Mekhi Becton answered a major Eagles question with ‘control’ in his debut at right guard

How would it go, and what would it look like?

Jason Kelce was gone, replaced at center by the next in line, Cam Jurgens, whose vacated post at right guard was filled by a career tackle, Mekhi Becton, who in 1,726 NFL snaps and three seasons before that at Louisville had never played guard.

The Eagles have for years fielded one of the NFL’s best offensive lines, but they took to the field at Corinthians Arena on Friday in a foreign country with a somewhat foreign front, albeit a big one, and it was fair to wonder how it might play out. Especially with Becton, a player who, to some degree, is at a crossroads in his NFL career — a 25-year-old picked 11th overall just four years ago now on a prove-it contract, whose future in this league revolves around how this goes.

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The Eagles liked what they’d seen from Becton since they signed him in late April and the offseason program began a month later. But Green Bay on Friday night was always going to provide some clarity on whether offensive line coach Jeff Stoutland’s hunch to try Becton at guard was the right one. Kenny Clark mans the middle of a formidable Packers front, and despite head coach Nick Sirianni’s insistence that hard practices and a joint practice qualify as real reps, Friday was for real.

Stoutland rarely is wrong. Series after series during the Eagles’ 34-29 win Friday, Becton proved the longtime offensive line coach right and helped answer one of the major question marks hanging over the Eagles as their new season begins.

Becton at times pushed Clark aside with ease. He looked agile at the second level at 363 pounds. He pulled to the other side of the line like a seasoned guard.

On Jalen Hurts’ touchdown pass to Saquon Barkley in the second quarter, Becton moved quickly to his left to pick up a blitzing Quay Walker, allowing Hurts space to move to his right and time to find Barkley in the end zone. Later, Becton dominated Clark one-on-one, forcing one of the better defensive tackles in the league to the ground on Hurts’ touchdown throw to A.J. Brown.

Hurts took 41 snaps with a passing play called, and Becton allowed just two hurries and pressures, according to Pro Football Focus. His 80 pass-blocking grade was behind only Lane Johnson and Jordan Mailata along the five-man front.

“Mekhi is so big,” Sirianni said, “and what you saw there with Mekhi on Friday night was — he was going against good players, that’s a good front — he was controlling them at the line of scrimmage, and there wasn’t a lot of pushback into Jalen’s face because he’s so big and so long that he was able to control there.”

Becton, who also helped execute the silent count snap, was formidable in the running game, knocking off defenders in the next level. On Barkley’s first touchdown run, he had the help of Jurgens, but the duo opened a huge hole.

Further tests await, but Becton certainly passed the first one.

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Kelce’s departure also meant the Eagles had to go on without the man who made the Tush Push, or Brotherly Shove, so successful.

But the quarterback sneak that the Eagles have mastered more than any other team is here to stay, at least for now. The Eagles tried it four times Friday night and were successful just twice, one failure coming after Hurts wasn’t able to secure a snap from Jurgens.

Sirianni was asked about the play’s past and future Monday afternoon. He did his best in a long answer on the topic to say a lot without saying anything at all. He said he didn’t want to give too much away on what made the play so potent in the past and why he thinks it can still be moving forward.

The NFL, after some speculation that the play would be eliminated, opted to leave the play in the rule book, but with a bit of a modification. Those doing the pushing now must line up farther behind the quarterback, eliminating a scenario in which nonquarterbacks are lined up just off the line of scrimmage and immediately pushing the quarterback from behind.

“Some of the things we were challenged with on Friday night made it more challenging to be successful on that play,” Sirianni said.

Maybe it was the field he was referring to, or maybe it was something else.

“I was pleased with the way we were getting some push on some of them,” Sirianni said. “We have some things to clean up.”

On one of the successful attempts — a third-and-1 from the Packers’ 13-yard line — the Eagles got quite a bit of push, with Jurgens and the interior line, and with the pushing help of Dallas Goedert and Barkley behind Hurts.

Barkley found the end zone on the next play.