Football at Four: Eagles Free Agency After Week 1

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It's the Monday.

That means it's time to check in with Jeff Mosher

from the inside of the Birds Park.

Yes, in Philly Voice, he joins us right now.

Here on 9-7-3 ES, being his Jeff,

it's never boring when it comes to the Philadelphia Eagles, is it?

No, never has been.

Never boring.

Actually, Josh.

I would say, you know, free agency for them

has sort of been a little boring now that I think about.

And I mean, they lose out on Jalen Phillips,

who's, you know, that would have been a big splash

had they made it.

And, you know, Dallas Goddard's nice bringing back,

but, you know, he was sort of a fixture here for a while.

I don't know, maybe they're starting to get a little boring.

Well, maybe it's a good thing then,

because maybe boring is the new sign of success,

because you don't have to be crazy.

By the way, can I just say, I said this earlier in the show.

I think Jalen Phillips is a nice guy.

Everyone seems to like him as a person.

But he said the biggest load of horse manure

this morning, a good morning football.

When he said the reason why he went to the Carolina Panthers

is because they have a great football culture.

He's always wanted to play for a team like that.

And it's like, no, no, no.

Yeah, what the Carolina, because they offered you $30 million.

All right, we're not going to be mad at you, Jalen,

to say that you were, you had the opportunity

to make life changing money.

Like, come on, man.

Well, that's true, but I think that not only does he not

want to just say it's about the money.

I think, you know, when you're trying to acclimate yourself

to a new town, you try to praise it.

I mean, yes, it's, this has been going on for the longest time,

you know, I think saying whatever.

I remember, yeah, it's funny.

I remember a long time ago, you'll remember this.

Like Mike Hampton, you remember the left-handed pitcher?

Oh, yeah.

The Mets of Rockies.

Right, the Mets trade for him.

He finishes out his year.

Mets think they're going to resign him.

He goes to Simon Colorado, big deal, which

was terrible career move.

But in his press conference, he makes some remark.

Well, they did the school system was just unbeatable.

You can't beat the school system in Denver, Colorado, I guess,

or whatever.

The Colorado suburbs, right?

And like, you know, the New York media had fun with,

oh, yeah, like there's really no good private schools

in Manhattan or Queens right away, you know,

I mean, New York City school system, private school system,

where it probably cost you 25,000 a year to go, right?

I'm sure that's not very good.

No, like I said, people, you know, people say anything.

Well, here's what we'll say.

I think probably the biggest news,

eagles wise of the last few days is the Dallas Goddard

signing yesterday, because this is a guy, Jeff,

that agreed not once but twice to push back the void date.

So he obviously wanted to be here.

You know, again, he's actually going to make less money

than he made last year.

So, you know, what does it say to you that a guy in Goddard

who did directly could have opened free agency,

could have gone through the 15 minutes of dating

and he was like, you know, a cycle with everybody.

He said, no, I really want to be here,

especially after everything that's happened

in the last couple of years.

Yeah, hey, he must like the football culture

you're in Philadelphia.

Now, look, it's not, hasn't been a very fruitful market

for tight ends.

I mean, you know, the joke who's still out there,

Waller's still out there,

John who Smith is still out there.

I forget someone signed for a deal that was around

eight million, seven million that I felt might get more.

And I think it made it a little easier

and more reasonable for both the Eagles and Dallas

to make it work when the market for tight end

for whatever reason.

And that happens every free agency, right?

There's like a market that hits

and there's a market that doesn't hit.

And tight end just didn't hit.

Do you think it didn't hit?

Because also maybe the draft class,

if people are looking ahead to the draft class

and saying, hey, I really want to get in on some of those guys

instead of spending money on guys,

you maybe they're upcycling.

Like, no offense Isaiah likely.

He got a nice little contract from the Giants.

I think the AAD is like 13 million.

But you can argue that there's five or six guys

in this draft class whose potential is higher

than Isaiah likely.

Yeah, it's possible that certainly is the case.

I think it's just the more there weren't that many young

tight ends like Isaiah likely.

You know, the guys I just mentioned were,

you know, whether it's in the joke

or Goddard or John who Smith or Waller, right?

