On the Shane Page #23: Do we love the Devin White signing? + Free Agency News Roundup

we may live over 5,000 miles from Lincoln Financial Field but what we lack in proximity we make up for in the film study and each and every week we'll be bringing you in-depth film breakdowns from across the pond and the sooner state welcome to on the Shane page I am your host Shane half you can follow me on Twitter Shane half NFL and I'm joined today by BG's own film Guru Johnny page give him a follow on Twitter at Johnny page9 Johnny how are you doing this evening yeah I'm not bad we were speaking off there and I've just realized that uh I'm very ill and my voice has been gone and I was worried about this podcast I've survived but I've got my tea here and I've realized that I don't I always thinket it's a video podcast so I got this very colorful strange like strong man style mug that looks very weird and I realized I've screwed up because my Eagles mug is downstairs and I've just realized and now I'm very sad I don't have the Eagles mug for the Eagles podcast but that would take preparation Shane I watch a lot of film but I don't prepare anything else uh what you hear what you hear here is very little preparation time it's basically everything I've seen in the film and then I just Waffle and I didn't even prepare the Eagles mug but yeah you've got building work going on as always I've got a dodgy voice but except for that I think everything's good I think it's been an interesting one actually because I think me and you have probably faced more criticism in the past three days than we have for a while um on our anti Dev white stance but I actually don't think I was too critical on my film review I'm sort of mixed on on Devon white so I think this will be an interesting one I think yeah we're going to talk quite a lot about him because I've watched a lot of him he was a player that I really wanted to watch so I basically haven't watched anyone else I spent all of my time on Devon white um so I feel like I've got a really good idea of what he's like so I think this will be a good one if you're here for in-depth Devon white breakdown then I reckon this is as good as it gets in the podcast Universe because there's probably not too many people too mental to watch as much Devon white as I have the past few days yeah um I made a lot of I made a lot of Eagles Twitter upet with Me by pointing out that I wasn't thrilled with Devon white um and then I made more of Eagles Twitter angry with me when I said I liked trading for Kenny picket and then I made even more of Eagles Twitter mad at me when I said I would have rather traded for Justin Fields so I lit Eagles Twitter on Pi on fire this week apparently um man Justin Fields is a guy you don't ever want to mention on Twitter because people just go mental um but yeah I love the mug H you're gonna have listeners like sending you Eagles mugs now or something if they can find your address I don't know unfortunately I my my daily coffee companion for the last four years met its in this morning it got knocked off of the counter so I had to I eulogized it on Twitter earlier so I'm gonna have to switch up mugs as well I tell you what is actually a true fact as well Shan is my mug is from Philly so I bought a mug and a glass from Lincoln Financial Field in 2016 the glass rip has not made it uh too many troops of a dishwasher for a glass for that equals glass as fire but the mug has survived despite trips to work in the bag it has lived on I've been repping Philly at work a lot but yes it is from Lincoln Financial Field from the official Stadium uh yet instead I have this random mug and not the Eagles one but yeah that was the only two things I bought as well as a Jeremy mcklin Jersey so it was not the most successful trip to linol fin field actually and we lost to the Cowboys when I went uh so really that wasn't a great trip in hindsight looking back at it obviously it was awesome because I went to Philly everything else connected to that day was a disaster but there we go Jerry Mackin Jersey is somewhere in the uh cover behind me maybe it will get a show one it will get an appearance on One show but poor Jeremy mcklin what could have been anyway let's not let's not really I have to ask when an Englishman goes to Philly do they visit all of the American independence memorials in Philadelphia do you boyot those when a history teacher does then he definitely does uh my holiday trips are basically history trips with a little bit of science seeeing involved but yes I didn't start chanting R Britannia I didn't wave the British flags uh people did realize I was British very quickly I actually meant Brett ced's dad which is a weird story so Brent celik's dad was in the truck selling food outside and I went to order something from him and the second I got there he just looked at me and went what the hell are you doing here and that was my sign that I sounded a lot more British than I realized I never realized that's just how British I sounded actually until I've started speaking on a podcast everyone tweets how British I am because I'm so used to American accents whenever I play any NFL podcast which is frequently my wife will come in and do her best American accent and for me the American accent is just normal because I've spent years listening to Americans on podcasts so I think in my brain I sound the same as the American podcasts and it's not until I've started actually talking that I've realized from the many many tweets of people saying wait you're British yes am and yes I do sound a lot more British than I realized but there you go my my mother-in-law swears that I edit this podcast and speed your voice up because she thinks you sound a lot faster speaking than I do I like I listen when I go back and listen to this podcast I listen to It sped up at like one and a half speed anyways so yeah my my my motto always is I've either got a lot to say or I've got a bunch of rubbage to say and the quicker you say it people won't actually taking any of it so hopefully it's the first one but if it's not for some people then yes uh slowing down my speech is actually a big Target of mine but when I get excited about something I find it very hard to maybe that's something you can play if I start talking really quickly about somebody then you know it's either really irritating me or I'm genuinely excited if I'm remaining calm I'm thinking it through because naturally I do like to uh get through as much as physically possible which is probably Wiest podcast uh last about an hour when we s last half an hour every week um sorry Shane I've just literally seen the most bizarre news of all time um okay like genuinely I know we're not doing a Broncos podcast but Ian rapero has just tweeted that Jerry Judy has agreed a contract with the Browns for three gear 58 million with 41 million guaranteed Jerry Judy what on Earth is going on with the wide receiver Market that is possibly the biggest overpay I've I've ever seen that's am I missing something like the Jerry Judy that nobody wanted that I mean I liked him pre-draft he's got three years 58 million yeah I mean that is that's a rich contract especially when you consider