Eagles General Manager Howie Roseman isn’t going to repeat what he did during the off season before forming the Dream Team of 2011. It turned out to not be a dream team but a nightmare. You remember that summer when Roseman and the city were celebrating as the signed all the big free agents such as: Jason Babin, Ronnie Brown, Vince Young, Evan Mathis, Nnamdi Asomugha Steve Smith, and Cullen Jenkins. They were supposed to be putting together a juggernaut of a football team, but it all blew up.
Roseman has leaned a valuable less from that season. You don’t build the core of your team with free agents.
“We have to learn from that moment,” Roseman told CSNPhilly.com. “I would say we’re going to continue to try to build this team the right way, and there are no quick fixes in the National Football League.”
“No matter where we are right now, or what we finished with, we’ve got to keep the process right and build onto a young team, hopefully have a good core group of players we can build on and with, and do things the right way.”
Last year Roseman and the Birds front office signed a number of middle of road free agents like LB Connor Barwin, TE James Casey, CB Cary Williams, CB Bradley Fletcher, S Patrick Chung, P Donnie Jones, and Isaac Sopoaga. Signing free agents that don’t have the huge contracts allows the Eagles to hit on some of the signings and miss on others. When they ink the big money guys like they did with Asomugha, they can’t afford to miss.
“It’s interesting, because when you look at it, if you can sign a bunch of guys that maybe aren’t the high-priced guys, you have a chance to kind of have a batting average, as opposed to if you sign one or two big-priced guys and one or two don’t work out, it kind of puts you in a bind,” Roseman said.
“So if you sign a bunch of good players, solid players, and you sign a bunch of them, you want them all to work out, but you don’t necessarily count on them and it doesn’t really hurt your team going forward if one or two don’t work out.
“That group as a whole, I think they contributed a lot to our football team. We certainly weren’t perfect on our free agent signings, but I thought it matched what was out there in free agency last year, and I thought served us well.”
I agree with the idea of getting middle of road guys because most of the players that become free agents are out there for a reason. The main reason the Birds made major improvements this past season was because of their success in the draft, especially 2012. Nick Foles was drafted in the 3rd round of that draft. Fletcher Cox was number one. Brandon Boykin was drafted in the fourth round that year.
Here’s the Birds list of unrestricted free agents: quarterback Michael Vick, wide receiver Riley Cooper, wide receiver Jeremy Maclin, defensive lineman Clifton Geathers, safety Nate Allen, safety Kurt Coleman, linebacker Phillip Hunt and punter Donnie Jones. Which ones would you resign and which ones would you let walk?
The Eagles are desperate for help at the safety position. It just so happens that there are two second team All-Pro safeties, Cleveland’s T.J. Ward and Buffalo’s Jairius Byrd who played for Kelly at Oregon, who are available via free agency. Each of them would be major improvements over the Birds 2013 safeties. Ward and Byrd are both 27 years old, so they’re in the peak years of their careers.
JByrd gets hurt I heard dont get me wrong like his size and aggresiveness I would love to have him. We might be able to get TJWard for less bread anyway it goes it s alot better that clueless and clumsy Chung the goof hurt more of his own team mates than opposition Pats know when release a stiff !
I really would love a pass rusher that can get 10-12 sacks a yr added with that safety then we on the right track, build that “D” build it big ,mean,and smart dudes with brains and balls to shut down and hurt somebody make other teams respect and fear their presence. Buil that D wwe have the offense oyh and I want a big sure handed smart route running WR someone physical and good the wayTO was they said he was crazy but in my book he was the best we had in long time and we never really replaced him Desean just too small and gets beat up and dissapears when physical safety covers him we dont need that I wouldnt structure contract the way he wants it noway!
Don, Byrd played only 11 games this year, but the last 3 years hes played all 16. His first year in 09 he played 14 games but tallied 9ints (I ll take that). So this stigma that he has of being injury prone is false and blown way out of proportion..
TJ Ward is a heavy hitting safety, not as good overall as Byrd but hes better than what we have. . This safeties unit needs to be completely gutted and transformed, enough of the shenanigans..
sign em both
yea sign them both…sign every free agent possible! smh! sign two safeties and forget about the OLB or depth at CB.
One safety in free agency, I hope and OLB in free agency! Draft CB for depth unless a stud CB can be signed.
As far as the safeties…Allen showed me some improvement this season in this new scheme! He’s not where I expected him to be right now….but played a lot better than we’ve come accustom too…I like the rookie Wolff and think he will be a solid safety in this league…He has good instincts and isn’t afraid to come up and meet the ball carrier.
I like Wolffe and Allen as back ups. I can’t comment on Wolffes play making ability but Allen doesn’t bring that playmaking to the table. I would like to see two new safeties. I prefer they draft them and allow Allen to start until the rookies are ready to play. A safety that will make receivers think about crossing the middle and a ball hawking safety is needed.
cool you like nate allen the 84th out of 88th ranked safety in the league. gotta love a guy that improves from 88 to 84. your eye for talent is on par with your reading comprehension skills.
The Eagles are not going to be signing players left and right like that. Howie made that perfectly clear Monday on his radio show. Some of you guys are going to be wondering why the eagles are not going to be really active in FA. He said that there will never be anymore 2011 free agency splashes. His main thing is to sign the Eagle free agents they want back, a couple of other free agents and to build through the draft. Maybe one of the FAs will be an impact player, I’m not getting hyped up and ready for a splash during FA because I’m taking him at his word as far as what he says the plan for this offseason is. The draft is where he definitely became more excited and animated during the discussion
Paulman list of Players the Eagles will pursue in Free-Agency
Strong Safety TJ Ward (Browns – 5-10″ 200lbs – 27 Years Old)
D/Lineman Arthur Jones (Ravens 6-3″ 315 lbs – 27 Years Old)
Guard – Geoff Schwartz (Chiefs – 6-6″ 330lbs – 27 Years Old)
CB – Walter Thurmond (Seahawks 5-11″ 190lbs – 26 Years Old)
ILB – Vincent Rey (Bengals 6-2 250lbs – 26 Years Old)
Eagles Draft will on DT, OLB, and Safety on Defense and OL & WR
on Offense
LB Rey will play ILB with Kendricks sliding to OLB as a Stand Up Blitzer
Phillie News
Phils Fire Announcers Chris Wheeler & Gary Matthews
Carry on
Well I hope Rey can play in the 3-4 and I also hope that can cover and the only olb I’ve ever seen that was good that was Kendrick’s height was Elvis dumervil.
Don’t want any cb’s that took steroids before
noway no how sign any midget safty please get big physical dude tired all these littledudes who get beat up and dont stop nobody man i wish b dawk, bobby taylor troy vincent were here in time capsule whewwwwwwwwwww!! man they do some damage oh lets not forget andre waters i loved to watch him hit