Latest news with #PhiladelphiaEagles'
USA Today
2 days ago
- Sport
- USA Today
Eagles OTAs: 5 under-the-radar players to watch on offense
Eagles OTAs: 5 under-the-radar players to watch on offense We're looking at five under-the-radar players to watch during the Philadelphia Eagles' three remaining OTA sessions and the mandatory minicamp The Eagles went indoors on Wednesday to hold Day 2 of OTAs in the practice bubble with constant rain going on up and down the Metro Atlantic and the East Coast. The second of six workouts saw Dallas Goedert, Saquon Barkley, and plenty of big names in attendance, while DeVonta Smith, Bryce Huff, and others were absent for personal reasons. Philadelphia has four sessions remaining and will return to the field on Friday, and then they'll be off until Monday and Tuesday, before wrapping up OTAs on Thursday. With a June 10 mandatory minicamp looming before the summer break, we're examining five under-the-radar players to watch. OL Myles Hinton The Eagles drafted three offensive linemen on Day 3. Still, Hinton is intriguing as a potential swing tackle early in his career and will likely compete with veteran Kendall Lamm for that role. WR Terrace Marshall The former LSU star, still only 24, was once a second-round pick in 2021 but has had a disappointing NFL career. Marshall's best season came in 2022, when he had 28 catches for 490 yards and one score with the Panthers. Last season with the Raiders, Marshall had just three catches for 41 yards and offers intriguing athleticism as a long shot. WR Ainias Smith The rookie wideout caught four passes for 35 yards and a touchdown when the team rested its primary starters in Week 18. Still, he was a non-factor on offense during his previous six appearances in the regular season and spent most of the season on the PUP list and injured reserve. He'll enter 2025 looking to prove he can contribute to the passing game and special teams. FB/LB Ben VanSumeren The ultimate throwback player, VanSumeren, is coming back from a knee injury that ended his 2024 season early, and he's also embracing a position switch. VanSumeren, who was signed as an undrafted linebacker a few years ago, is now a full-time fullback for the Eagles and even switched his jersey number to 43. The special team's standout will hang his hat on opening holes for Saquon Barkley. RB/KR/PR Avery Williams Williams, 26, was signed primarily to be a return specialist, but he has played on both sides of the ball during his NFL career. With the Eagles, Williams will play on offense and could add versatility at key positions. WR Darius Cooper – Tarleton State A player to watch, the St. Louis, Missouri native joins the Eagles from Tarleton State, where he earned first-team Associated Press FCS All-America honors in his senior season. The 5-foot-11, 210-pound receiver is athletic and finished second in Division I in receiving yards with 1,450 (the second most in single-season school history) and sixth in touchdowns with 14 (the third most in single-season school history) in 2024. In 48 career games, Cooper accumulated 164 catches for 3,185 yards and 29 touchdowns, averaging 19.4 yards per catch. OL Hollin Pierce – Rutgers The 6-8, 341-pound Trenton, New Jersey native was Rutgers' first offensive lineman to earn All-America status since Anthony Davis in 2009. He also earned second-team All-Big Ten honors in 2024 after starting 13 games at left tackle. WR Taylor Morin – Wake Forest Morin is Wake Forest's all-time leading pass catcher after logging 2,974 yards throughout his career and finished second all-time in school history in receptions (227) and fourth in touchdowns (21). Morin was a 2024 All-ACC Honorable Mention after picking up a team-high 64 catches and 756 yards. Morin has also been used as a punt returner, finishing second in program history in career punt return yards (809).