what they're already paying DeShaun Watson I mean Jerry Judy still never had a thousand yard season he got 19 million in a year and it's not even all like one of those rubbish contracts where it's only the first year he got 41 guaranteed at signing that is mental so when people talk about sa barley deal just remember that you can always just pay 19 million for Jerry Judy what a talk about banking on upside sorry nothing Ste Eagles it's just come up I've got rap sheet notifications off on my phone of course and that's just pinged up and I've like just it's taking me back um weird look at what some of the other guys did like Gabe Davis and uh who was I can't remember Darnell Mooney the contracts they got I said on Twitter earlier in free agency that's the strongest possible argument that you should just be drafting a receiver in the second or the third round every single year the receiver Market's insane uh that's kind of that's a crazy contract just draft them there's like probably like five or six guys at least are better or more exciting than that's sorry that is it makes me feel bit about the saquon barley do as well because who's going to be better for your offense next year Sequon Barkley or Gabe Davis or Jerry Judy it's like it's it's not comparable it it's weird what a weird uh contract Market what especially when there's so many good receivers in the draft it like doesn't make sense like the the market has gone nuts at the same time that there's hundreds of good well not hundreds slight exaggeration on my behalf uh but there's multiple good receivers every year that is just that one shocked me not many contracts really shocked me that one has shocked me um right it's eight minute shame we have to SP about Deon white should we get into it shall we get into it maybe we should maybe we should so uh we will dive in we're gonna spend some time on Devin white and then we'll rapid fire the rest of the Eagles free agent signings uh Andor trade Acquisitions uh at least that's the plan so we'll see where we get to so let's start with Devon white uh who received a one-year uh it was reported as up to 7.5 million contract uh we since know that is a one-year $4 million contract uh with 3.5 million guaranteed and then incentives can bring that up to seven and a half million so basically a $4 million base 3.5 guaranteed so he'll be on the roster uh we've got some stats we've got some film uh we can get into Devon white now I know there's a contingent of Eagles Twitter that was really excited about the Devon white signing and I know this because I was live on a podcast the week before or the day before excuse me the Devon white signing and there was a lot of people in chat that were uh throwing Devon white out as a name and they were really excited and so certainly I expect those people to be pretty excited by the Devon white signing I I'm a little I'm cooler on Devon white I think you were as well and we were briefly mentioned off air and then said we just hash it out on podcast how our views changed watching him a little more uh in depth so do you want to start with stats here you want to start with film you want to start with your initial Impressions let's do your stats do your stats and then I'll go a little bit more in depth in film after for like do you want to give us like the generic Devon white breakdown of last year and thenan I'll go a little bit more specific on what I've watched okay so I tweeted this out you can go find it on Twitter at Shane half NFL obviously if you're watching on YouTube it's up here on the screen uh like I do for all the Eagles players at the end of the year I tweet out their stats uh from Sports info Solutions their PF F grades where those rank Etc so this was among all qualifying linebackers of which there were 69 and to qualify you had to play 500 total snaps with at least a hundred of those snaps being in coverage so we're trying to exclude the Hassan reic that primarily just rushed the passer so he played 857 snaps in 2023 uh he had 437 coverage snaps uh in those coverage snaps he had two interceptions two passes defensed uh again this is per Sports info Solutions he allowed a completion percentage on 55.6% of passes which he was targeted which actually ranked seventh among all linebackers uh but his deserved catch percentage was 85% which was 41st among linebackers his passer rating allowed was 42.6 which ranked second uh yards per coverage snap3 which ranked 10th as EPA per Target was negative .560 which was third now it's worth mentioning that coverage stats are really tricky particularly for linebackers because charting Services don't know the call sometimes it's really hard to figure out um who who exactly is responsible for what so you can take those with a grain assault but at least they're a snapshot uh he rushed the passer 116 times which was eighth and he had two and a half sacks a 2.2% sack rate which ranked 4 45th 22 pressures an 18.8% pressure rate which was 37th and then when it comes to tackles uh he had 81 tackles seven tackles for loss an average tackle depth of 2.4 yards and his broken tackle plus Miss tackle rate was 10% which ranked 35th and then of course he had his PFF grades PFF really doesn't like Devon white uh he ranked second to last in defense grade second to last in run offense grade 21st in tackle grade 42nd in pass rush grade and 44th in coverage grade so PFF definitely does not like Devin white uh I posted out on Twitter right after the signing his PFF grades and like they're all red so he he's pretty much never had an average PFF grade uh his stuff from Sports info Solutions painted a little better picture this year H so that's kind of the stats on Devon white also just say up front like I wasn't excited by this deal now I do feel a lot better about the deal knowing it's four million with incentives rather than seven and a half million because at seven and a half million you know I really start to question why not get Jerome Baker why not go pay a million more dollars for Jordan Brooks and some of those guys that why not keep TJ Edwards from last year which certainly you can't just go get him back but TJ Edwards signed for six and a half million a year uh so seeing the numbers come out that it's a lower contract that makes me feel a little bit better um but overall I think Devon I I went into the film thinking Devin white is really bad in coverage but he's a good pass rusher he's a good tackler he's Elite athlete as terms of speed and things and I don't think coming out of the field out of the film I've changed those views a lot other than to say he's a I still think he's not very good in coverage but I think his speed allows him to like get to the right place at times if that makes sense uh and I actually think I overestimated how good he was as a pass thrusher because I think most of that also comes from his speed so he's kind of the epitome of a speed wins player I don't think he like stacks and sheds blocks well I don't think he's really got good pass rush moves he just blows by people and in coverage I think he generally doesn't do like the best job staying connected to guys but I feel like he can make up a lot of ground in a hurry if he reads