Recent Eagles redraft delivers hype but the wrong outcome

USA Today

4 hours ago

What if we told you a bad Eagles decision led to a chain reaction of necessary events?
Things couldn't have been any stranger in 2020. The Philadelphia Eagles entered the NFL Draft on the heels of a 9-7 season. A win-loss total that barely exceeded .500 was good enough to give the Birds the NFC East's crown.
Four straight wins had catapulted them into the playoffs, but things ended with a thud during the Wild Card Round. Carson Wentz would be injured early. He left the game with a concussion. A 17-9 loss would follow about three hours later. It was a bitter end to a season that was beginning to feel like Philadelphia had possibly caught fire at the appropriate time.
No one knew it then, but that would be the only postseason appearance for the Eagles with Wentz under center. Things only got stranger. COVID-19 turned our world upside down and soon restricted us to our homes.
There would be no March Madness. We would, however, enjoy the draft mentioned above, which, by the way, was virtual. The plan seemed obvious. Philadelphia needed to find Carson Wentz a weapon at wide receiver.
It seemed easy enough in a selection meeting that was full of them. The stars had aligned. Philadelphia was on the clock with the 21st overall selection. Justin Jefferson was still on the board, but an ugly fact of life is that things don't always work out as we think they should. There isn't an Eagles fan breathing that doesn't know what happened next.
The Philadelphia Eagles ignore Justin Jefferson in favor of Jalen Reagor
Some call it the greatest draft-day miss in Howie Roseman's career. Philadelphia passed on LSU All-American wide receiver Justin Jefferson, electing instead to go with Jalen Reagor.
Some say the deciding factor was that Jalen Reagor gave the Eagles the added dimension of having a special-teams ace. He was billed as someone who wasn't just a receiver but also a punt returner.
Others believe wide receivers coach Aaron Moorehead was an unnamed culprit who helped precipitate a bad decision. After all, he and Jalen's father, Montae Reagor, were friends and former teammates.
Whatever the reason for the decision, it doesn't rewrite history or change what happened. Jalen landed with the Eagles. The Minnesota Vikings drafted Justin Jefferson one spot later at 22.
Reagor's career didn't work out in Philadelphia. Jefferson is still playing in Minneapolis and has grown into one of the best talents in the game at his position. If only there were a machine of some sort that would allow us all to travel back in time, but what if there were? Based on everything that has transpired since the Reagor addition, is it feasible to state maybe it's best to leave things as they are?
Some of you are having a hard time with that theory, aren't you? Well, not so fast, as the great Lee Corso would say. Let's reason through this one together.
A 2020 draft re-do gives the Eagles Jefferson (But, hold on a second)
Since that draft mishap, whether fair or unfair, Eagles fans still think of Reagor every time they think of Jefferson. It's understandable why they would, but here's the most radical theory you'll hear all week. The Jalen Reagor selection set off a satisfying domino effect.
Bleacher Report's Matt Holder recently redrafted every NFL team's worst pick of the past five offseasons. You already know where this is headed, right? However, perhaps a redraft isn't the best option. Maybe we should see Reagor as the catalyst for one of the best positional rebuilds in NFL history.
Holder is correct in stating, "taking the TCU wide receiver in the first round will go down as one of the biggest draft whiffs in NFL history, considering the player who was drafted right after him." He's also right to point out "Howie Roseman made up for his blunder by drafting DeVonta Smith in 2021 and trading for A.J. Brown in 2022".
Here's what he misses. Here's where we connect the dots. Had Philadelphia taken Jefferson, they more than likely wouldn't have drafted DeVonta Smith in Round 1 a year later. They certainly don't trade for A.J. Brown later if they have both of them.
Dare we say that the blunder that was Reagor's addition was some weird blessing in disguise? A.J. and DeVonta have morphed into the best one-two punches we have seen in the game at the wide receiver position. Sure, Jefferson is excellent. He always has been, but raise your hand if you're giving away A.J. or DeVonta. That's what we thought.
Perhaps we've been looking at this the wrong way. Maybe Howie Roseman is so great at his job that, even when he screws things up, they turn out alright.