I mean, they've all been around the league.

If there was, you know, likely,

yeah, I mean, I think if there was a young,

if Goddard was maybe three or four years younger,

he probably would have hit a little bit harder

on the money, you know, or better on the money scale.

But you're right.

Teams are seeing the age of tight end

and seeing how good of a tight end class this was.

And last year, a couple of teams loaded up on the,

there weren't that many good tight ends last year,

but they were, it was a top heavy group.

So yeah, it just created a year

where the market wasn't so great.

Now, of course, Goddard signs for a one-year deal

so did Grand Calcutera.

So the, not trying to put words in the Eagles mouth,

but to me, one-year deals to me is a clear signal

that they are going to look at tight end in this draft

considering they have two guys under one-year contracts.

Yeah, I mean, they have to,

they had to do it whether they signed Goddard or not

because you're right.

You look at Goddard one year,

him, Calcutera one year, month one year,

a lot to last year or a two year.

So, technically, they might have zero tight ends

under contract in 2027.

So they need to rebuild the position.

It's a position that they've done an excellent job

if you think about it.

For almost two decades of being able to go from one

to another to another starter, right?

From Chad Lewis, LJ Smith, Brent Selick,

to Zach Erts, to Dallas Goddard.

Okay, I don't think I missed any starter out between there.

That's about 15 to 20 years of really good tight end play.

So I thought they were going to do it last year.

It didn't work out, but by bringing back Goddard here

for a year, it does allow them to draft a tight end.

If they don't draft a tight end this year,

then maybe suddenly they don't value the position

the way they used to.

I don't think that's the case,

but I really think that it makes a whole lot of sense

for this year for them to be able to draft a tight end.

So they don't have to reach now, right?

Because they do have Goddard.

You don't have to use your first round pick and say,

I can't line up and play a football game right now

unless I use a first round pick on a tight end

because you have Goddard and Calcantara

and some at a little bit of depth there, Monk.

Absolutely, Jeff Mosher joining us

from the inside of Bird's podcast,

and Philly Voice at Jeff P. Mosher on the X platform here

on the sports bench football and four on 973 ESPN.

So with that being said, okay, so Goddard's back.

We got that check mark, right?

They bring in Rick Woolen.

They got that check mark.

There's still a couple other situations

where they have holes to fill, right?

Safety being one, edge rusher being another.

We know the Eagles in the past,

some of their biggest moves, Jeff,

have not come during the month of March.

Are they've come late March, April, May?

So how important is it to remind people out there

that how we season does not end

when the first week of free agency ends

is how he's season is all season, right?

Oh, I mean, LeGarrett Blunt,

a huge part of their first Super Bowl success,

I think was a May signing.

Yes, he was.

Well, McIbectin was signed the day after the third day

of the draft, so like April 29th or 30th, two years ago.

CJ Gardner Johnson was acquired via trade a week

before the start of the season.

August 30th.

There you go.

Johan Dodson as well, although he wouldn't,

I wouldn't call him as high impact,

but the point is the Eagles,

well, I mean, Chris Long,

the Eagles will continue to always add to their roster,

all throughout how he says this all the time.

They all see that it's not the first two weeks free agency.

It's not just the draft.

There's plenty of time to use the trade market

and late signings to help your team.

I always will remember LeGarrett Blunt was,

when he was signed by the Eagles, Jeff,

because he was signed on my birthday.

Oh, what a happy birthday that was, yeah.

It's a happy birthday, John.

Here's LeGarrett Blunt.

He's going to run people over for a Super Bowl champion.

I'm going to talk about that day on the radio.

I will say, though, that you make this point

and I think that people can be misled, though,

when you say do they need a guy at safety, right?

And they need a guy at wide receiver,

but they actually need more than a guy.

I mean, these are positions they need a starter and depth.

Take a look at safety, right?

So they have Andrew Mahuba.

Their number two safety right now is whom?

Carter?

Mike, okay.

So he's in the mix and he's not even played safety

in a long time.

Sydney Brown is not going to play defense for this team.

We don't have that.

I'm so glad you said that.