you know out the play correctly so H there's a lot of raw athleticism with Devon white there's a lot of upside with him um and we'll see if the Eagles are able to get him there I think at the end of the day the Devon white signing is a lot of it's it's a it's basically low risk uh it's high reward potentially and you know the upside is he's an elite athlete he's been utilized well as a Blitzer in the past we all know the Eagles defense lacked Youth and speed last year Deon white brings Youth and speed and so if you can get disciplined play out of him he could be a Difference Maker I wouldn't say that has happened in five years of his NFL career but there has been flashes and so low base salary high incentives I don't want this to make the Eagles think they have properly addressed the linebacker position but he's going to be uh it's going to be an upgrade over what the Eagles were rolling out last year um at least over Nicholas Morrow like I would still like Zack Cunningham to be a part of that picture because I do think Cunningham's pretty good as a run Defender but that's kind of where I was at after circling around I know you've got some film examples we'll show here and talk through some more things but what did I miss as I was watching white what did you see that I missed I think we're pretty similar um so I went in expecting a guy that was just like a bit gung-ho just like all over the place running round uh sort of getting beat by play action uh offens is like taking advantage of him and I didn't really see that he was a lot more disciplined than I thought actually at times um the obvious one is the pass rushing like we don't need to talk about that too much um I agree with you I don't think he's a great pass rusher but he is because he's so fast if that makes sense so if guys get hands on him he struggles to get off Blocks he's not an edge Defender by any means but he's just so fast that if you're going to send a blitz and you're going to send an overload for example you're going to send six on five as every team did against Eagles last year Deon white is brilliant because he'll get to the quarterback in a second quicke and most normal Lineback as well um I I feel like big picture what I'm really interested by this signing is that he is coming from a scheme that is totally different to the fangio scheme like you just can't see ex I try to find examples of Zone coverage where he's like picking up slot receivers or um running down the field with tight ends or doing more like Zone match stuff and it's just not really there like there are some examples of Zone coverage that I thought oh I I can see what the eagles's like but it's such a projection it's like a huge projection they are going to be hoping massively that fanjo can Reign him in and just big picture I'm a little worried about how light this defense is in general against a run it feels like Howe and the Eagles organization really value undersized speedsters at linebacker right now um and I'm guessing that's because of the trend of going to a more modern NFL and more passing and we know the Eagles want to stop explosive plays but I think on a downto down basis they're going to be light against the run so the thing that I noticed about um Devin white is and this is going to sound really basic but this is as simple as I can make it if he's and let's talk about Run game first if he's kept clean he's really good so if you can keep him clean he's strong now when I say kept clean what do I mean by that if you look at um play threee on my film review Shane so it sounds really basic to say kept clean because sometimes he does a good job keeping himself clean so this is an example where he's basically not blocked he looks very quick he gets downhill very quickly so this is easy to be kept clean like I watched this play and thought right I'm not exactly wowed by it no one's going through anyway so but there's also examples which is better uh which is play eight on my film Fred no no it's not it is uh play this is good podcasting there is a good example where he has kept clean on my film Fred and uh maybe that was the one I was on about anyway there is another one where he has kept clean I'm sure I tweeted it where basically he manages to avoid the offensive linan because of his speed it is play eight I don't know what I'm doing I'm going mad it is play eight so this is an example where I think a guard or a tackle actually trying to get to him at the second level it's a tackle but he's too quick and he avoids The Tackle now that is when he's really good so you got two examples there you got one example where he simply isn't blocked and one example where he's too quick um for the lineman that is when he's good and I think I've said this before about the Bryce Huff signing the Eagles are putting so much faith in Jordan Davis next year like the more I see the way this team is built Shane they are really trusting him Carter Milton Williams to take on some double teams because they're all light like everyone's lightweight Huff's lightweight noan Smith's lightweight the Kobe Dean's not exactly big I want say he's lightweight but he's not exactly big he's a fast guy Devin White Run game wise if he's kept clean he fine he's a good tackler and he's very fast at coming downhill the problem is if we just do Run game first he is so lightweight when it comes to getting off contact so if you look at film Fred uh 10 for example um this is the classic like stack and shed where you get a pulling guard and if you go back to like football 10 years ago you get those are pulling guards and you get big strong linebackers taking on the guard at the point of attack he has no interest in taking him on like none he this game Shane the 49ers game and I didn't just watch one game before people tweeted me saying it was one game I had one person saying we don't care about the 49ers because they're so good that's not relevant I'm like if you want to win things they're the kind of games you should be watching if you want to learn about a player you learn about them from the toughest games he was appallingly bad against the 49ers now it was his worst game like I watched about five or six and I based it off P grades and they gave him the worst one he had some games where he was good he was good against the Jags he was good against the Vikings but he's really passive downhill and that's not the only example I saw um clip 12 is the one that will scare a lot of people because this is a tight end blocking him a tight end look how much he is moved by a tight end here Shane that's not on offensive line he is being carried if you're not watching you're listening to a podcast I'm not exaggerating when I say six yards laterally six steps he's just moved like there is no strength at the point of attack he is lightweight as hell so that's why I'm talking about how you need to keep him clean in the Run game and again I go back to you're going to put Faith in Jordan Davis that Jordan Davis is going to clog up um two offensive lineman and keep Devon white clean and the final negative I'll show Run game why wise Shane is what I thought i' see more I didn't see as much of this but look at play 11 he has plays