Wanted and Winning: Versatile TE Picked Eagles For A Reason

PHILADELPHIA - Even before NFL free agency, the Eagles highlighted the need to improve their depth at the tight end position en route to a Super Bowl LIX championship.

Philadelphia brought in former Minnesota draft pick Nick Muse to the practice squad after the Vikings’ season ended, and worked out a futures deal with 2023 San Francisco third-round pick Cameron Latu.

In free agency, the Eagles carpet-bombed TE with one-year deals to a pair of versatile reserve tight ends in Harrison Bryant, 27, who spent last season in Las Vegas after a four-year run with Cleveland as a Mackey-Award winning fourth-round pick out of Florida Atlantic, and Kylen Granson, 26, a similar type of player coming off his rookie deal as a fourth-round pick out of SMU by Indianapolis.

Both players have H-back-like versatility with the ability to line up in-line, as a flex player, or even in the backfield as a fullback.

The skinny is that Bryant is the better blocker and Granson the more explosive receiver despite Bryant leading all Division I tight ends with 65 receptions and 1,004 receiving yards as a senior at FAU.

TE Harrison Bryant — Sep 29, 2024; Paradise, Nevada, USA; Las Vegas Raiders tight end Harrison Bryant (84) runs against Cleveland Browns linebacker Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah (6). | Stephen R. Sylvanie-Imagn Images

An NFL life behind Cleveland’s talented Davis Njoku and Las Vegas All-Pro Brock Bowers has forced Bryant to find ways to get on the field and the path to do that has been to refine his technique as a blocker.

“I think I've always been a decent blocker but in college, I just wasn't asked to do it as much,” Bryant said. “So in the NFL not everyone's going to get 50 or 60 targets a year, so you got to find a way to be on the field and that way for me was to improve my blocking.”

The Eagles still have a decision to make at the top of their TE depth chart with Dallas Goedert, who is under contract for the 2025 season but is out of guaranteed money, something that typically foreshadows a need to address the contract.

The back end of the depth chart looks significantly improved, however, whether Bryant and Granson are pushing each other or TE2 Grant Calcaterra.

“I just think it's a great opportunity with a great tight end room,” Bryant said of signing with the Eagles. “And obviously, what's better than signing with the defending Super Bowl champs? That was why I ultimately made a decision to come here was to just play on a winning team.

“... At the end of the day, I just wanted to come to a place where I was wanted with a winning organization.”

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