Three Bye Week Personnel Tweaks Eagles Should Consider

The Eagles need to tap into the youth and athleticism of Cooper DeJean and Sydney Brown, while tapping into Bryce Huff's one trick.

Philadelphia Eagles cornerback Cooper DeJean (33) warms up. / Caean Couto-Imagn Images

PHILADELPHIA - The soft bigotry of low expectations doesn’t exist in the current era of Philadelphia Eagles football. If you want to coin a more accurate phrase to explain the state of the fanbase you’d have to do a 180 to perhaps the unrealistic entitlement of unfounded expectations. 

The Eagles are 2-2 during an early bye week but it sure feels worse than the mediocrity that often defines the NFL.

Over a small sample size, Philadelphia has been OK some weeks and uninspiring in others.

Any potential changes are going to be in intangible areas because the personnel, particularly on the offensive side, is largely locked.

However, there are a few personnel tweaks on defense the Eagles should pull the trigger on while waiting to take the field next against Cleveland on Oct. 13.

The first was already foreshadowed bu defensive coordinator Vic Fangio:

START COOPER DEJEAN IN THE NICKEL

A pre-training camp hamstring injury cost DeJean 20 days in the summer that set back the eventual end game of the 40th overall pick in April’s draft being the nickel CB.

The Eagles currently rank 29th in the NFL in defense and No. 27 in passing defense with the major issue being against 11 personnel when the nickel defense is employed.

Veteran Avonte Maddox has been average as the placeholder, allowing completions on 10 of 19 passes when targeted for 115 yards and a touchdown with an 88.7 passer rating allowed per Pro Football Focus.

That said there are not a lot of cards Fangio can pull from the deck he’s been handed and this is one of the few that offers potential upside due to DeJean’s athletic ability.

The Iowa product also showed glimpses of his run-blitzing ability in the preseason finale against Minnesota, a trait Fangio wants in his slot CB and one that could allow the Philadelphia defense to hold up better in run support while employing four-man fronts.

Eagles edge rusher Bryce Huff. / John McMullen/Eagles SI

SCALE BRYCE HUFF BACK

Fangio let the Eagles faithful on his counterintuitive teaching method of throwing a lot at the players early before scaling back.

The time for the latter has come for Bryce Huff, who has generated almost no production in four games despite being signed to a three-year, $51 million contract in the offseason.

The projection from GM Howie Roseman was that Huff could turn into a three-down player and that was Fangio’s directive heading into training camp.

Now it’s about salvaging something and getting Huff back to the guy who had other-worldly pressure percentages for the New York Jets in a limited role over the prior two seasons.

If Huff is only a one-trick pony, let him perform the one trick by limiting him to wide 9 work in obvious passing situations while leaning on Brandon Graham, Josh Sweat, and Milton Williams to handle most of the heavy lifting in run support.

Eagles Sydney Brown / Ed Kracz/Eagles on SI

GET SYDNEY BROWN INVOLVED

The Eagles are expected to start the second-year safety’s practice window next week and Brown is champing at the bit to go. He’s been rehabbing daily and taking mental reps while waiting for the all-clear from his ACL tear suffered in January, an injury that takes a certain amount of time to heal.

That number is 9 months and Brown was injured on Jan. 7. The demarcation line for that is Oct. 7 which is Monday coming off the bye week. Expect Brown to be on the practice field Wednesday and while there will certainly be some rust to knock off, the Eagles need as much athleticism as possible on the field.

Mixing Brown in as the third safety as well as a big nickel and dime player, along with his expected special teams work, should be paramount because veteran safety C.J. Gardner-Johnson has been struggling, allowing a league-high three TD passes while surrendering a 137.5 passer rating and missing eight or nine tackles, depending if you like PFF or TruMedia, a number among the worst in the NFL.

The Eagles can’t live with that kind of play forever and may need an alternative ready sooner rather than later.

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