USA Today
4 days ago
- Sport
- USA Today
Dallas Goedert details the winding road that led him to remain with the Eagles'
Dallas Goedert details the winding road that led him to remain with the Eagles' Dallas Goedert details the offseason journey that eventually led to him reworking his contract to stay in Philadelphia with the Eagles Well, he's back like he never left. That's because, well, he never left. Dallas Goedert had one foot out of the NovaCare Complex's front door for what seemed like an eternity, but the second never followed. In the end, he's still a member of the Philadelphia Eagles' roster, and no one is complaining. Fans love him. So do his coaches and teammates. There were some tough weeks and long days. The nights must have seemed longer than usual. No one can answer that but Goedert. Who can better detail what he was thinking than he? It's no one's story to tell but his. The usually open tight end recently sat with media members to share in detail what happened during the past few months during a contractual disagreement that eventually ended with the longtime Eagle staying home. Dallas Goedert shares his account of the contract dispute and his decision to stay in Philadelphia. Following the second day of Eagles OTAs, several players were made available to the media: Dallas Goedert, Jalyx Hunt, Cooper DeJean, and Quinyon Mitchell. No one was shocked when Dallas was asked about the details of his offseason. Let's be honest. It was going to be hard to imagine him in another jersey, right? Thankfully, he, his agent, and Howie Roseman worked things out, so we don't have to think about that, at least until his contract officially expires and everyone returns to the negotiating table next offseason. It's a challenging discussion to navigate. He's one of the best offensive talents on a roster that's stocked with them, but he's missed 15 combined games because of injury over the past three seasons. He also turns 31 in January, and he's expensive. Players typically don't get stronger, faster, and more durable as they continue to age, and Philadelphia must also begin thinking about paying some of their younger players. Dallas is choosing to focus on the coming season: 'I'm really excited about this year. Obviously, I'd love to play my entire career in Philadelphia, but I'm not too worried about (the future). I'm excited to see what happens this year. Excited to put up a really good year, have a successful year with an incredible team, and let my agent handle his job and talks after the season." Enough said. For now, that's good enough because, despite what has transpired over the past few months, the Eagles are certainly better with Dallas Goedert than they are without him.
The Herald Scotland
6 days ago
- Sport
- The Herald Scotland
Vehicle strikes people during Liverpool FC's parade in England
More: Cheap and deadly: Why vehicle terror attacks like the Bourbon Street ramming are on the rise "We were contacted at just after 6pm today, Monday 26 May, following reports a car had been in collision with a number of pedestrians on Water Street. The car stopped at the scene and a male has been detained." United Kingdom Prime Minister Keir Starmer said he is being updated on developments in Liverpool. "The scenes in Liverpool are appalling -- my thoughts are with all those injured or affected," he said in a post on X. Liverpool sealed the title last month with four games to spare and ended the season with a 10-point lead over second-placed Arsenal in the English professional soccer league. They lifted the trophy after their 1-1 draw with Crystal Palace at Anfield on Sunday. During the celebrations earlier on Monday, the players and staff waved to the crowd from an open-top bus with the words "Ours. Again." emblazoned on the side as red flares were lit along the route, running from Allerton Maze to Blundell Street. The May 26 incident is the latest in a series of sporting celebrations marred by tragedy. In the United States, the Philadelphia Eagles' Super Bowl parade in February saw two people shot. A year before that, a shooting at the Kansas City Chiefs' championship parade killed a mother and injured 20 others. Contributing: Reuters
Yahoo
22-05-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
Saquon Barkley boldly claims that 2024 Eagles were 'a top-5 team of all time'
We're only a few months removed from the Philadelphia Eagles' dominant Super Bowl win to close out the 2024-2025 season. But it's been long enough for Eagles running back Saquon Barkley to make some bold claims about last season's team. On an episode of "Exciting Mics" — a podcast co-hosted by Barkley's Eagles teammates Cooper DeJean and Reed Blankenship — released on Thursday, Barkley told the defensive backs that he believed last year's team should be valued as one of the best teams all-time. "I firmly believe when you look at our team that we had last year, I think we're a top-five team of all time. And I tell my boys this all the time. Like if you really look at the season, outside the first four games, it was belt to a**," Barkley said. "How dominant you guys were on defense, and how dominant we were on offensive and special teams — people don't realize how great of a team that actually was." Advertisement "We were working together," Blankenship chimed in. "After the bye week, we just bought in." Barkley agreed, and added, "When you have the talent and skill that we have in our team, mixed with the coaches, we all play together like how we played, teams really stood no chance." Barkley, DeJean and Blankenship are obviously going to be a bit biased when it comes to the Eagles. But does Barkley's claim hold water? Barkley's key caveat — "outside the first four games" — is kind of a hard one to overlook. The Eagles lost two of their first four games of the year; their two victories were only one-score wins. After a bye week in Week 5, Philadelphia went on a much better run, going 12-1, before cruising through four playoff games to win the Super Bowl. But to ignore those first low-scoring games feels like a major oversight. Advertisement Otherwise, when looking at the season-long stats, the 2024-25 Philadelphia Eagles were an excellent team — especially, as Barkley noted, on defense. The Eagles were arguably the best defense in the league last year, allowing by far the fewest yards (4,732), the fewest offensive plays (999) and the fewest passing yards allowed (2,961), per Pro Football Reference. Opposing teams averaged only 4.7 yards per play, and only one team allowed fewer points (the Chargers, who allowed two fewer points in total). Philadelphia's offense was also incredibly strong, though less so comparatively than its defense. The Eagles had one of the best scoring offenses in the league, but were seventh in key offensive stats like total points and points per game. Philadelphia was top 10 in most of the special teams stats as well. But calling the team an all-time great might be a little bit too strong. Even on defense, Philadelphia's strongest area, the '24-25 Eagles don't quite measure up to some of the greatest defensive teams in the NFL's history. Advertisement Last season, Philadelphia had a DVOA (defense-adjusted value over average) of 21.3%, per Joseph Acosta of SB Nation. That number, per Acosta, is lower than some of the top Super Bowl-winning teams of the past two decades, including the 2004 New England Patriots, 2013 Seattle Seahawks and 2020 Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Those teams (two Tom Brady-led squads, and the Seahawks at the peak of the Legion of Boom era) alone are hard for the 2024 Eagles to square up against — and that's not including all of the legendary teams that came before the turn of the century. With that said, last season's Philadelphia team was a great, cohesive squad — enough that the organization is sticking with most of its biggest pieces. Barkley got a massive extension that can keep him in Philadelphia potentially through 2028; Eagles head coach Nick Sirianni just agreed to a multi-year extension of his own. Now, Barkley and the team will just have to try and replicate that success next season.
