Eagle Walter Thurmond Is Competing For Starting Safety Spot

Newly acquired Eagles veteran defensive back, Walter Thurmond got the chance to do something that is rare in the NFL.  The Birds coaching staff let him decide whether he wanted to continue to play the cornerback position or make a switch and play the safety position.  This doesn’t make any sense to me from a team standpoint, because I think Thurmond should be playing cornerback, which is the position he has NFL experience playing.

“Once they had the draft and we drafted three corners, they gave me the option actually if I wanted to play corner or if I wanted to play safety,” Thurmond said after the OTA practice on Thursday. “I chose to play safety and I’m competing.”

His experience at the nickel back position makes him confident he’s going to be able to make this transition to safety, but he’s never played the position before in a NFL game.   The former Oregon Duck is comfortable rolling up and covering the slot man-to-man.  This is a unique assignment that the Eagles ask of their safeties and it’s one of the reasons that Thurmond is confident he can be the starter at the safety position opposite Malcolm Jenkins.

“I’m not (completely) new to the position,” Thurmond said. “I’ve dabbled a little bit in practice during scout teams in Seattle and New York and stuff like that, so I’m pretty familiar, but it’s a lot different from playing corner my whole career playing football. So there are going to be a lot of opportunities, especially in this defense, and I’m looking forward to the challenge.”

There’s more thinking that goes into playing the safety position and there’s also a lot more communicating.  The safeties must make sure they are on the same page with everybody else on defense.  If there is a change of the coverage when the offense is at the line of scrimmage, it’s the responsibility of the safeties to make sure everybody is on the same page.

“You’re another quarterback on the field so, especially in our defense”, Thurmond said. “You have to make a lot of coverage calls so you have to be a lot more vocal and verbal to the cornerbacks and to the linebackers as well. So that’s probably one of the biggest differences from playing corner and safety.”

“The biggest (change) is just your eye progression,” Jenkins said. “A lot changes about reading things. You have to see the field and see the quarterback as opposed to just seeing the guy in front of you. So your eye progression changes a lot. And then obviously making calls and getting people lined up is something that safeties have to do. You have to kind of be the quarterback back there.

Safeties are also asked to do a lot more tackling than the cornerbacks.  Coaches want their safeties to tackle aggressively, but maybe even more importantly they want their safeties to be sure tacklers.  They’re the last line of defense.  Their essence of their jobs is found in the name of their position.   There’s a huge difference from playing cornerback as compared to playing safety and only a player who has played both positions would know how drastic and fundamental the differences are.

It’s very early in the off season and Thurmond is currently lining up on the second-team defense opposite Chris Prosinski.  In the OTA practice on Thursday, Jenkins and Chris Maragos, were playing safety with the first-team defense.  Maragos and Prosinski are considered Special Teams specialists and they’re not expected to be serious contenders for the starting positions.  Right now Thurmond is the favorite.

“The thing about Walt is, he has really good instincts”, Jenkins said. “He’s played the nickel position, and once you learn the nickel, you pretty much know everybody’s position. I think he’s really a natural fit. I think once he starts learning a lot more of the scheme, he’ll be a lot more comfortable, but right now, he’s showing great instincts. He’s been around the ball a lot, he’s making plays.”

Thurmond will probably get more competition for the starting spot from Earl Wolff, when and if he gets healthy.  Other than Wolff, Thurmond probably has more experience and knowledge about playing the safety position at the NFL level than any of the other players competing for the spot.  Wolff, the former Eagles draft pick, isn’t practicing because he’s recovering form micro fracture surgery on his right knee.  He was doing rehabilitation work on the side on Thursday as the rest of the team practiced.  This leaves a major question mark on Wolff’s future and puts Thurmond in position to win the job.

The other players competing for that starting safety position are currently Maragos, Prosinski; Ed Reynolds, second-year safety and 2014 fifth-round draft pick, Jaylen Watkins, second-year safety/cornerback and 2014 fourth-round draft pick, and rookie Randall Evans 2015 sixth-round draft pick.

Again, I don’t think this is a wise move by the Eagles.  Thurmond should be playing corner because it will give the Birds some certainty at that position.  Moving him to safety, leaves you with question marks at both positions.