where I just don't know what he's looking at like I watch his play a lot um and I he's just got completely confused like if you pulls this play um when the guard pulls like I watch this quite a lot it seems pretty obvious the 54 is it David is basically taking on the um pulling guard Deon white is basically actually kept free like he is actually in this situation he's like the the lone man and it looks obvious that they're playing already outside 54 is taking the outside shoulder 98 is taking outside like there's the Gap it's right in front of you and he runs past it and again we're not in the room it could be that 98 is playing this wrong Deon white is meant to be exchanging and he's meant to set the edge so I'm not going to comment too much but the way it looks defensively to me it looks worrying so I think Run game wise where the Eagles really struggled last year you've got a guy that can be really efficient if you keep him clean and he can be really explosive in terms of coming downhill but the Run game scares me more than the coverage the coverage I'm not as worried by it's the Run game that bothers me and I think there's a general theme about the Eagles at the moment is that they're weak against the run and he builds up a picture of an undersized defense that is very fast very explosive but I think you're gonna get some teams try and Bully the Eagles next year um teams are going to look at if you have lay out a starting front seven and you've got Devon white the Kobe Dean Bryce huff and Nolan Smith out there at four of your seven or even three of your seven if you take out noan Smith and say put a Josh out there I think teams are going to look at that and say yeah we can run on that and then you go back to a vanio style where you're going to have two deep safeties and they might be plus one in the box if I'm an offensive coordinator going into playing inter Eagles next year I'm thinking we can bully this team up front and again I go back to that word or that name Jordan Davis I think huge Faith huge Faith currently the way this team is constructed now they don't have a big Lineback they're all undersized uh I really liked what we saw from Ben vaniman last year as well when his one start he's also about 220 230 P I know that linebacker is changing position and people are trying to put safeties at linebacker these days and that people are becoming undersized but I think the Eagles are a little bit light um before we do coverage because I've got some clips for that is anything you wanted to add there just to his run defense before I get into the coverage stuff no I mean I think you covered that pretty well like he he always he's a good tackler and he's strong and powerful he's like you mentioned on on your film threat about him not giving up a lot of yards after contact if he's kept clean and and to be honest like that's kind of what the scouting report on nicoe Dean was not for the size but just that he was a good run Defender but if he was kept clean and he was playing behind Jordan Davis and Jaylen Carter funnily enough in college and so the whole thing was keep ncoe Dean clean in college and he can fly downfield and make plays in The Run game and it feels a little bit like doubling down on that and he does he's got great range with his speed but like you mentioned not identifying the gaps and his responsibilities sometimes and uh you know people pointed out his I think he was a second team All Pro in 2020 the year they won the Super Bowl or whatever year that was was that 20 I can't remember now but it's like well he had nine sacks that year and also you know he was on a Super Bowl team so he got a lot of attention and he was playing next to Levante David who did a lot in terms of like pointing things out to him pre- snap and and getting him lined up and he's kind of a point and shoot player I feel like and the Eagles don't have that presence now maybe you're hoping that can be ncoe Dean but ncoi Dean doesn't really have a lot of reps either and so I share your concerns uh especially against the run that you know the Eagles just added Josh Huff who we talked about last week that's not necessarily a good run Defender and you've got you should do a drink every time you say Josh H shine oh I did that on Twitter too I did that on Twitter and somebody called me out for saying I was going to do it on the podcast but I'm just going to start saying last names the Eagles added Huff last we talked about Huff last week and light against the run and this has been the Eagles Achilles heel and you would like for it not to be your Achilles heel when you've drafted defensive tackles backto back years and you know the top 14 uh but it goes back to that little dichotomy we said last week you cannot be light at Edge have poor linebacker Play and play light boxes and expect to stop the run so I think the Eagles are hoping uh that Devon white is a key cog in helping uh remedy the linebacker problem h i I remain unconvinced as far as that goes in the Run game though I do think it's going to start a lot more up front if they're able to keep him clean like you said I think you summed up the point there Shane in some ways where you said they drafted two defensive lineman in the top 14 I think that is the the plan um just very quickly then we'll move on because we don't spend too long on him and I think we've sort of said our thoughts I'm I'm similar to you I think he's better than Maro Cunningham he's better than sha Leonard definitely um I would have liked maybe a someone a little bit better or a little bit more consistent let's say because I'm fed up at Eagles linebackers being awful but the difference between this one I will admit is when you watch him he's obviously Got Talent like this is not a guy that hasn't gotten his tent like nich I liked to an extent and Zack Cunningham I even liked to an extent but they were very limited like they just got beat because they couldn't physically do it like the top guys whereas if Devon white Works don't get me wrong he's gonna have some really good games he's gonna make some explosive plays like a little bit en coverage that surprised me so as you said I don't want to make football sound very basic but sometimes all sports are very basic he's really fast and when you're really fast you can make plays that players who aren't as fast so if you go to uh clip two Shane now I tweeted this saying like Please be aware I actually do not watch the highlights I did not look at highlights on my Fred if you watch all my Freds you'll see there are four games only it's because I only watched five games so I did not go in say I want to watch a game when he got sack this interception is just like nuts like I mean you can count on one hand how many middle linebackers can make plays like that in the league so he's lined up as a blitzing in the a gap and he's not even like off the board like he's really in the a gap he Sprints back and manages to pick off a comeback about what 15 yards down the field and Trevor law doesn't throw us late he throws it before the guy comes out his break like this is just one of those players you're like yeah Nicholas Moro Zack Cunningham they're never making this play like