Yahoo
22-05-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
Saquon Barkley boldly claims that 2024 Eagles were 'a top-five team of all time'
We're only a few months removed from the Philadelphia Eagles' dominant Super Bowl win to close out the 2024-2025 season. But it's been long enough for Eagles running back Saquon Barkley to make some bold claims about last season's team. On an episode of "Exciting Mics" — a podcast co-hosted by Barkley's Eagles teammates Cooper DeJean and Reed Blankenship — released on Thursday, Barkley told the defensive backs that he believed last year's team should be valued as one of the best teams all-time. "I firmly believe when you look at our team that we had last year, I think we're a top-five team of all time. And I tell my boys this all the time. Like if you really look at the season, outside the first four games, it was belt to a**," Barkley said. "How dominant you guys were on defense, and how dominant we were on offensive and special teams — people don't realize how great of a team that actually was." Advertisement "We were working together," Blankenship chimed in. "After the bye week, we just bought in." Barkley agreed, and added, "When you have the talent and skill that we have in our team, mixed with the coaches, we all play together like how we played, teams really stood no chance." Barkley, DeJean and Blankenship are obviously going to be a bit biased when it comes to the Eagles. But does Barkley's claim hold water? Barkley's key caveat — "outside the first four games" — is kind of a hard one to overlook. The Eagles lost two of their first four games of the year; their two victories were only one-score wins. After a bye week in Week 5, Philadelphia went on a much better run, going 12-1, before cruising through four playoffs games to win the Super Bowl. But to ignore those first low-scoring games feels like a major oversight. Advertisement Otherwise, when looking at the season-long stats, the 2024-25 Philadelphia Eagles were an excellent team — especially, as Barkley noted, on defense. The Eagles were arguably the best defense in the league last year, allowing by far the fewest yards (4732), the fewest offensive plays (999) and the fewest passing yards allowed (2961), per Pro Football Reference. Opposing teams averaged only 4.7 yards per play, and only one team allowed fewer points — the Chargers, who allowed two fewer points in total. Philadelphia's offense was also incredibly strong, though less so comparatively than its defense: The Eagles had one of the best scoring offenses in the league, but was seventh in key offensive stats like total points and points per game. Philadelphia was top 10 in most of the special teams stats as well. But calling the team all-time great might be a little bit too strong. Even in defense, Philadelphia's strongest area, the '24-25 Eagles don't quite measure up to some of the greatest defensive teams in the NFL's history. Advertisement Last season, Philadelphia had a DVOA (defense-adjusted value over average) of 21.3%, per Joseph Acosta of SB Nation. That number, per Acosta is lower than some of the top Super Bowl-winning teams of the past two decades, including the 2004 New England Patriots, 2013 Seattle Seahawks and 2020 Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Those teams (two Tom Brady-led squads, and the Seahawks at the peak of the Legion of Boom era) alone are hard for the 2024 Eagles to square up against — and that's not including all of the legendary teams that came before the turn of the century. With that said, last season's Philadelphia team was a great, cohesive squad — enough that the organization is sticking with most of its biggest pieces. Barkley got a massive extension that can keep him in Philadelphia potentially through 2028; Eagles head coach Nick Sirianni agreed to a multi-year extension of his own. Now, Barkley and the team will just have to try and replicate that success next season.
