Eagles Likely to Remain Status Quo at LB

Jim Schwartz's defense usually only uses one linebacker on the field, and the team is high on the ones they have on the roster

Howie Roseman said there would be holes.

Well, he didn’t put it exactly it that way last month at the NFL Scouting Combine when he talked to reporters away from the more public podium format. The Eagles general manager said, “you have to figure out what your priorities are, what are the thing you have to decide you have to have and things you’d like to have or want to have.”

Roseman went on to say that, “we have to make sacrifices somewhere going forward and we’re going to continue to do that.”

And, oh by the way, he gave those answers in a response to how the team will address the linebacker position.

In other words, anyone holding out hope for the Eagles to add a linebacker in free agency, well, it’s probably not going to happen. It may not even happen in the draft, which would be a surprise. After all, they parted ways with Nigel Bradham and Kamu Grugier-Hill.

Hey, every NFL team has holes. It’s how you cover them with what you have is what prevents those holes from becoming killers.

If they do replenish it will likely be on the third day and be someone that will send most fans scrambling to Google.

It’s just the nature of the position and the way the league is heading these days.

A lot of defenses use more nickel packages, especially Eagles defensive coordinator Jim Schwartz, who also likes to play those packages with thee safeties and only one linebacker.

Bradham, who has not yet been signed, was that one linebacker and often played more than 90 percent of the snaps when healthy. Grugier-Hill, who signed a one-year deal with the Miami Dolphins, played 29 percent of the snaps.

Therefore, the need to find one isn’t as great when the Eagles have a few linebackers they really like in Nate Gerry, T.J. Edwards, and Duke Riley. One of them will likely inherit Bradham’s role, and it very well could be Edwards, who played just 11 percent of the snaps last year.

It could also be Gerry, who was the top fill-in for Bradham. Gerry played 61 percent of the snaps but was an inconsistent tackler at times, even though he finished with 67 tackles.

Riley is the longshot, though he is a standout on special teams. Same with Alex Singleton, whose role figures to be only on special teams.

Of course, it’s too early to begin sorting out who will get what snaps, just know, however, it won’t be any of the big-name linebackers available in this draft, such as LSU’s Patrick Queen, Oklahoma’s Kenneth Murray, or Tennessee’s Darrell Taylor.

“You have a limited number of resources and whether it’s draft picks and money,” said Roseman, who now has eight draft picks after shipping away two to acquire cornerback Darius Slay on Thursday. “For us, as we go forward here, there are certain positions on our team that we’ve committed huge resource to, whether it’s picks or money.

“We have to figure out which position we can scout, what we can find. That doesn’t mean if there’s an opportunity to get a great player at a particular position then maybe, in the past we have seemed to undervalue, that we wouldn’t look at that, because we would.”

Not likely, though.