never ever ever um and that's the upside you get in coverage and I would like I'm praying Shane that he was not a hoe Roseman signing which I think he probably was but I hope they really looked at him with fanio because I am guessing that Fano is looking at it going you know what if we just teach him how to play own coverage we're going to get someone who's really really useful in coverage because there's not a lot of players that can make plays like that there are some other plays I really liked so there was and noce I haven't showed any examples of in blitzing here Shane because if you want to watch that just literally watch any highlight package of Deon white go on my FR I've got some or just go on YouTube and type Deon white sacks he can fly after the quarterback I'm not really worried about talking about that because it's quite basic if you look at play six this is probably my favorite play of his um which s of sums up the sad person I am because it's a nothing play but the Vikings use motion to try and create like a stretch to the left and all of this play is basically to get Deon white in the middle of the field moving to the left so you can hit the backside dig you can see Kurt Cousins looks to his left he knows exactly what he's doing and Deon white starts to move but he's so quick and he's got the ability to redirect and I'm not blaming him for moving either every Defender moves with the quarterback's eyes and motion but you can see that is pure film room from Kurt Cousins if you watch a little pump fake from Kurt Cousins he's not even trying to throw that to the because in fact he's actually got the numbers to the left he could throw this to the left this is purely about moving Deon white behind the camera angle now this one's the best one if you just watch Kurt Cousins on this all of this play is deliberately designed to get get to get Deon white to move he is not trying to throw this ball look at this pump fake this is not like he's not reading this out this is by Design he is going exactly to that backside dig and that's really good by De well like that's really good he doesn't commit and he's got the speed to get back to the throwing Lane he creates that sack in many ways the upside is there like the potential is there and he's that kind of guy I've written this in my film review it's not been posted yet but he's the kind of guy that coaches will watch the film and go I I can work with him give me that guy and I'll fix him and the problem is after five years in the league you're probably not going to fix him but coaches are arrogant of course they are they wouldn't be where they were in their career and they're still arrogant they're I think any head coach or offensive defensive coach is not incredibly uh optimistic about their own beliefs of course they are that's part of being high level coaching he's the kind of guy that when you turn it on you'll see plays like that and you go I can I can work with that because he's got talent the problem is Shane is that talent doesn't always matter if you make mistakes like this now if you go to clip 13 You can disagree with me here and I'm not going to kill him too much for this one because it's possible you could argue that we don't know how he's been coached but if you look at this he's in basically the same Zone there's a guy running an intermediate out right behind him and he complet completely vacates his Zone and goes chasing the quarterback now you're not playing Lamar Jackson you're playing Kurt Cousins there's a guy chasing him out the pocket there's also a guy closer to you you that's just easy and to me that's about awareness and I think that's what Deon white lacks after five years do I think he's gonna get that probably not but if Vic vano wants him and fanjo signed off on it and he thinks he can convert him and he thinks he can teach him the way that he wants his defense to be played I think the ability and coverage is there he was better in coverage than I thought I expected worse I expected more of this on tape I actually didn't see as much of it um I didn't tweet this clip out because I I didn't want to go past 14 for a de white Fred but there was a clip I watched of him covering George K down the scene and he ran with him effortlessly like he just ran alongside him um there's a couple of clips of him covering running backs in the flat we know fangio scheme asks a lot of one-on-one with running backs because essentially if you play a team team that plays trips to one side bit of scheme nerdiness here but if you play a team that plays trips to one side three receivers on one side loads of teams do that what the Eagles will often call on the fio will probably be a tricks call which essentially means you'll play four over three on that trip site and what that does is it locks up your quarterback who's on the single receiver in man coverage and your linebacker if he's on the same side as the running back will be locked up with the man cover in man coverage with running back one-onone um that means Deon white will probably have to play more man coverage last year in the games I watched he didn't do it a lot but in the games I watched of him he looked pretty competent doing it he looked pretty good handling running back and Titans out in the flat because of his speed um do you want him matched up with the best rout runners in the league no but that's the same as basically 99% of the linebackers that's always a bad matchup but when you've got speed you can cover up faults I actually I'm slightly more optimistic than I was before when when I saw the news because I am a little bit sick of just a lack of talent at linebacker it's not just about bad play I'm a little bit Fed Up of just guys that don't deserve to be starting that really just do not have the requisite athleticism to be starting linebackers I think at the very least you haven't got to worry about that with Evan Wy if he can make three or five Splash plays a game makes one or two bonehead plays a game but plays the rest of the time pretty well then the Eagles have had a pretty big upgrade so I'm not completely out it's not the signing I would have made it's not the type of linebacker I would have signed but I'm not going to kill the move too much for the reasons that I've out L um that's about as in depth on Deon white as I think I can go Shane I think there's a there's enough there for the real film sios to get stuck into um but overall yeah I don't hate the signing I don't love it it's like a six 6.5 out of 10 for me personally yeah you talked about his his ability to play Man coverage and that's one thing where if you are have Elite Speed and sometimes there's struggles with awareness like you want that guy in man coverage not trying to read multiple things out in zone it's just this is your guy like take him and don't worry about complex rules and if this guy goes vertical you cover this guy and and I think there's some really good applications uh some really good usage for Devon white in that area um you know just you're our backside linebacker you have the running back if he comes out of the back field like I think those are things he can handle better than you know trying to be a