What To Make Of Eagles’ Latest Vic Bombs

PHILADELPHIA - Vic Fangio's press conferences have become appointment viewing as a mirage in the oasis of typical NFL spin.

Except the Eagles’ well-regarded defensive coordinator is no mirage, and his answers are his real unfiltered thoughts without the political bent that most of his peers feel the need to operate with.

Tuesday’s pre-practice session was chock-full of interesting nuggets, starting with a somewhat tepid review of veteran cornerback Adoree’ Jackson, a player who seemed to be gaining on pre-camp favorite Kelee Ringo for the outside CB job opposite Quinyon Mitchell.

ADOREE’ JACKSON:

First, Fangio downplayed the early positive perceptions of Jackson.

“The first few days out here, he was kind of like he didn't know he was out there. The ball wasn't going his way at all,” the veteran DC said.

It pivoted to positivity from there.

Aforee Jackson — Adoree Jackson during an Eagles training camp practice. | Ed Kracz/Eagles on SI

“Then [Monday], he had a couple balls thrown his way and he did very well,” said Fangio. “He had a very good day yesterday.”

What was curious was that Fangio pointed to GM Howie Roseman spearheading the signing of Jackson without much input.

“I didn't watch a whole lot of tape on him,” Fangio admitted. "Howie wanted to sign him, and when Howie wants to sign somebody, it doesn't matter what I say. So we just took him in."

The translation there is that Fangio would probably prefer the gifted Ringo gets the job or perhaps even someone like Eli Ricks, who hasn’t been mentioned much, rather than Jackson.

TOO MUCH 11 PERSONNEL?

Fangio noted that he’d prefer to test Cooper DeJean at safety a little bit more, but the Eagles’ offense is in 11 personnel too much to get the requisite work in.

“I think it's going fine,” Fangio told Eagles On SI when asked about DeJean’s dual role between safety in the base defense and the slot in nickel. “We just haven't, to be honest, we haven't had enough snaps of it for him [at safety]. Our offense is primarily playing 11 personnel out there against us, so we haven't had a ton of base snaps up to this point. I'd like to see him get some more and get him tested. I don't know that he's ever truly been tested yet with a hard play.”

The advantage of practice vs. a preseason game is that you can script what you want to work on, so the follow-up for Fangio was about doing that with head coach Nick Sirianni.

“I mean we'd like to be able to. Right now we haven't been able to,” Fangio said.

My initial thought to that was uh oh, the communication between the head coach and the DC is not clicking all cylinders before Brandon Lee Gowton of BleedingGreenNation.com brought me back to the idea that Fangio was floating the idea to practice more, something that he’s been a proponent of and has gotten his way with the overall rep count far greater than the pre-Fangio era.

ONE-ON-ONES

The most popular part of any camp is the one-on-one drills between the offensive linemen and the defensive front, with work between the receivers and defensive backs a tad behind, and pass protection drills with the backs against the inside linebackers also an underrated piece of the puzzle.

The problem is that those drills are not nearly as important as most believe they are, and Fangio was quick to pour cold water on their value when asked how much he weighed one-on-ones as opposed to team drills when evaluating players.

“Me personally, I don't weigh [one-one-ones] a lot,” Fangio bluntly stated.

An example of Fangio's sentiment on the field has been second-year receiver Ainias Smith doing some nice things with a ton of space against a star like DeJean in one-on-ones. In team drills, that hasn’t translated at all.

COMING FOR CAM

Eagles Pro Bowl center Cam Jurgens probably overstepped on Monday when he explained that the offense was still installing things while Fangio’s defense was working with a full deck.

“Totally installed? No,” Fangio said when asked about Jurgens’ assessment.

When asked for clarification, who said the defense was installed, Fangio bandied back playfully, “Our center? We've got some stuff for him.”

Since this reporter asked the question, this will serve as my public apology to Jurgens, who might be seeing some curveballs over the next few days.

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