecessary hits.
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: In my opinion, maybe the Eagles feel differently.
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: Next on the list, we have Terris Marshall Junior, who
• 12:31
  is drafted by the Panthers in the second round of
• 12:33
  the twenty twenty one NFL Draft.
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: This is his fourteen believe it or not. He's just
• 12:38
  twenty five years old.
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: Played in forty three games, started seventeen of them with
• 12:43
  the Panthers and the Raiders.
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: His career numbers are eight hundred and eight.
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: Receiving yards and a touchdown on sixty seven catches. We
• 12:50
  talked about Johnny Wilson and him having a tentative foothold
• 12:54
  on a roster spot. Well, Terras Marshall Junior could have
• 12:57
  something to say about it, because I think that he
• 13:00
  can kind of fulfill a similar role.
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: It's a big bodied receiver.
• 13:05
  Speaker 2: He can probably do some of that dirty work and blocking,
• 13:07
  and we know that he can go up there and
• 13:09
  come down with contested catches when the ball comes his way.
• 13:12
  We've seen it before, there's data to back that up.
• 13:16
  You never want to get too carried away with OTAs,
• 13:18
  but I thought Terris Marshall had a really sound series
• 13:22
  of OTA and mandatory mini camp practices that we were
• 13:24
  able to see as the media. But I do think
• 13:29
  that he can carve out a role as a gritty blocker.
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: And catch the occasional ball.
• 13:34
  Speaker 2: It seems like jaywhen hurts, and I didn't really have
• 13:39
  an issue establishing and early rapport with him. And he
• 13:42
  has familiarity with Devonte Smith, Tarris Marshall Junior has familiarity
• 13:46
  with Davante, So there is a path, a realistic path
• 13:51
  for him to make the roster. He doesn't play special
• 13:53
  teams much though he's only played a handful of snaps
• 13:57
  in the third phase throughout his career. That could hinder
• 14:00
  him in the long term, or I should say in
• 14:03
  the short term. That brings us to Danny Gray, the
• 14:08
  fourth year wide receiver who's really no longer flying under
• 14:11
  the radar. He turned some heads during the media attendance
• 14:14
  spring practices. It's got that four to three to three speed.
• 14:18
  He can get vertical. He liked the quickness and his
• 14:22
  releases off the line are something that I find to
• 14:27
  be pretty noteworthy. Look, he was the third round pick
• 14:30
  of the forty nine ers in twenty twenty two, was
• 14:32
  bagged up a little bit, never quite fulfilled the expectations
• 14:35
  that they had for him, but he comes to Philadelphia
• 14:37
  last year after Week one spends the entire year on
• 14:40
  the practice squad. This is a classic case of a
• 14:43
  player now knowing Kevin Patulo pretty well, he knows Aaron
• 14:48
  moorehead the Eagles receivers coach well, and he's been able
• 14:51
  to be on whatever plan the team had for him.
• 14:55
  So there's that continuity there, But there's also the ability.
• 14:59
  This is a player who on multiple accounts two of
• 15:03
  I talked to Danny last season, and I talked to
• 15:05
  other players who sort of co signed this. He was
• 15:09
  giving the starting secondary fits last year when he was
• 15:12
  working on the scout team, and he has athleticism, he's
• 15:17
  just twenty six years old. And there's also the opportunity
• 15:20
  that he may have as a kick returner, which he
• 15:22
  got some reps there last year in practice, and from
• 15:26
  what we saw in the three that we got to
• 15:28
  see this spring, he's a dark horse candidate and you
• 15:31
  cannot rule him out when you're trying to configure what
• 15:34
  the roster might look like because he has that vertical
• 15:37
  speed that is sort of unmatched. There's no player that
• 15:40
  has that kind of downfield ability.
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: Or straight line speed that's worth something.
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: Ques Watkins stayed around probably a little bit longer than
• 15:51
  most players drafted in the sixth round because he had
• 15:54
  something that is a hot commodity and valued in today's NFL.
• 16:00
  So Danny Gray should absolutely be a player that you
• 16:02
  all are keeping an eye on. Then we get into
• 16:07
  some of the rookie free agent signings that are going
• 16:09
  to be in camp as well.
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: So let's start with Darius Cooper.