hole Defender and cover two and things like that I think that's going to be a little bit more of a struggle for him and so one of the nice things about a lot of the matching coverages that Vic fangio runs is it's going to end up with Devon white manned up on somebody and I think that is a good usage for his skill set um another thing we mentioned that he's not necessarily a good pass rusher um but he's productive rushing the passer because he's just so fast and uh if you get hands on him you can kind of slow him down well Vic fangio runs a lot of these creeper type pressures where he's going to uh BR he's gonna have the one Tech this is going to be too scheme nerdy but he'll have the one technique like cross the face of the center and rush into that Gap and he'll also bring a linebacker from that side and then drop out the backside Edge rusher so in effect you're still rushing for but like all four of them come from one side of the center and it's really hard for people to pick up and it messes with their slide protection rules and things and like that would that's something that's a good fit for Devon white because you're trying to just let him explode up field and you know go chase the quarterback you can utilize him in some spy situations we talked about if you flash all the way back to the fio podcast that they try to play even like their cover three zones they try to play more like fire zone with a bonus dropper so instead of you know three three deep four underneath it's three deep three underneath with a bonus guy you can sort of do whatever with and we talked about you know the advantage to doing that is that bonus guy you can just let him do whatever you want uh you know if you're playing the Ravens you can run that coverage and you can have you know Devin white spy on Lamar Jackson if you're playing uh I don't know if you're playing the 49ers you've got yeah you're playing the Saints you've got Alvin Kamar out of the backfield you can play that same coverage and just tell your bonus dropper and Devon white like you've got Kamar out of the back field and so I think there's some creative things that you can do with him like I said H it's not a very big contract I feel better about the numbers than what was initially reported um and we'll see it's an upgrade it's the Eagles and getting some speed on the field at linebacker and that's certainly not a bad thing H and we'll see hopefully fangio is able to use him in some creative ways just quickly shy and this is the very very very last thing because we got about 10 minutes left we said we wanted to do and we can do very quick fire but as I said we said this before this podcast is meant to be more in depth so we're not going to go in depth on every single free agan signing because quite simply we haven't got the time to watch them all yet either if you actually want me to us to watch these PL it does take time but I had two really good tweets from bux fans um which is always nice when you get guys on Twitter that you've never followed that uh You' never even heard of I genuinely didn't read any Devon white film reviews everything I've said is purely based on the games I watched but somebody replied called real Buck talk who is I believe is a film analysis YouTube channel they got 5,000 followers um they tweet me saying basically they agree they say he they said great Fred they said he's very inconsistent he can be effective when he has openings to work with which is what I spoke about um but it's only in flashes and then there was another YouTube video that somebody has uh linked to me that said that basically it's called what happened to Devin white saying about how good he was in the Super Bowl and they basically said when Vita ve is in there and he's kept clean he is able to float the ball a lot better and it goes back to my point said it many times today huge trust in Jordan Davis next year he is going to have to be the Eagles vitaa um and he's really going to have to help keep Deon white clean because if Devon white isn't kept clean then this signing will be a problem um right let's move on because we haven't got long so what let's do a very quick free agency uh news news Roundup and uh do you want to start with Kenny picket seeing as he's the one they got the people mad let's do it so we'll talk about we'll rapid fire some of these others so uh the eagle this wasn't a free agent move but it was a trade so we'll talk about it they traded um for Kenny picket so they gave up 98 overall which is their compensatory third round pick that they got from Javon hardgrave leaving so 98 overall and two sth round picks next year which they had four so that's fine for Kenny picket and a 2024 fourth round pick which is pick 120 so according to trade value charts moving from pick 98 to 120 is the equivalent of trading the 120th pick so essentially they got Kenny picket for the pick difference of a fourth round mid fourth round pick and the two sevenths next year which are pretty much throwaways so that's the compensation my initial take on the picket deal um I liked it that the Eagles have shown that they're going to invest in backup quarterback and I would rather you go get Kenny picket who you're going to pay like $3 million this year then go pay Marcus Mariota six or seven or eight million I really don't want to be drafting another quarterback because they've already got Tanner mcke as their developmental guy so uh I didn't mind the move at all I thought there were lot of Eagles fans that were really upset by the Kenny picket thing I mean at the end of the day I didn't have a first round grade on Kenny picket I had a second round grade on him but and he's been bad at times but Al he's been in a really bad situation I mean their their offensive coordinator uh Matt Canada is one of the biggest jokes like everybody for years knew that Matt Canada needed to go and so you know he was in a bad situation with a bad offensive line is he gonna come in and Nick fos The Eagles to a Super Bowl if Jaylen Herz gets hurt highly unlikely can he come in and win you know one game out of two if Jaylen Hertz sprains his ankle probably especially you know with the the weapons the Eagles have at their disposal so I like the Kenny picket move it solidifies that backup quarterback position for you for the next two years uh at which point I'm sure they'll decline his fifth year option and you hope Tanner mcke is ready to step into that position uh by then but what was your initial thoughts on the Kenny picket deal yeah I was a bit confused because I didn't see the pick come back and I thought it was a third round pick and I was like what um but yeah perfectly fine I I really like it you get two years of him which is important Justin Fields only gives you one um because of obviously where they were drafted Justin Fields is also so Uber talented that it will create media distractions because you'll come in and create some stupidly good plays and Philly media were going mad and to be honest I just can't be bothered to do that again I did have a first round grade on picket so there you go I was wrong I had him as a late first although I'd like to see him with a better offense um I basically