'I'm Excited!': Eagles DT Fletcher Cox Chimes in on Cam Jurgens' RG Experiment

Philadelphia Eagles defensive tackle Fletcher Cox is looking forward to the battles between he and Cam Jurgens at training camp.
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The Cam Jurgens Experiment will be must-watch this spring when the Philadelphia Eagles begin OTAs, and Fletcher Cox will have a front-row seat.

The Eagles defensive tackle will get to line up across from Jurgens as the second-year offensive lineman begins his audition to be the starting right guard after Isaac Seumalo left the position up for grabs when he bolted for the Pittsburgh Steelers in free agency.

“He’s taken some reps at guard, so I don’t think it’ll be all new to him, but it’s different than playing center,” Cox told his former teammate, Chris Long, on Long’s “Green Light” podcast recently. “I’m excited to see him, if he ends up in that position, grow.”

Cox then threw down a challenge, in a roundabout sort of way.

“He’d be at right guard and we’ll have our battle during training camp if he’s put in that position, and it’ll only make him better,” said Cox.

If he ends up that position are key words, though, because it’s a big if.

Eagles coach Nick Sirianni was asked if Jurgens is “the leader in the clubhouse” to be the starting right guard during last week’s NFL owners’ meetings in Phoenix.

“You don’t have to get into the leader in the clubhouse at this particular point,” Sirianni said. “We’ll always see what we can do to play the best five that we have right there. Cam had a really good year of sitting behind one of the best players in franchise history, one of the best centers in the history of this game.”

Jurgens spent the year learning from none other than center Jason Kelce, but also others on what is arguably the best offensive line in the league.

"I can definitely work (right guard) into the offseason," said Jurgens, days after the Eagles’ season ended in the Super Bowl and during the team’s locker room cleanout day. "And we’ll be back here for OTAs as well.

"I mean, I’m going to approach it the same as any offseason, go in expecting to get better, get stronger, and the offseason is a good time to work on speed, strength, and skill. And when you get back to the team, you work on position stuff, and we’ll see.”

The Eagles are scheduled to report to the team’s facility for their offseason program, which is supervised workouts and conditioning. The first OTA is May 22-23, with eight more OTAs to follow through June 9.

“Whatever the decision is, I’ll be OK either way,” said Jurgens on the decision on who the starter at right guard wil be. “I’d love to learn under (Kelce) or play next to him for another year. That would be pretty cool."


Ed Kracz covers the Philadelphia Eagles for SI Fan Nation Eagles Today and co-host of the Eagles Unfiltered Podcast. please follow him on Twitter: @kracze.

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Ed Kracz
ED KRACZ

Ed Kracz has been covering the Eagles full-time for over a decade and has written about Philadelphia sports since 1996. He wrote about the Phillies in the 2008 and 2009 World Series, the Flyers in their 2010 Stanely Cup playoff run to the finals, and was in Minnesota when the Eagles secured their first-ever Super Bowl win in 2017. Ed has received multiple writing awards as a sports journalist, including several top-five finishes in the Associated Press Sports Editors awards.