A Working-Man's Hero Tops the List at No. 63

Maybe the ultimate lunch-bucket player, Hank Fraley still looks better suited for a beer league softball game than a stint in the NFL, but the former undrafted free agent out of I-AA Robert Morris is about to enter his third decade in the game, now as the offensive line coach of the Detroit Lions.

Fraley didn’t catch on with the Pittsburgh Steelers as an undrafted free agent in 2000 but the Eagles were watching and had the Maryland native crisscrossing the Keystone State after picking him up on waivers.

After a rookie redshirt season, the heady Fraley was installed as the Eagles’ starting center from essentially 2001 until midway through the 2005 season when a shoulder injury put Jamaal Jackson in the mix.

When Jackson beat out Fraley in training camp before the 2006 season, the Eagles dealt Fraley to Cleveland where he spent three more seasons as a starter.

In Philadelphia, Fraley started 71 of the 72 games he played with the organization and another 10 in the playoffs including Super Bowl XXXIX.

That sounds like the resume of a guy from OL factories like Notre Dame, Wisconsin, or Iowa, not Robert Morris.

From now until the Eagles begin the season at Washington on Sept. 13, SI.com EagleMaven will do a jersey countdown, listing the current Eagles player to wear the corresponding number to the days left before the season opener. As a bonus, we will list the top three players in team history to have that number.

Current number 63:

Unassigned. Because of the strange offseason, the Eagles have yet to officially assign numbers to their undrafted free-agent class and Western Michigan center Luke Juriga or Iowa State guard Julian Good-Jones is likely to get the number but we’re still in wait-and-see mode.

Top 3 to wear number 63:

3. Raleigh McKenzie. McKenzie is easily the best actual player who wore the No. 63 for the Eagles but most of his career was spent down I-95 with the Redskins where he played a decade, was a two-time Super Bowl champion and named one of the best 70 players in franchise history.

An extremely versatile interior O-Lineman, McKenzie started games at both guard positions and center for Washington. When he arrived in Philadelphia, McKenzie took over at center for two seasons and started all 32 regular-season games in 1995 and 1996.

From there McKenzie finished his career as a one-year starter with two seasons in San Diego and two more in Green Bay, finishing with 16 professional seasons under his belt as a one-time 11th-round draft selection out of Tennessee.

His brother Reggie had a far shorter NFL career but is best known for a stint as GM of the Oakland Raiders from 2012 to 2018 when Raleigh was a scout.

2. Ron Baker. After two seasons as a reserve with the Baltimore Colts as a 10th-round pick out of Oklahoma State, Baker arrived in Philadelphia for the 1980 Super Bowl season and was a reserve on the interior of the offensive line. By 1981 Baker took over as the starting right guard and kept the job for parts of the next eight seasons.

The latter portion of that stint was during the Buddy Ryan years when the Eagles were notorious for their poor play on the offensive line, including 1986 when Philadelphia gave up an almost unthinkable 104 sacks, a dubious standard that still stands. Baker was a part of that, but he was also the most competent option on that line.

1. Hank Fraley. Overall, Fraley spent nine years in the NFL with 123 starts as a player before he put a degree in organizational leadership to work and made the transition to coaching as the OL coach at the University of San Diego in 2012. By 2014 Fraley was back in the NFL as the assistant O-Line coach with the Vikings for three seasons. A short stint back in college at UCLA led to his current job in Detroit where he started as the assistant OL coach before being promoted for the 2020 season.

Runner-up:

Danny Watkins. Maybe the biggest bust of the Andy Reid era, Watkins ended up playing only eight games for the franchise as the 23rd overall pick in the 2011 draft. Hindsight on Watkins says that the Kelowna, British Columbia native and former firefighter didn’t like football, he was just good at it which was enough to turn him into a prospect at Baylor but not close to enough to make him even serviceable at the NFL level. Watkins, who was also a first-round pick in the CFL Draft, was the oldest first-round NFL selection since 1971 at the age of 26.

Others: Ralph Fritz, Rupert Pate, Bruno Banducci, Albert Baisi, Leo Skladany, Norman Willey, Ken Huxhold, Tom Catlin, Mike Woulfe, Lynn Hoyem, Tom Luken, Daryle Smith, Joe Panos, David Diaz-Infante, Bryan Smith, Jeremy Clark, and David Molk.

John McMullen contributes Eagles coverage for SI.com's EagleMaven and is the NFL Insider for JAKIB Media. You can listen to John every Monday and Friday on SIRIUSXM’s Tony Bruno Show with Harry Mayes, and every Tuesday and Thursday with Eytan Shander on SBNation Radio. You can reach him at jmcmullen44@gmail.com or on Twitter @JFMcMullen