There’s no replacing Dallas Goedert, but last year’s stretch leaves clues on how the Eagles might try

The Eagles view Dallas Goedert as irreplaceable, but replace him they must.

Reconvening from the bye week for their first practice Thursday, the Eagles offense faces the daunting task of filling in for Goedert after the star tight end suffered a fractured forearm against the Dallas Cowboys two weeks ago.

There are few players as integral to the Eagles offense as Goedert, who watched practice Thursday in street clothes as the team prepared for a much-anticipated Super Bowl rematch against the Kansas City Chiefs. The 28-year-old’s ability to impact both the run and pass game makes him one of the best tight ends in the league, leaving the Eagles with the challenge of calling on the right combination of players to maintain their offensive success.

“Any time you lose a player to Dallas Goedert’s capabilities, you have to compensate,” Eagles coach Nick Sirianni said. “It’s never just one guy’s responsibility to take all the brunt of that work. It will be by committee. We just don’t have another guy like Dallas Goedert sitting around.”

Even after a slow start to the year, Goedert has 38 catches for 410 yards and two touchdowns on the season. Goedert ranks fifth in run-blocking by Pro Football Focus as well.

The Eagles will turn to reserve tight ends Jack Stoll, Grant Calcaterra, and Albert Okwuegbunam to help compensate for Goedert’s absence, particularly in the run game.

“He’s pound-for-pound one of the best two-way tight ends in the league,” Calcaterra said. “There are a lot of guys who are better blockers and better route-runners, but he’s able to open up so much for our offense because he’s very good at both. Jack and I and Albert are going to try to emulate that as much as you can.”

The Eagles were without Goedert for five games last year and mostly managed to sustain their production over that stretch with Stoll and Calcaterra as the primary replacements. The cluster of games also saw an uptick in targets for Quez Watkins, who had five or more targets in four of the five games Goedert missed.

“We schemed it up a little bit differently,” Stoll said. “We went out there and executed everything we could as a tight-end group and I think we played really well. I think, this year, in my eyes, hopefully they stack a little more responsibility on us and keep growing our roles even with Dallas out.”

That 5-0 run may be instructive for this year’s group, but it’s worth noting that the offense struggled in its first game without Goedert, a 17-16 win over the Indianapolis Colts.

Sirianni said Thursday that the uncharacteristic issues the offense had against the Colts last year were down to more than just Goedert’s absence, but acknowledged it was a contributing factor.

“We learned how to play without him [last year],” Sirianni said “And we continued to improve and it made us just better when he got back.”

Last year’s stretch didn’t lead to massive receiving production for either Stoll or Calcaterra. Stoll finished the year with 11 catches for 123 yards while Calcaterra managed five catches for 81 yards all season.

The Eagles did find success with the two of them in the run game, though. They ran for 363 yards against the Green Bay Packers in Week 12 and managed 253 yards against the New York Giants two weeks later. The level of competition is important to consider — the Giants and Packers ranked 32nd and 31st in efficiency against the run last year — but it was still illustrative of the reserve tight ends’ ability to keep the run game afloat.

“Jack and I were just kind of thrown in there and we tried to not miss a beat,” Calcaterra said. “I felt like him and I did a really good job of keeping the offense going. We ran the [crap] out of the ball when we were out there and the pass game was great. Hopefully we can continue to do that while he’s out for this short period of time and pick up right where he left off.”

As a receiving specialist throughout his college career, Calcaterra had to spend significant time honing his blocking technique over the last two seasons while working with tight ends coach Jason Michael and former Eagles tight end Brent Celek, who has a part-time role in the Eagles front office. That work has paid off; according to PFF, he was the Eagles best run-blocking tight end over Goedert last season and 35th among all tight ends.

“I’ve grown a lot,” Calcaterra said. “Not having done it a lot in college, Celek, and Dallas, and [Michael] have helped me a ton. It’s just about getting those reps in and getting confident with it.

“There’s no way to replace a guy like Dallas Goedert. But I feel like with my skill set, I’m confident I can step in any way that I’m needed to and help fill that void.”

The Eagles will visit the Kansas City Chiefs on Monday Night Football. Join Eagles beat reporters Olivia Reiner and EJ Smith as they dissect the hottest storylines surrounding the team on Gameday Central, live from GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City, Mo.