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: He's one of three receivers to side with the Eagles
• 16:15
  after the draft. He went to Tarlatin State. He's six
• 16:19
  ft one hundred and ninety pounds. Played at Tarleton State
• 16:22
  for five years. Last season, caught seventy six passes for
• 16:25
  one four hundred and fifty yards and fourteen touchdowns. He
• 16:29
  was a twenty twenty four first team Associated Press FCSO
• 16:34
  American and was on the receiving end of a deep
• 16:36
  shot from Tanner McKee for a touchdown during the first
• 16:38
  media attended OTA practice. He also ruled in a handful
• 16:42
  of passes during team drills. His reps and I've talked
• 16:46
  about this with running backs and even quarterbacks in this series,
• 16:50
  but reps are going to be so few and far
• 16:52
  between for the players at the further you get down
• 16:54
  in the pecking order that Cooper is going to have
• 16:57
  to continue to maximize his opportunities and really flashed in
• 17:01
  the preseason for a spot on the probably the practice squad.
• 17:04
  I would assume that also brings us to Taylor More
• 17:08
  and another undrafted free agent wide receiver. He is a
• 17:13
  really really affected pump returner five to eleven, one hundred
• 17:16
  and eighty five pounds. He holds a Wake Forest record
• 17:19
  for most career receiving yards twenty nine hundred and seventy
• 17:22
  four and also ranks second all time in pump return
• 17:25
  yards with eight hundred and nine. He averaged seventeen yards
• 17:29
  a run back last year and ran one back for
• 17:31
  a touchdown. You have to love that. But due to
• 17:34
  his quickness and ability to find the saw spots underneath
• 17:36
  and coverage, I do think that Moran will be a
• 17:39
  popular safety valve this summer for quarterbacks Kyle McCord and
• 17:43
  Dorian Thompson Robinson. He'll have an uphill climb, but if
• 17:47
  he can really start to kind of carve out a
• 17:49
  role as a punt returner be effective in those opportunities,
• 17:53
  maybe somebody who you start to become a little bit
• 17:57
  more familiar with.
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: Giles Jackson is the third rookie.
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: He signed to the Eagles ninety man roster following a
• 18:03
  successful rookie Minicamp tryout. He joins a credit group of
• 18:10
  pass catchers. Obviously spent time with Michigan and Washington during
• 18:15
  his collegiate career. Finished with one seven hundred and twenty
• 18:18
  three receiving yards and ten touchdowns on fifty nine catches,
• 18:21
  and added one hundred and eighty three yards and two
• 18:23
  touchdowns on the ground. This is a player who had
• 18:27
  five to nine five as a speedster. He's quick and
• 18:30
  he does have some explosive qualities. He produced oney seven
• 18:34
  hundred and thirty yards and two touchdowns off seventy one
• 18:36
  kickoff returns. He also returned twenty five punts. We talked
• 18:40
  about the vacancy at kick returner Giles Jackson. If he
• 18:44
  gets some looks he could impress Elijah Cooks. Rounds this
• 18:49
  group out and Cooks signed to the Eagles practice squad
• 18:52
  in January leading up to the Divisional round against the Rams.
• 18:55
  I've reported this at the time. I thought I found
• 18:57
  it interesting. He was tasked with emulating pukua Akua on
• 19:01
  the scout team that week, and then he signed a
• 19:03
  reserve futures contract after the season. He's a big body
• 19:07
  wide receiver at six foot four, two hundred and fifteen pounds.
• 19:10
  He originally joined the NFL as a rookie free agent
• 19:14
  in twenty twenty three. The Jacksonville Jaguars signed him and
• 19:18
  he played an eleven games over two seasons with the team,
• 19:21
  and he pulled in three catches for thirty eight yards
• 19:23
  over that span. And I would also say that this
• 19:27
  is notable because he was sidelined during spring practices with
• 19:31
  an undisclosed injury.
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: So there you have it.
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: That is the group of wide receivers. You can see
• 19:36
  that there's different roles at stake. There's players who have
• 19:40
  varying degrees of intrigue, and I'm really curious to see
• 19:45
  who emerges from that group because if we're being honest,
• 19:49
  receivers four, five, and six all that, it all seems
• 19:53
  to be a little bit fluid to me. Johnny Wilson
• 19:56
  likely has the inside track for the four, but there's
• 20:00
  questions behind aj Brown, DeVante Smith, and Johan Dotson. That
• 20:05
  will be one of the more compelling position groups to
• 20:07
  keep an eye on this summer, and I look forward
• 20:09
  to covering it all with you right here on insidethebirds
• 20:12
  dot com and of course the check Odaily. That'll do
• 20:16
  it for this episode, and i'll talk to everybody tomorrow
• 20:18
  when we break down the tight end room.
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: Have a great day.