Let’s get to the Philadelphia Eagles news and links …
Adam Schefter shared best guess for Patriots, A.J. Brown trade cost – PatriotsWireESPN’s Adam Schefter shared his best guess for what it might cost the New England Patriots to acquire Philadelphia Eagles wide receiver A.J. Brown in a trade. While most have been focused on the 2027 NFL Draft, Schefter wonders if the Patriots and Eagles would agree on a 2028 pick instead. He also believes it will be a future first-round draft pick. “I expect that this trade will come together on June 1st,” Schefter said on Monday, during an appearance on The Pat McAfee Show. “…It’s not gonna be hard to get done. The Eagles are open to moving him, the Patriots want him, and I believe in the end it will involve a future first-round draft pick. My guess is 2028 — one in 2028. But, let’s see what the two sides finally figure out there in the end.”
Eagles Film Review: Makai Lemon will hopefully be the player who forces the offense to become something better than it has been – BGNWhat makes him particularly interesting as an Eagle is how precisely he addresses what this offense has been missing. Jalen Hurts has historically been reluctant to work the middle of the field and doesn’t throw a ton of short routes that give receivers opportunities to create yards after the catch (largely because of personnel issues and design issues). Lemon is at his absolute best in the middle of the field. The quick-game concepts, the condensed formations, and the pre-snap motion that creates space are what the Eagles’ offense will need to run to get Lemon the targets he thrives on, and they are also the schematic evolution that offensive coordinator Sean Mannion’s system naturally points toward. Lemon will hopefully be the player who forces the offense to become something better than it has been in recent years. You can’t just line him up out wide and expect him to win like A.J. Brown could. That’s not his game.
NFL Draft grades for every team’s full 2026 class – SB NationPhiladelphia Eagles. Best Pick: Makai Lemon, WR, USC — 1st round, 20th overall. Unlike past drafts the Eagles did enter this draft with some questions. They had a core need at pass rusher and wide receiver, especially if the team is going to be trading A.J. Brown after June 1. Landing Makai Lemon was a gift courtesy of the Cowboys, who facilitated the trade to make it happen. The other big part of this class was making the trade for Jonathan Greenard with the Vikings, giving the team the veteran pass rusher they needed. This was a great draft top to bottom. Grade: A
Eagles Notebook – Iggles BlitzBoth players could end up getting contract extensions. But both are complicated. Jalen Carter is one of the best DTs in the league so his will involve major money. That’s never a simple thing. There is also the fact he had a bit of a down year, mainly due to a lingering shoulder issue. The spitting incident from the opener didn’t help matters. That set a weird tone for his whole season. Still, he is a difference-maker. You want to keep those guys when they are young. Carter just turned 25 so he is just getting ready to enter the prime of his career. Smith played well in 2024 and really came alive in the playoffs. He also had an injury that limited him last season. The Eagles like Smith. They just don’t know how good he is right now. I’m sure they’ll talk about getting something done, but the edge market was crazy this offseason. You can’t overpay for Smith since there is still some uncertainty with him. Let’s hope he stays healthy and has a good year.
Jeff Stoutland says Eagles’ struggles last year came down to not “calling the right plays” – PFT“I think any time things don’t go well, and I don’t want to sound like I’m on an interview, but it’s the truth — it’s execution, it’s calling the right play at the right time, and not running bad plays into bad defenses. I mean, it ain’t that hard — that’s pretty much it,” Stoutland said. The Eagles fired offensive coordinator Kevin Patullo after the season, and while Stoutland didn’t mention Patullo by name, it’s impossible to hear those comments and not think Stoutland was frustrated with Patullo’s play calling. As was much of the city of Philadelphia.
