Growing weary of A.J. Brown drama,\u00a0understanding Howie Roseman’s cornerback additions and a historic stretch for Jalen Hurts. That’s a taste of what’s in store for you with this week’s Roob’s Random Eagles Observations.<\/p>\n
There’s no bye week for Roob’s Obs!\u00a0<\/p>\n
1. This constant A.J. Brown drama is exhausting. Hey, the dude is a top-five wide receiver and he\u2019s higher than fifth. I love watching him play. Guy\u2019s a beast. But the social media stuff isn\u2019t helping anybody and I can\u2019t imagine Jeff Lurie, Howie Roseman and Nick Sirianni are thrilled with it. He never comes out and says what he\u2019s thinking, he just keeps sending out these cryptic tweets that leave everybody guessing and force the media to run to his locker and ask what he meant. Does he just crave attention? Is he unhappy being an Eagle? Does he want to play elsewhere? Does he have issues with Jalen Hurts? Nobody has any clue because he never comes out and actually says anything, he just hints at it, then either apologizes or says he was misunderstood or just smiles and says he doesn\u2019t want to talk about it. It\u2019s so tiresome. It\u2019s this endless cycle of A.J. sending out social media posts and everybody trying to figure out what he means. How about this: Get rid of social media and just play football and if you have something to say, just come out and say it instead of playing this game of hinting at it with enigmatic tweets. Hey, Brown is not a bad guy. This isn\u2019t T.O. here. This is a dude who plays hard whether he\u2019s running a route or blocking and has never gotten into trouble off the field. But the constant drama is just silly and unnecessary. Brown isn\u2019t getting traded this year, but if it doesn\u2019t stop I wonder when it will just be too much for the Eagles to deal with.<\/p>\n
2. The Eagles have faced 841 regular-season passes by opposing quarterbacks since their last interception by a cornerback.<\/p>\n
3A. With slot corner Michael Carter and outside corner Jaire Alexander both in the fold after two more Howie Roseman trades, the Eagles still have question marks at cornerback but they also have options. Carter in the slot and Cooper DeJean is an option. Alexander at outside corner is an option. But those are hardly locks. The 1-7 Jets gave up on Carter and the 3-5 Ravens gave up on Alexander, so we\u2019re not talking about guys at the top of their game here. The Eagles basically gave up a couple late-round picks in the hopes that Carter and Alexander can help a secondary that needs help. But neither one is a lock. Carter is here in case Vic Fangio wants to move Cooper DeJean to outside corner full-time so they have an experienced slot to replace DeJean. But that\u2019s hardly a lock. And Alexander is here to see if he can revive his career to the point where he\u2019s a better option at outside corner than Kelee Ringo, Adoree\u2019 Jackson or Jackorian Bennett. And that\u2019s hardly a lock, either. Carter and Alexander are no-risk moves. Howie didn\u2019t give up much for either one, they\u2019ve both been very good players in the past \u2013 a few years in the past \u2013 and if they don\u2019t work out, no harm done. They give Fangio options. But it could very well be that the Eagles\u2019 strongest cornerback lineup is still Quinyon Mitchell and Ringo outside and DeJean inside.\u00a0<\/p>\n
3B. With these trade-deadline type of moves, it\u2019s never as easy as just sticking a new guy out there and saying, \u201cGo play.\u201d There\u2019s a reason most of these moves don\u2019t work. Robert Quinn? Kary Vincent Jr.? Kevin Byard? Genard Avery? Golden Tate? Jay Ajayi certainly helped, but that was eight years ago now. It\u2019s just really challenging for a player to change teams in the middle of a season, learn a new scheme, get used to new coaches, move to a new city, build a rapport with new teammates and go out and play at a high level soon after uprooting his life.\u00a0<\/p>\n
4. It\u2019s been 38 years and I still can\u2019t wrap my arms around what Reggie White did in 1987. In a strike-shortened season \u2013 three games were played by replacement players and a fourth was cancelled \u2013 White had 21 sacks in just 12 games. At the time, that was the most sacks in a season and to this day, nearly four decades later, it\u2019s still 6th-most in NFL history and also remains the Eagles\u2019 single-season record. And he did it in just 12 games, the most sacks ever by an NFL player in a 12-game span within one season. What may be even crazier is that from Week 13 of the 1986 season through Week 12 of 1987, Reggie had 24 sacks in 12 games \u2013 an average of two per game. In those 12 games, he had four sacks once, three sacks twice, 2 \u00bd once, 2.0 sacks four times, 1 \u00bd once, 1.0 sack twice and no sacks just once \u2013 in a win over Washington at the Vet.\u00a0<\/p>\n
5A. First six weeks of the season, the Eagles ranked 28th\u00a0in the NFL with 4.68 yards per play. The last two weeks, they rank second with 7.43 yards per play.\u00a0<\/p>\n
