Day 9 of Philadelphia Eagles training camp is in the books, and it was a longer practice at just under two hours. Let’s just get right to the notes.

•  First, injuries 🦅🩼

Did not practice: 

LB Zack Baun – backWR A.J. Brown – hamstringS Lewis Cine – hamstringRB Montrell Johnson – hamstringOG Trevor Keegan – backWR Terrace Marshall – kneeiDL Byron Young – groin

Limited practice: 

LS Charley Hughlett – neckCB Mac McWilliams – quadS Andrew Mukuba – shoulderEDGE Nolan Smith – concussionFB Ben VanSumeren – ankle

Mukuba didn’t participate in team drills, for the sixth consecutive practice.

• Quinyon Mitchell is so good. With A.J. Brown out, Mitchell has begun covering DeVonta Smith in 1-on-1’s. Smith usually owns corners in that drill, but not Q, who locked Smith up on a comeback route.

Mitchell also picked off Tanner McKee today, while in zone coverage. He jumped an Ainias Smith route near the hash from his corner spot and made the play. (I don’t think McKee saw him.)

Prediction: Mitchell is going to be an All-Pro, and I don’t think I’m even going out on much of a limb saying that.

The Eagles have been pretty open about Mitchell likely following alpha receivers this season, and we got more clarity on when that would happen from defensive backs coach Christian Parker today.

“It’s game to game,” Parker said. “You just look at what the offense is doing. Do they have a premier guy? Does that guy line up at a certain spot? Is he a motion guy? Because really, if he’s a motion guy, traveling really doesn’t do anything. So you just really want to look at the offense, see how they’re presenting their primary players, and once they move their premiums around and we’re going through a gameplan, we’ll decide how to do that week to week.”

When asked to explain the motion aspect, Parker said, “For example, if the receiver is lined up in the slot to the left, and I’m at left corner and he motions to the right, we’re not going to travel and do all that because with jet motion / change of strength, you can get all discombobulated from that standpoint. So usually it’s when you have guys who are more stagnant in their approach, X and Z receivers, how do they move, and we’ll have different things we do. It could be a play-by-play thing, or a game-by-game thing, as I’ve done it historically, and how I’ve done it with Vic historically.”

• DeVonta Smith had a very good day otherwise. The Eagles worked on a bunch of situational drills, notably backed up in their own end. Unsurprisingly, DeVonta was Jalen Hurts’ primary target with A.J. Brown sidelined.

Hurts connected with DeVonta on an out route that beat Cooper DeJean, and he also found DeVonta wide open over the middle of the field running through zone coverage.

Hurts also found Jahan Dotson for a “game-sealing” completion in a backed up situation with little time left on the clock.

• Elijah Cooks got a lot of targets today, and had a bunch of catches. He beat Adoree’ Jackson twice. Cooks has made more plays in the passing game than Johnny Wilson and Ainias Smith combined. But, well, Wilson and Smith were drafted players, so it’ll be interesting to see if Cooks is rewarded for his play if he continues to outperform them.

• There was some good action in O-line / D-line 1-on-1’s today. The standouts were Jordan Mailata, Josh Uche, Tyler Steen, Jordan Davis, and Drew Kendall. 

Mailata owned Jalyx Hunt twice. Hunt didn’t sniff the quarterback on his two reps. There used to be a time when Mailata wasn’t great in 1-on-1’s. I remember Joe Ostman giving him all he could handle back in the day. Not anymore. He’s a beast.

Uche smoked rookie Myles Hinton on an inside move, and then on his next rep he tried a speed-to power move that initially knocked Hinton back, but Hinton recovered nicely and stood his ground.

Steen had a pair of wins over Ojomo, who has been a menace throughout camp.

Davis had an impressive swim move past Brett Toth, followed by a push-pull move for another win. Toth isn’t exactly Jason Kelce in his prime, but Davis undeniably looked quicker than we have seen him on those two reps.

Kendall displayed great feet and good hand fighting in a pair of wins over Gabe Hall.

Other 1-on-1 notes:

Rookie Ty Robinson easily beat roster exemption guy Laekin Vakalahi, who he has smoked all camp in these drills. Give him someone else to battle against, please.Kenyon Green had a loss to Thomas Booker. Green later puked on the field for a while (all liquid, no chunks that I could see), and I don’t think (?) he returned to practice.Nolan Smith beat Matt Pryor twice around the edge, but Pryor recovered and later picked up a pair of wins over Ogbo Okoronkwo.

• UDFA WR Giles Jackson probably had the play of the day. He was tracking a deep ball, and had to turn his body to the outside and relocate the ball while in a full sprint before making a long TD catch from Dorian Thompson-Robinson.

• Braden Mann had a long “open field” punting session today, and holy hell he was hitting some bombs. Like, 70 yards in the air from the line of scrimmage, and angled toward the sideline. It was as impressive a punting session as I’ve seen since the Donnie Jones days. Donnie used to hit moonshots that would be well over five seconds of hang time, while Mann’s bombs were more about distance. Mann is my player of the day. (Seriously.)

• In case you missed it, the Eagles signed a long snapper on Sunday by the name of Christian Johnstone. Because Charley Hughlett (the Eagles’ regular long snapper) appeared on the injury report on Sunday, my assumption was that Johnstone was merely a temporary fill-in under Hughlett is good to go.

But it’s worth noting that Hughlett was in full pads today practicing, and long snapping. So mayyyybe there’s actually a competition here? Whatever the case, I’m going to cover it like it’s Michael Vick vs. Nick Foles.

I watched the new guy long snap for a while today, both on field goals and punts, and he looked pretty good. I can’t speak to the velocity of his snaps or whether the rotation of the football was perfect so that the laces were out when the holder put it down, but he was definitely very accurate. 

• We got answers on who the emergency specialists are today:

Kicker: Braden Mann
Holder: Cooper DeJean
Long snapper: Grant Calcaterra

Although Jake Elliott didn’t get any punting reps, he has filled in as an emergency punter in the past.

Mann got one crack at a field goal, which had good height and distance, and looked like it was good from my sideline view.

Also, is there anything DeJean can’t do?

• Late in the day during a team red zone session, the third team offense scored a TD on a pass from Kyle McCord to Taylor Morin. After the play, Saquon Barkley ran onto the field and was wildly celebrating with the deep backups, to the point where A.J. Brown had to yell at him to get off the field so they could run a two-point conversion. Anyway, my conclusion here is that Barkley is a cool teammate.