I said that before you came on, Jeff,

about how I think the Sydney Brown lack of development

is a coverage safety and becoming more of a special team's guy

has kind of pigeonholed the Eagles roster wise

to have a guy who like they want them for special teams,

but he ain't going out there and starting 17 games

of safety, right?

Right.

So you look at the situation and you say,

you have one starter and you have a really nothing after that

that you feel really confident about if there's an injury.

So they absolutely need a safety

and then they need a number three safety

of which could come by the drafts, who knows.

But the and same thing a wide receiver.

AJ Brown stays, that's great.

If he does, if not, they of course need

an outside wide receiver, right?

And Devonte, but who's their number three wide receiver

right now with Johan Dotson gone?

I mean, and that's why I think they really need to get themselves

a slot, a real true slot wide receiver.

Not a Z miscast as one the way Dotson was.

And when Adam and I were talking about that on the podcast

that dropped this morning, I asked him to read me the list

and I was like, hey, you know what?

There's some pretty, there's like Keenan Allen

and Adam Thielin and there was somebody else he mentioned them.

I'm like, Keenan Allen just had 80 catches,

you know, last year for the charge.

That's pretty good for a guy at his age.

Get a guy like that.

One year deal, obviously, you know,

some of them may want a little bit more

than just a veteran minimum, I don't know.

But I would take Adam Thielin,

you're not playing this guy 70% of the game anyway,

because you're still going to be

in a 12 personal decent.

But get some guy who's played the slot

and knows how to play it and then build your depth,

you know, missing on Anaya Smith,

a couple years ago, hurt them.

Johnny Wilson's injury last year hurt them.

And Darius Cooper, I liked when I saw from him, Josh,

and I think he can be a player in this league.

I think he's probably more of an outside receiver,

you know, they did play him in the slot

when they wanted to run and put him in there

because he's a big body guy.

Maybe he can acclimate it, but you can't bank on that.

Now, by the way, one guy just got taken off the market

just now as we're talking Christian Kirk.

He just signed a one-year-old guy.

He just signed a one-year deal with the 49ers.

Which is so smart, right?

And oh, my man, the Niners,

what a quietly good off season they've had, right?

With Mike Evans, they bring back Drake, Reno,

they just signed Kirk.

They're going to get through that brand-of-the-you situation.

They obviously have a good offense.

We know that they'll get Bosa back from the ACL.

It's a team that won 12 games with like

popsicle sticks and gum of a roster, right?

Especially on defense.

So that's a really smart signing by them.

That was one of the guys I had to mention

that I thought would be perfect for the Eagles.

Does Kirk then signed with the 49ers

make Juan Jennings more interesting for the Eagles?

Sure, and that's the kind of guy

I think would really function well,

but I would say you could probably look

at some Google aside.

I think throughout his 49ers career,

he's kind of wanted like a decent amount of money

for who he is, right?

And he's always seemingly asking from one running.

I don't, the Eagles are not putting out

a lot of cash here.

So, but listen,

and the Eagles still have to get themselves an edge.

So that's the other conversation.

Who's left?

Nobody in free agency that's going to give you

the equivalent of what you were hoping for at a jail

in Phillips.

So now you have all that money to spend

that you were going to spend on jail in Phillips.

Where does it go?

Because now how he's got to be creative

in the trade market, find an edge,

and then maybe give that guy an extension.

See, my problem with Jennings is the injury history.

This guy has had numerous injuries over the years,

but he keeps demanding he wants more targets.

It's like, well, get on the field, man.

Like he went, you want more targets?

Can you be, can you play?

Who's on the ball?

I think that's always a problem with some of these guys.

And that is like, they value themselves.

I don't blame them for that.

And so, so high.

Look at you on Phillips.

He took a huge game with a free agent.

Mark, he cashed in big, good for him.

But like, John Jennings has some self-awareness to be like,

hey, if no one's going to want to give you the money,

get a good something.

Like, I think the Rick Wolland deal

should be the model for a guy like Jennings to be like,

go get a one-year deal and just ball out

and then go with the market again.

Yeah, that's not a bad suggestion.

And you know what, all he has to do

is use the tape against the Eagles game

to show what he can do.