5B. That 4.68 figure was the Eagles\u2019 worst through Week 6 since 2003. The 7.43 figure is their best in any two-game span since Week 15 and 16 in 2013.<\/p>\n
6. The win over the Giants last weekend was the Eagles\u2019 11th\u00a0consecutive home win against NFC East opponents, the longest streak in franchise history. The Eagles\u2019 last loss at the Linc within the division was 32-21 to Washington in November of 2022. Their previous longest home winning streak within the division was 10 in a row over the 2001 through 2004 seasons, a streak that ended with a 21-20 loss to the Cowboys in November 2005. The Eagles led by two touchdowns in both the Dallas loss in 2005 and the Washington loss in 2022.<\/p>\n
7. Jalen Hurts Stat of the Week: Hurts\u2019 155.2 passer rating in his last two games is 5th-highest in NFL history by a player in any two-game span (minimum 40 pass attempts). In wins over the Vikings and Giants, Hurts was 34-for-43 for 505 yards with seven touchdowns and no interceptions. That\u2019s nine incomplete passes, seven touchdowns. The only players with a higher passer rating in a two-game span: Jared Goff (157.5 in 2024), Brock Purdy (157.3 in 2023), Nick Foles (155.3 in 2013) and Kurt Warner (155.3 in 1999).\u00a0<\/p>\n
8. This is the first year since sacks became an official stat in 1982 \u2013 that\u2019s 44 seasons ago \u2013 that the Eagles haven\u2019t had an edge rusher \/ defensive end with at least two sacks through eight games. Their leading edge rusher remains the retired Za\u2019Darius Smith with 1 \u00bd sacks. Jalyx Hunt and Patrick Johnson have one each. There have been four seasons where their leading edge through eight games had 2.0 sacks \u2013 Clyde Simmons in 1993, Hall of Famer Richard Dent in 1997, Ndukwe Kalu in 2003 and Vinny Curry in 2013.\u00a0<\/p>\n
9A. I think it\u2019s pretty cool that Mack Hollins, the Eagles\u2019 4th-round pick back in 2017, is still playing. Hollins is in his first year with the Patriots, his sixth team, and playing with Drake Maye he\u2019s got 18 catches for 208 yards and two touchdowns. What\u2019s impressive is that Hollins has only been targetted 21 times, and his 85.7 catch percentage is tied for best in the NFL among receivers with at least 20 targets. Stefon Diggs is also at 85.7.\u00a0<\/p>\n
9B. Hollins has played in 120 games, 6th-most ever by a wide receiver drafted by the Eagles. He trails DeSean Jackson (183), Harold Carmichael (173), Nelson Agholor (149), Jason Avant (148) and Tommy McDonald (140).\u00a0<\/p>\n
9C. Hollins was a 4th-round pick in 2017, No. 118 overall. There were 32 wide receivers drafted in 2017 and Hollins was 17th. But he\u2019s one of only 10 who\u2019s still active. Only five of the 16 taken ahead of him are still playing. Hollins has outlasted all three top-10 WRs taken in 2017 \u2013 No. 5 pick Corey Davis, No. 7 pick Mike Williams and No. 9 John Ross, the former (briefly) Eagle. His 2,277 career yards are 10th-most out of those 32 receivers taken in 2017 and his 17 touchdowns are 9th-most. The only other WR the Eagles have drafted in the fourth round with 17 TD catches? That would be good ol\u2019 Billy Dewell, the Eagles\u2019 4th-round pick (but 29th\u00a0overall) out of SMU in 1939. Billy also had 17 TD catches but they were all for the Chicago Cardinals.\u00a0<\/p>\n
9D. Where else are you getting freaking Mack Hollins stats?\u00a0<\/p>\n
10. It\u2019s crazy what kind of impact one big game can have on a player\u2019s or team\u2019s stats. Going into the second Giants game, Saquon Barkley ranked 23rd\u00a0in the NFL with 369 rushing yards, and his 3.3 average was 37th\u00a0of 38 backs with at least 50 carries. One 150-yard game against the Giants moved him up to 10th\u00a0in the league in rushing with 519 yards and tied for 25th\u00a0with a 4.1 average. As a team, the Eagles\u00a0ranked 29th\u00a0in rushing yards and 31st\u00a0in yards per carry before Sunday. Now they\u2019re all the way up to 14th\u00a0in yards and 20th\u00a0in yards per carry at 4.1.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Growing weary of A.J. Brown drama,\u00a0understanding Howie Roseman’s cornerback additions and a historic stretch for Jalen Hurts. That’s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":494430,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2068],"tags":[25,4904,7,6,242,109,2476,14851],"class_list":{"0":"post-494429","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-philadelphia-eagles","8":"tag-eagles","9":"tag-eagles-blog","10":"tag-football","11":"tag-nfl","12":"tag-philadelphia","13":"tag-philadelphia-eagles","14":"tag-philadelphiaeagles","15":"tag-roobs-observations"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/115480170789255465","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/494429","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=494429"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/494429\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/494430"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=494429"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=494429"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=494429"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}