PHILADELPHIA -- The Philadelphia Eagles’ journey to the past may finally have gone a bridge too far.
When ESPN’s Adam Schefter reported Sunday that the Eagles were unlikely to use the franchise tag on quarterback Sam Bradford, it sounded logical. The franchise tag for quarterbacks is going to cost more than $20 million. That would be reason enough for the Eagles, or any team, to avoid using it.
But the Eagles’ peculiar history with the tag makes their use of it even more unlikely. The Eagles twice used the franchise tag on players who didn’t want to be tagged. With Jeremiah Trotter and Corey Simon, the team wound up rescinding the tag, losing the players to free agency.
Imagine that kind of friction with the team’s starting quarterback. Over the years, the Eagles have demonstrated a clear understanding of the importance of keeping the starting quarterback comfortable with his contract. They were quick to do big long-term contracts with Donovan McNabb and Michael Vick, and even overpaid Kevin Kolb during his brief tenure as the No. 1 quarterback.
Handcuffing Bradford with a one-year contract -- even at that generous salary -- would create all kinds of issues. Would both sides be willing to commit to a long-term contract? Would the team hold the 2017 franchise tag over Bradford’s head for leverage? What happens if Bradford plays below expectations in 2016? And what affect would contract uncertainty have on Bradford’s performance?
Those are all serious concerns about using the franchise tag. But the second part of Schefter’s report was really eyebrow-raising. Schefter said the Eagles could possibly look to replace Bradford with Nick Foles.
So far, Eagles owner Jeff Lurie has dismissed head coach Chip Kelly, returned deposed general manager Howie Roseman to power and hired Doug Pederson from Andy Reid’s staff. Those moves don’t guarantee that the Eagles will be better off than they would have been with Kelly. But they all have a reasonable chance of working out.
That chance will be greatly improved if the Eagles move forward by making sound, smart decisions. Perhaps the worst thing Roseman and Pederson can do is judge current players by their provenance. Don’t dismiss Bradford -- or Kiko Alonso or DeMarco Murray or Nelson Agholor -- because of a connection to Kelly. Judge them based on their performance and their potential.
It’s hard to believe the current Eagles could prefer Foles to Bradford based purely on their performance or their potential. It is true that the Eagles drafted Foles in 2012, and that Pederson was the quarterbacks coach sent to work him out.
But the Eagles took Foles in the third round, and he played like a third-round rookie under Reid and Pederson in 2012. Foles had half an excellent season in 2013, but that was thanks largely to playing Kelly’s offense. Foles showed in 2014 that he wasn’t able to sustain his 2013 level of play.
Could a return to Pederson’s Reid-derived offense get Foles back to that kind of performance? Possibly. But is there a better chance of that than of Bradford continuing to make progress in his second season after ACL surgery? It is tough to make the case for Foles in those terms.
And that’s the issue. The Eagles took Foles with the 88th pick of the 2012 draft. They were also interested in Russell Wilson, but Seattle took him earlier in the third round. They chose Foles over Kirk Cousins.
The Eagles never had a chance to draft Bradford. He was taken with the first overall pick of the 2010 draft. The Eagles took Brandon Graham with the 13th pick of that draft. They were convinced Vick would be their quarterback for the next few years at that point, but the other QB options that year were Tim Tebow, Jimmy Clausen and Colt McCoy.
Kelly arrived in Philadelphia after it was clear Vick wasn’t the answer and after Foles had been drafted. He did the best he could with that, adding Matt Barkley in 2013 and Mark Sanchez in 2014. After two seasons of that, Kelly made the bold move for Bradford.
It would be shortsighted and wrong to blame Bradford for that. The Eagles don’t have to bring Bradford back, but they do have to come up with a more promising alternative. Rewinding the clock to 2012 isn’t good enough.
