Eagles' Rashaad Penny Reveals Injury View: 'It's A Gruesome Sport!'

Philadelphia Eagles running back Rashaad Penny talks about his difficulties staying healthy early in his NFL career.

New Philadelphia Eagles running back Rashaad Penny knows what the elephant in the room is. He flashed superstar potential in parts of five seasons with the Seattle Seahawks, averaging 5.7 yards per attempt. But he only played in 42 of a possible 82 games, and as the cliché goes, the best ability is availability. 

However, after signing a one-year deal to join the Eagles this offseason, Penny isn't approaching the upcoming season with the mindset of trying to silence those who don't believe he'll stay healthy. 

"Obviously, it puts me in a place where I gotta prove people wrong. But again, I’m not trying to prove anybody wrong," Penny said of his critics. "I know what I can do. I feel like a lot of people know what I can do as well. It’s just about availability. 

"Again, I don’t go out to get hurt. I don’t think people understand that. I play a very gruesome sport. I play the running back position. I’m taking three or four hits, with maybe two or three guys on my back. ...

"It’s a gruesome sport, and the guys that stayed healthy, I tip my hat off to them because I feel like it’s all luck." 

Certainly, there's a degree of luck that goes into staying healthy as a running back, but five years is a long enough time period for trends to develop. The most games that Penny has played in a season was 14, and that came in his rookie season of 2018. It would be a mistake for the Eagles to plan on Penny playing in 17 games during the regular season. 

The thing is, though, the Eagles - who open the preseason on Saturday against the Ravens - have four legitimate options in the backfield with Penny, D'Andre Swift, Kenneth Gainwell and Boston Scott. Even if Penny does miss time throughout the regular season, if he's healthy when the playoffs come around, he could be the type of piece that pushes the Eagles over the hump in a postseason matchup. And if he's not, the Eagles won't be left without a capable option(s) to carry the ball.  

As we wrote earlier this week, if there's going to be a 1,000-yard rusher on the Eagles this season, Swift is probably the best bet. But if any of the quartet of running backs is going to take over a game in January or February, the feeling here is that Penny is probably the most likely candidate. 

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