Why Howie Roseman’s misses — Wentz, Jeffery, JJ Arcega-Whiteside — aren’t big misses | Marcus Hayes

It’s easy to pick on Howie Roseman. I’ve done it. Fired him after the 2016 season. Then he won a Super Bowl.

Turns out, my instincts were right. Roseman went on a Vegas-style hot streak in 2017. He rolled 7s on receiver Alshon Jeffery, defensive end Chris Long, running backs LeGarrette Blount, Jay Ajayi, and Corey Clement, and, of course, Nick Foles.

Roseman also wasted a second-round draft pick on Sidney Jones that year. This was more typical of his acumen; in fact, it was the fifth-worst move since his return from exile in 2016. Below are the other four.

Spoiler: They do not include Carson Wentz, Alshon Jeffery, Malik Jackson, or, believe it or not, JJ Arcega-Whiteside. To them, then, first.

When Wentz agreed to a four-year, $128 million contract extension in June of 2019, he was one year removed from an MVP run and was entering his fourth year. He had an injury history, but Roseman considered him worth that risk. He was. Wentz hasn’t missed a start due to injury since he signed the contract.

Further, by signing Wentz before Jared Goff, Dak Prescott, Patrick Mahomes, and DeShaun Watson signed their second contracts, Roseman got a bargain (assuming Prescott signs for big money).

There was no way of knowing in June of 2019 that, by the fall of 2020, Wentz would become so mentally fragile that he would regress historically at the hint of challenge from rookie Jalen Hurts.

Similarly, drafting Hurts was not a mistake. He was a low-budget backup who would have posed no threat to any starter with a backbone. The Eagles drafted Kevin Kolb 36th overall in 2007, when Donovan McNabb was 30. McNabb went to the Pro Bowl two years later.

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A few eyebrows raised when Roseman gave a big, inconsistent, 27-year-old wideout a four-year, $52 million extension in December of 2017, even though by then he’d outperformed his one-year, $9.5 million show-me deal. Those eyebrows lowered when Jeffery caught three touchdown passes in that year’s playoffs, including the defining catch of Super Bowl LII, all while playing with a torn rotator cuff. Jeffery was cast as Wentz’s long-term target of preference.

Jeffery earned his money again in 2018, despite dropping a key pass late in a second-round playoff loss in New Orleans. Then, suddenly, Jeffery got old. In the past two seasons injuries limited Jeffery to 49 catches, five touchdowns, and just 12 starts. He cost more than $21 million against the salary cap in those two seasons, and assuredly will be released soon. But, in the year of his extension and the next, he justified the deal.

Roseman signed Jackson to a three-year, $30 million free-agent deal in 2019, when Jackson was 29. He hadn’t missed a game in six years, figured to pair nicely with fellow defensive tackle Fletcher Cox, and his leadership and versatility would help replace Long, who retired. But Jackson hurt his foot in his first game, which cost him the rest of 2019 and diminished him in 2020. It happens.

Roseman underestimated the value of DK Metcalf in the 2019 draft, when he picked Arcega-Whiteside 57th overall, seven picks before Metcalf — a physical specimen whom several teams considered a risk after a gruesome neck injury suffered in college in October of 2018 threatened his career.

At least six other teams, to differing degrees, made the same misjudgment. Because six other teams also selected inferior receivers before the Seahawks took Metcalf (a seventh, the Titans, drafted A.J. Brown 51st, and he’s been almost as good as Metcalf).

Now, to the other side of the ledger: The inarguable mistakes.

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Old speed receiver with an injury history wastes millions and occupies a roster spot? Completely predictable.

Roseman traded a sixth-round pick for Jackson in March of 2019, then gave him a three-year, $27 million contract extension, moves generally applauded — applauded in error.

Jackson was still fast, but he was 32, and he had missed 14 games the four previous seasons, or 22 percent. He missed 24 games in two seasons as an Eagle, or 75 percent. He was fully healthy for just four games. Roseman cut Jackson two weeks ago, but he cost the Birds more than $17 million — or, about $750,000 per catch.

There’s more.

Jackson’s presence kept the Eagles from considering March 2020 trades for Stefon Diggs, whom the Vikings shipped to the Bills, and then DeAndre Hopkins, whom the Texans shipped to the Cardinals. Diggs cost the Bills a 2020 first-round pick (as well as lesser assets); the Eagles used their first-round pick on raw speedster Jalen Reagor. Hopkins cost the Texans a 2020 second-round pick (as well as lesser assets); the Eagles notoriously used theirs on Hurts, whose mere presence apparently short-circuited the football section of Wentz’s brain.

Hopkins and Diggs went to the Pro Bowl. So did one of Roseman’s other mistakes.

As much as missing on Metcalf will haunt Roseman (more on that later), picking Reagor at No. 21 over Justin Jefferson at No. 22 might be Roseman’s last Waterloo.

Jefferson caught 111 passes for 1,540 yards and 18 touchdowns at LSU in 2019; Reagor went 43-611-5 at TCU. But Reagor ran the 40-yard dash two-tenths of a second faster than Jefferson, and Jefferson moved to the slot as a senior, so the Eagles went all “Mike Mamula” and chose the workout over the work.

The Vikings used the pick they got from Buffalo to draft Jefferson, whose 1,400 receiving yards set a rookie record. He also caught 88 passes, which would have tied the Eagles’ single-season record for catches by a wide receiver.

Reagor finished with 31 catches for 396 yards and one touchdown.

This is not meant to criticize Jalen Mills. The “Green Goblin” was, at his best, a mediocre, seventh-round cornerback who overachieved, both in football and in follicles, for his first four seasons.

Then, in 2020, Roseman used him to replace Malcolm Jenkins, the second-best safety in Eagles history, behind Hall of Famer Brian Dawkins. Somehow, Roseman didn’t anticipate the huge drop-off from Jenkins to Mills in physical ability, football genius, and leadership.

This isn’t to say that the Eagles should have retained Jenkins. In 2020, as a high-mileage 32-year-old who has now played almost every snap for seven consecutive seasons, Jenkins in New Orleans wasn’t the Jenkins of 2014 through 2019 in Philadelphia. Still, the Eagles needed something much better than Mills. They needed something like Jeremy Chinn, a Jenkins-like safety/linebacker whom the Panthers picked 64th — 11 slots after Hurts.

Hmm.

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It’s too early to tell whether Reagor or first-round left tackle Andre Dillard were bad picks.

To be fair, the Eagles got four seasons, 19 1/2 sacks, and the fumble recovery that clinched Super Bowl LII out of 2017 first-rounder Derek Barnett, taken 14th overall, for just $12.8 million. Wentz, drafted No. 2 overall in 2016, gave them a Rookie of the Year and MVP candidate.

But drafting Sidney Jones in the second round of the 2017 draft was a huge mistake.

Roseman used the 43rd overall pick to stash Jones, a cornerback projected as a top-15 pick who’d injured himself preparing for the draft and was not expected to play in 2017. As it turned out, the injury cost Jones all but one game of the 2017 regular season. The Eagles released him out of training camp last summer. He has now started 14 games between Philadelphia and Jacksonville, usually because there were no other options.

Steelers receiver JuJu Smith-Schuster went 19 picks later. Offensive tackles Dion Dawkins and Taylor Moton, taken 20 and 21 picks later, have started every game the past three seasons for the Bills and Panthers, respectively.

The Eagles, meanwhile, have no offensive line depth.

This always has been Roseman’s greatest sin.