Because he made the Eagles look silly

on a couple of big catches in that game.

Come on here for Jeff Musher from the Inside of Birch Park.

Yes, Billy Voice, check out all of his writing

about the Eagles over there.

Other news that came out today,

David Darius Slay retiring officially from the NFL.

Now, I will clarify,

he has been talking about retiring

after 13 years for about the last three years.

So, if you have any listening to this podcast,

he has talked about on his pod

about how he wanted to play 13 years number tire.

So, although he was surprised,

but I do think it's opportunity for us to talk about

the value that he brought to the Eagles.

Because I remember when he was a choir, Jeff,

there was a long death of like good corners

for Philadelphia for many years.

And you could argue that the Eagles

would have not had this success,

not just on the field,

but the development of the younger players

like the regimes and the Mitchell's

if Slay wasn't on this team for those years.

One of the most significant trade acquisitions

by the Eagles over the last 25 years.

I mean, Jason Peters probably number one, right?

But you can put Slay, I'm trying to think who else.

I mean, obviously AJ Brown up there,

but you know what, Slay is in that mold.

And because you could even,

I don't want to put him above Peters,

because Peters is so good.

But honestly, they won the Super Bowl without Peters

because he was hurt.

Slay was so vital because as you just mentioned,

for years, for 20 freaking years,

the Eagles were drafting corners, signing corners,

trying to get corners.

And you know, they did win their first Super Bowl

without Slay, they wasn't on team then,

but they were just getting by.

I mean, they gave a 500 freaking passing yards

in the Super Bowl, but Slay was finally the answer.

I mean, it was sort of like the white whale for the Eagles, right?

Like finally, they had a corner who was good.

They only had to give him a third and a fifth round

picked to get him.

And you know, that first year was 2020,

so it was rough because the team was just terrible

and imploded, but it started to pay off very next year.

He was a pro baller again,

and then the year after that, they win a Super Bowl.

And then he winds up sticking around a couple of years

longer, and he winds up making three probals

with the Eagle, find a cornerback to make three probals

for the Eagles in the last 20, I think Lido made two.

I don't think he made three,

and I don't think Sheldon made any actually.

He was really good, but sort of solid.

I have to go back and look at Lido.

Lido made two.

Lido made two.

All right, this guy made three just with the Eagles,

and I think six in his career.

So he was, and first of all, also not to be forgotten,

he was a glue guy in the locker room.

Yes, the young kid, especially Quenia Mitchell

and DeGene learned a lot from him.

He was great.

Accountable, he was accountable.

He was good with sports writers, not that that matters,

but it's just, he's set a good example.

But, though, he's one of the matters.

There's a reason why that matters is,

sorry to interrupt you, but I got to point this out

because I pointed that earlier.

He showed the younger player.

He showed the other players how to handle the media.

That's important, because I don't think Cooper DeGene

would be as talkative as he is with the media now.

I don't think Jordan Davis would be evolved

into the talkative guy with me now.

If Slay didn't take those guys aside,

and directly and indirectly show them the way.

Very possible, Josh.

I mean, Cooper and both Quenia and Cooper

came from the small market.

I was a big college football team,

but it's a smaller market, right?

And of course, Salino.

So yeah, I think he did set an example.

And again, I mean, it just, I think for the Eagle fan,

to finally see a cornerback come in here and work out

after some really disastrous years

in between, say, the Lido and the Sheldon

and the Asante Samuel years,

it was probably really a welcome edition.

It was definitely a welcome edition.

And with that being said, I would be surprised

that the Eagles draft more secondary depth

in the draft this year.

I mean, just because of the fact, like you said,

it's not just safety.

It's, you know, people keep bringing up to us

on the text board, Jeff, about how,

well, you know, Cooper could play safety,

but my mind keeps going back to you.

How many times have the Fangio said,

we're not going to play Cooper somewhere else

unless we have a good enough slot corner.

So they've made it very clear that, at least Fangio has.

I think the Eagles are bad through their,

their moves and their signings and they're not going

to move Cooper to Jean to safety

unless they have a bona fide slot corner.

I agree with that.

I agree.