said that his issues will be when the when basically there's pressure he's a bit of a disaster he becomes too aggressive he doesn't want to take checkdowns and this has always been the problem going back to college um but I think for the Eagles that's actually not the biggest problem because the Eagles offensive line is normally very very strong he's I really liked his ball placement coming out I think he's someone that thre with good anticipation he's got decent arm strength he can create outside of structure um I don't think he fits the offense in terms of the QB run stuff is hurt which I understand why people are worried about um but then also Marcus Mariota did and he was still not a very good backup because I don't think he could throw the ball basically I think this offense wants to throw the ball first and the running game is almost secondary and you've also just added Elite running back who you think if you got your callback out for a few weeks he should be able to carry the load give him 20 25 snaps in those games and don't worry about the QB Run game as much so I like it um my to be honest Shane I want to back a quarterback who's basically decent and doesn't cost a lot of money when I see Marcus Mariota cons continually getting like then he get like 10 million again or six million or something stupid um I just don't get it like the back like the wide receiver free market we spoke about to start I I'm and bold for getting a quarterback for basically nothing for two years like if you develop him if he plays a little bit if you can get something for him in two years great if he stays here for two years as a backup he won't create a QB controversy um Jaylen Herz will be the guy picket can learn from him and I think he is decent I think he is uh fine uh personally I know why people know about Justin field it scared me a little bit just because I think Justin field is so extremely talented that he could create some stupid Philly Media stuff whereas Pi it's not that big it's not a Flash Player um so yeah I'm fine with it I don't have too much to say except for backup quarterback two two cheap years I can't really ask for a lot more do I wish they given up the pick probably not um I wish it could have been maybe around later but um that's life that's what happens I can assure you that Kenny Pickett's gonna make some throw in a preseason game and Philly media is gonna be like oh should Kenny picket be the week one starter it's going to happen you can book it I don't think you can avoid that but uh yeah I I was totally fine with the deal um by the way not a not a Steelers podcast but I love what the Steelers have done this offseason at quarterback just getting Russell Wilson who I don't think's a good player but essentially for free getting Justin Fields who I do think is a talented player that hasn't put it together also for free uh essentially H and you know having the being able to say hey we missed on this first round guy let's move on and try something different but H anyways not a Steelers podcast let's keep rolling here uh the next one we've got is wide receiver Devonte Parker he is on a one-year 4.7 million deal the eagles only pay 1.2 million of that though the the Patriots are on the hook for the rest Devonte Parker is a former first round pick and I mean he just never lived up to that billing he's only had one 10,00 yard season it was in 2019 however he is 63 he does have 445 speed and so you know again there's some upside there uh to a much greater degree than we talked about with Devon white there's some upside there but if you've been in the league this long and not hit it you know I saw uh Warren sharp had a tweet that went out talking about how he was last and nextg stats player tracking data for separation uh each of the last four years uh which you know you you can take when you're consistently that low there's a problem but it's kind of like coverage grades also take it with a bit of grain of salt because you know you get guys who maybe aren't great separators in the slot facing off coverage that automatically get separation and things like that but Devonte Parker in my opinion he is not your wide receiver three uh he is depth piece here that may or may not make the roster and I I fully expect now that the Eagles I mean we're we're still sitting here in mid-march and the Eagles haven't signed any other wide receivers so they have four receivers on the roster Brown Devonte Smith Devonte Parker and Britain cvy and that's it I fully expect the Eagles to draft a or multiple wide receivers and make other wide receiver moves uh between now and the preseason yeah uh you know that he is not wide receiver free absolutely no way I actually quite like it if he's an outside wide receiver only basically jayen Herz FRS a great deep ball this offense likes to take one-on-one shots on the outside I think he's a 4-4 speed guy at six fo three so basically stick him on the outside every so often give him a few go balls he's capable of making some wild catches just don't make him any wide receiver free don't ask him to play in the slot basically stick him out wide um that's when he can be really good stick him out wide throw him a couple of go balls you might get a couple of special plays once every few often once every few weeks or so uh but I don't expect anything more should not affect the Eagles draft plan plans in the slightest uh I think very controversial take here but looking at what Jerry Judy just got played I don't know if the eag is gonna be able to afford Devonte Smith in a few years and I'm sure they will try but I think that wide receiver a slot wide receiver should be a big need for the draft I think getting a wide receiver free in here who they can develop into a potential two is um is a definite possibility so I would not Devonte Parker Do's nothing in that sense to fill that hole for me he's an outside wide receiver only who maybe gives a few snaps when AJ Brown needs a bre maybe you can come in and play in 12 Personnel I've never watched him in depth but I'm sure he can block at his size I like to think he can so 12 Personnel uh bring him in when you get single high safety take the occasional shot down the field on First and 10 and if not just lamb block L on a few very simple routes the classic like free receiver route come back go and out something along those lines I would rather see six deep balls to Devonte Parker than six deep balls to quz Watkins this season so it's an upgrade there um okay let's keep going uh linebacker Zack Bond was signed from uh the Saints uh one-year deal the we still don't know the contract which again probably means it's very low he was a third round pick in 2020 uh he has appeared in 62 games with 14 starts in that time he's coming off his most productive season as a subpackage player and a course special teamer he had 383 special team snaps this season H he's basically an edge slash linebacker hybrid like I he's probably he would probably be like your Sam kind of the Hassan reic sort of role obviously not a guy you want starting playing a lot of snaps I think that he's probably your Hassan reck backup uh heading into this year assuming Hassan reck's still on the