Roob’s Observations: Why Jonathan Greenard makes more sense than Jaelan Phillips – NBCSPI’d rather have Jonathan Greenard at $25 million per year than Jaelan Phillips at $30 million per year. Phillips is a couple years younger, but Greenard has been the more productive player. Let’s look at their careers. Phillips has never had more than 8.0 sacks in a season, and his best two seasons were his first two. He’s averaged 4.0 sacks per season, has missed a ton of games with injuries and has only played 10 games once over the last three seasons. Greenard has averaged 6 ½ sacks per season and over the last three years has more than twice as many sacks (27 ½) as Phillips (12 ½). If you want to break it down by sacks per snap, we can do that. Phillips has averaged a sack every 99 career snaps and Greenard is at one every 81. Greenard cost you two 3rd-round picks, but Phillips will bring back a 3rd-round comp pick. I thought Phillips played OK while he was here last year, but he was certainly nowhere close to a $30 million per year player. Greenard had a down year last year after back-to-back 12-sack seasons and still had more sacks in 12 games with the Vikings (3.0) than Phillips had in nine games with the Eagles (2.0). Their Pro Football Focus pass rush grades were similar – 77.6 for Greenard, 76.2 for Phillips – and surprisingly Greenard had a much higher run defense grade – 77.8 to 60.3. Greenard had 10 tackles for loss to just four for Phillips, more QB hits (12 to 7) and more hurries (12 to 9). The Eagles have the right guy.
Grading the Eagles’ NFL Draft: Makai Lemon? Love it! – PHLY2 (54) – TE ELI STOWERS – VANDERBILT – CHECK BACK IN TWO YEARS. I was certainly lower on Stowers than the consensus. Let me explain why. Can I see the upside here? Absolutely. He’s an explosive athlete and a phenomenal kid. He hasn’t played the position for long and there’s reason to believe he can continue growing into it. That said, we have seen many cases of players with a similar type of profile enter the NFL and they oftentimes do not meet the expectation. My concern is that he’s not a pass-first tight end, but that he would be – at best – a pass-ONLY tight end. That severely limits the usage and effectiveness of his role. If he’s a faster Grant Calcaterra, the same limitations that plagued him will continue to carry over. If Stowers can reach a Zach Ertz level as a blocker, then I think this can work. My grade and projection show that I think the most likely outcome is that he does not. I hope he proves me wrong! It would not be the first time and would not be the last.
2026 NFL draft: Judging overreactions to picks, team classes – ESPNThe Eagles’ two-year NFC East title streak will end in 2026. […] Verdict: NOT AN OVERREACTION. This point of this annual exercise, of course, is that the other teams in the division have reason to believe they got better, too. The Giants received a ton of praise for their Day 1 haul, which saw them land Ohio State edge rusher/linebacker Arvell Reese and Miami offensive tackle Francis Mauigoa in the top 10. They drafted Tennessee cornerback Colton Hood in the second round and traded up for wide receiver Malachi Fields in the third. With new coach John Harbaugh and hopes high for second-year QB Jaxson Dart, the Giants could be in for a big leap in 2026. The Commanders, who were Philly’s opponent in the NFC Championship Game two seasons ago, hope to rebound from a down year with QB Jayden Daniels now healthy and first-round linebacker Sonny Styles on board to shore up the defense. And the Cowboys had their usual impressive, workmanlike draft, adding safety Caleb Downs and edge rusher Malachi Lawrence in the first round and Michigan edge Jaishawn Barham in the third in the hopes of finally fixing a defense that fell off a cliff last year. The Eagles might still be the favorites to repeat, but repeating is always hard in this division, and there are plenty of reasons for the other three teams to think they’re closing the gap.
Two favorite 2026 NFL Draft picks in every round: 3 reps for Eagles; 2 for Bucs, Steelers – NFL.comMAKAI LEMON: The events leading up to this selection are the stuff of legend. It appeared the Steelers were all set to make a splashy pick to electrify the home crowd in Pittsburgh on Thursday night, but then Eagles GM Howie Roseman did what he so often does, blowing up the competition’s plans with an aggressive move to get his guy. As NFL Network Insider Ian Rapoport reported, Lemon was on the phone with the Steelers, who were ready to draft him 21st overall until Philadelphia traded with the Cowboys to move up three spots and land a slot menace who will eventually help replace A.J. Brown, leaving Pittsburgh at the altar. While the critiques of Lemon’s game and demeanor throughout the draft process seemed to enter unfair territory at times, the bottom line is the guy produces. Jalen Hurts is going to love throwing to a player who has rightfully drawn comparisons to his fellow former Trojans wide receiver, Amon-Ra St. Brown.