And that's why Rick Wolland is here

because they want him to be a good enough,

at least good enough outside corner

to keep Cooper to Jean in the slot.

And we'll see what they do at safety.

I still think, well, I know.

I know when the Eagles drafted Cooper to Jean,

they viewed him as an outside corner.

That's how they viewed him.

Some teams viewed him as a safety.

Eagles viewed him as an outside corner

who could thrive in the nickel.

So just because they're hurting at safety,

doesn't mean Cooper's going to play there.

It's funny because around OTA's last year

was a big storyline.

It was practicing at safety on the first team base defense.

And then that just went away

because he started practicing at corner

on the first team base defense.

Well, we will continue to monitor

how the Eagles progressed to the offseason.

By the time Jeff Mosher returns

with us back on Wednesday here for football at four,

the Eagles could have made another addition.

And then we'll have to announce that guy's name, right?

We will, we'll hopefully, we will.

Who's your file for Josh?

Oh my goodness.

Do you want to tell me Wednesday?

I'll tell you Wednesday.

I haven't even done a bracket yet.

Like, come on, it's Monday.

You got to get on this thing, man.

Well, you know, I'm doing,

I'm here by myself in the studio.

You know, I'll cry a river for a hot second.

You know, I'm doing a contest in between the breaks.

You know, I got my guild texting me yesterday

that people are trying to qualify for a contest.

I'm like, come on, man.

Do I get one day to myself?

Like, we're not even know,

Gil was going to be off today.

Where is he at?

He, this is his week to get a clear water.

Oh, of course.

I mean, I guess Egypt wasn't enough.

Jeez.

Let's see, I guess it's my fault.

I should have texted you and Adam and let you guys know.

That's okay.

That's the same way it was over the course of the prize.

All right, we'll chat Wednesday.

Give me some good sleep.

I'll, I have some.

St. John's got screwed, by the way.

And I'm a, I'm a Yukon fan, you know,

being from Connecticut and all,

but like terrible that they got the fifth seed

in the same bracket as Yukon getting the two.

That's awful.

Yeah, I mean, for me, the only,

the only thing I'm really hot on right now

that comes to the tournament is,

I keep waffling about how much I believe in Arizona.

That's like my big thing.

Oh, I'm still with you.

I'm trying to, I'm looking at that Nova Arizona

second round potential matchup thinking,

Nova can win that game.

I do think Nova can win that game.

The craziest thing about the tournament nowadays

is that for, for as much NIL money is out there

being thrown around, Jeff.

It's not like it created like that much more parody.

It's not like you're going to,

I don't, I don't think you're going to see,

like, you know, one lose was 16 ever again.

You know what I mean?

I don't think that stuff's going to happen anymore.

Yeah, I agree.

I think, I think the NIL has made the blue bloods bluer.

Right.

Yeah.

Yeah, just a good dude.

They got all the, got all the boozers.

Yeah.

Yes.

Duke and Michigan, to me are the clear best.

I think Florida is just a little tick below,

although they could beat them.

And then if for as errors, I think,

I actually like Iowa State a lot.

They're kind of like a sleeper for me,

but I don't really see anybody after those first three

that I think I would give like a really good shot at winning.

I like Michigan State, the baby scares somebody.

I think I have to really.

Well, I mean, every year, Mizo, sure.

Well, I mean, it's just like, you know, that,

that team feels like a body shot team.

It's like, you know, if you ever watched like a boxer,

they go through their premiere and they're like,

like a knockout artist, right?

And then they were the one guy that's like a

auto-goddy Mickey Ward guy who just body shots you the death.

Like I feel like Michigan State could body shot a team like Duke

and just like wear them out.

I could see that.

And you know, I think they're, they're the three

and where the Yukon is the two.

So I could absolutely see them beaten up on Yukon

to get to that game.

All right, John, I'll have some more concise answers

for you and Winston.

I'll be my homework.

Yeah, I was a little disappointed, Josh.

You have to come, come better Wednesday.

I'll do my best.

Thanks, my man.

Tomorrow, tomorrow, we'll be better than ever.

Jeff, thanks, man.

Appreciate it.

See you.