Eagles Still Searching for Core Special Teamers

PHILADELPHIA - The Philadelphia Eagles are coming off a special season last year but not everything went to plan.

Lost in the mix of the No. 2 defense and the third-ranked offense was a third phase that underperformed.

Whether you watch the film or accumulated the statistics the Eagles performed poorly on special teams and perhaps it was apropos that a special teams play in Super Bowl LVII (Kadarius Toney’s electric punt return) tilted the game away from Philadelphia and into the hands of the Kansas City Chiefs.

Pro Football Focus graded the Eagles at No. 30 on special teams and Rick Gosselin’s annual cumulative rankings had Philadelphia at No. 31 of 32.

Entering Week 1 at New England the fluff is who will be punting and returning punts against the Patriots (The plan is to elevate punter Arryn Siposs and returner Britain Covey from the practice squad) but the real meat of the matter is who will be covering kicks against All-Pro Marcus Jones.

The Eagles lost two of their core special-teams players to torn Achilles tendons in the preseason, cornerback Zech McPhearson and linebacker Shaun Bradley. Two other cornerstones, safety K’Von Wallace and linebacker Kyron Johnson, were waived.

Other key contributors lost were Zach Pascal, who left for Arizona in free agency, and Nakobe Dean, who is now the starting Mike linebacker, a role that will demand he scale back special teams work.

The new plan seems to be built around linebacker Christian Ellis, who proved to be a revelation when the Eagles pulled the trigger on him in the second half of last season, and second-year cornerback Josh Jobe.

Jobe and rookie third-round pick Sydney Brown are expected to be the gunners against Jones in New England with speedy fourth-round rookie cornerback Kelee Ringo ready to go as well if needed.

Special teams coordinator Michael Clay is taking a position approach to the turnover, also bringing up edge defenders Patrick Johnson and Nolan Smith, the 30th overall pick in April’s draft.

“It definitely brings an excitement on who is going to unveil themselves as those core guys,” Clay said earlier this week. “You have the Christian Elliss’s from last year, who played a big part. Patrick Johnson has been here for a few years.”

Clay then shifted to the youth.

“A lot of these young guys, there’s a lot of excitement around Sydney Brown,” Clay said. He did a lot of good things in training camp. There are a lot of people we were able to throw in there and see what they can do.

“You have Kelee Ringo, Nolan Smith, those freakish athletes that you want to see out there and perform at a high level. I’m very excited to see who unveils themselves to be those core guys because it’s going to be important for us to lean on those guys.”

Clay himself has gotten some more help as well.

Along with his assistants, Tyler Brown and Joe Pannunzio, long-time NFL special teams coordinator Brad Seely spent quite a bit of time at training camp this summer with the Eagles and a core special-teamer told SI.com’s Eagles Today that Seely, who retired after the 2019 season when he was the STC in Houston, continues to work with the team as the regular season nears.