Inside the NFL Draft: Ty Simpson pick explained, surging TEs and favorite strategies – The AthleticFinally, on the Eagles trade for Vikings pass rusher Jonathan Greenard: Philadelphia has been active in monitoring the pass rusher market all offseason. It has also been overtly rebuilding its receivers room, most recently with a trade up in the first round for USC’s Makai Lemon. He projects as an early contributor out of the slot. New offensive coordinator Sean Mannion may be drawing from both Rams and Green Bay Packers influences in wanting multiple skill players who can sift across the middle of the field as volume targets plus contribute as blockers — in turn helping DeVonta Smith draw less attention outside the seam. Because the Eagles didn’t target a pass rusher in the first round and still needed immediate help, it made all the more sense to execute a trade for the veteran Greenard (who was essentially a cap casualty in Minnesota and needed a new contract, which the Eagles gave him).
The changing perception of the Micah Parsons trade – Blogging The BoysWhen you look at the Parsons trade, all of the pieces are finally showing themselves. One player has turned into five for the Cowboys, just as Jerry said when the trade first happened. Financially, the cost of Parsons ($45 million) is essentially the same as the combined cost of both of the defensive tackles, Williams ($24 million) and Clark ($21 million). The team will take on an additional cost for extra rookies, but that will only amount to roughly $7.5 million annually for all three of them combined. We should also mention that there remains one caveat. As part of the Quinnen Williams trade, the Cowboys gave up a 2026 second-round pick, and they still owe one of their two 2027 first-rounders to the New York Jets. And it’s the better of the two. So there are some missed opportunities that we will never really know about. If the Packers finish with a worse record than the Cowboys this upcoming season, the Jets will receive Green Bay’s pick, and the Cowboys keep their normal pick, and it’s business as usual. If the Cowboys finish worse than the Packers, the Jets get the Cowboys’ pick, and Dallas will take Green Bay’s pick, meaning they’ll lose some additional draft capital this time next year. For all intents and purposes, the Parsons trade is then donezo.
Survey results: Commanders fans think GM Adam Peters has room to improve when it comes to the draft – Hogs HavenIn general, the selection of Sonny Styles in the first round drew broad praise. In a similar vein to the selection of Jayden Daniels over Drake Maye in 2024, the primary criticism of the Styles pick was that it wasn’t the Caleb Downs pick. Yet, even those who preferred Downs seemed to feel that there was no ‘wrong answer’ in picking between the two. If anything, fans seemed to be more prepared to live with the GM’s choice this year, whatever it turned out to be, than in 2024 when passionate fans seemed to have deeper feelings about the choice between Daniels and Maye. The next pick, that of wide receiver Antonio Williams, was less universally welcomed. Fans expected a wide receiver to be drafted (position of need and good positional value) but the general expectation was that the team would aim for a bigger-bodied receiver rather than one like Williams, who has spent 80% of his career lined up in the slot. Commments from GM Adam Peters immediately after Williams was drafted indicate that he (AP) believes that Williams is capable of playing as a Z receiver.
How good was the Giants’ 2026 NFL Draft? Dane Brugler says it was this good – Big Blue ViewThe New York Giants got high marks for their 2026 NFL Draft in grades that were released on Sunday. Now, draft analyst Dane Brugler of The Athletic has released his rankings of the 32 draft classes, and the work by GM Joe Schoen and head coach John Harbaugh earned high praise. Brugler has the Giants’ draft haul ranked No. 2 in the league behind that of the Cleveland Browns. Brugler writes: Favorite pick: Arvell Reese, edge, Ohio State There are multiple contenders for this spot — Francis Mauigoa, Colton Hood, Malachi Fields. But Reese was my No. 1 player in the entire class, and his addition will allow the Giants to mix up their pressure packages. Quarterbacks won’t have fun facing this front seven.
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