roster he's not a guy that I would want to be a starter though um this is one that I'm interested about and I haven't watched him so hold fire I might talk about him in future podcasts I'm going to try and watch him this weekend but the reason why I'm interested in him is purely because this L the only reason why I'm interested in him Shane uh read one scouting report of him and it was by Bleacher Report in the year 2020 and Matt Miller's Pro comparison for him was Assan reck so the second I saw that that made me think right I should watch him because I think Assan reic may go and he's a bit like a Nolan Smith type in terms of is he an edge is he the offall linebacker I think it adds weight to what the Eagles view about the linebacker position Shane so he is one that I'm going to watch uh so hold fire on him check my Twitter Fred over the end of the week I might even get to him on Twitter or on Thursday is if I get time to watch him so yeah keep an eye out for uh get excited Zack Bowen film incoming soon all right uh uh we'll go to the next one here that I am excited about uh it was the signing of interior offensive lineman Matt Hennessy again one-year deal unknown contract um but Hennessy is only 26 years old now he's coming off of a season in 2023 uh he missed the whole season with an E injury but the reason I really like the Matt Hennessy signing is because he has over a thousand career snaps at Center he's also got experience at left guard H cam Jurgens only has 43 snaps at Center in the NFL and I know that Jason Kelsey Han picked him he's had two years all of that stuff it would be grossly negligent to walk into a season with the only Center on your roster having delivered 43 snaps in the NFL like that's a great way for there to be a catastrophe and I'm not even talking like what's your backup plan if Cam Jurgens gets hurt obviously now that's Matt Hennessy H but what if you get into camp and cam Jurgens just can't snap the football accurately like the eagles are in shotgun all the time this is a problem if he can't do that and I'm not saying that's going to be an issue I'm saying a smart team prepares for that contingency and so I think that's Matt Hennessy if you know you get into Camp I don't think they're going to like make this a competition Center but if you get into camp and cam Jurgens is really struggling there and Matt Hennessy can step in and do it well cam Jurgens has played Right Guard for a year and you can roll with that and Hennessy's young at 26 so I really liked this signing uh I don't think it speaks to them being concerned about Jurgens I just think it's a responsible move for the team to make I'm glad they brought in a vet center yep I'm fully on board with that I'm a little bit gutted they lost Jack Drisco actually so this might be like a not a replacement in the same position but someone else um I agree could be a guard could be a backup center and it gives you a little bit of backup if Jurgens has a bit of a nightmare or gets injured he was also a third round pick and he became a starting center the year after before he got injured which if you just look at that very basic timeline third round pick suggests he's got some level of talent and the fact he started in his second year and basically only lost a job when he became injured suggests that there is Talent there as always I don't mind taking a risk on injury prone players when it's like a backup because you don't expect going to play every snap anyway so he I've not watched him uh I'm not really sure I intend to I'll depend how much time I get in between this and draft season but he fits the bill of like a good solid backup that seems like a classic Eagles move that I think down the line we might say that was a sensible signing all right uh they also brought back defensive back chony Gardner Johnson on a three-year 33 million deal uh contract full details aren't out but reportedly only 10 million that was guaranteed which essentially makes it a one-year deal with Team options so at 10 million guaranteed the Eagles could get out of it after a season if they wanted to now obviously uh we weren't podcasting together at the season that chony Gardner Johnson was here but I've talked about chony Garder Johnson a lot on this podcast feed I know you've written about him a lot uh what are your overall briefly what are your overall thoughts on chony Gardner Johnson and his return to Philly yeah I sort of love but I'm guessing Shane no contract news is probably good news because agents normally want to get out when they get big deals so my guess is that his deal is not as good as he hoped um I think the Eagles sorely missed him last year I think he's a very versatile Defender I think he could be your starting slot quarterback if you really wanted to use him there but I think in a fer defense you want this sort of hybrid uh safety Corner anyway um I won't go into the huge detail about the film because I feel like everyone's knows the film and if you don't just go and look at basically anything of it and I actually did write a whole review about that I tweeted out about a week ago but the big reason why I like him Shane is what I wrote in my conclusion I said very simply he's the player you can count on to make a big play he is the type of Defender that can change the momentum of a game and he is the Eagles defensive tone Setter and I think he plays with an attitude and he plays with an edge but quite simply the Eagles defense looks weak and passive last year and I think they missed a bit of a nasty guy a bit of an annoying guy to be honest in some ways a bit of an idiot and I think his comments about the Eagles fans sort of summed him up he's a wears his heart on his sleeves um and I think sometimes that's what you need um on defense I think the Eagles last year just sort of accepted they were bad and I think someone like chy he maybe wouldn't have accepted that he'd have gone down swinging and I think in the world NFL sometimes it's not a bad idea to have a player like that on your roster yeah I when they made the move I jokingly said on Twitter that I liked the move H now go sign a safety and I and I I think he brings a lot of Versatility like you mentioned but at the end of the day like I I I'm just like I was having I had I'm having dreams now about like drafting Cooper de Jean who also is a guy that people think might be a safety and maybe he can play slot and like just having both of these guys and the creative things that fangio could do if like you know we're starting with both of these guys high and we can rotate one of them down into the slot and it could go either way and like I just think there's a lot of versatility there and the Eagles don't have a slot corner right now obviously they cut avonte Maddox Zack mcferson was cross training to be a backup slot corner and got hurt last off season so you know what are the Eagles going to do at slot maybe they draft somebody maybe they draft a safety and chony Gardner Johnson plays in the slot a lot a lot more which is where he started his career he's a really good run Defender uh he's a good fit for that I just think it brings versatility at to the backside of the Eagles defense and it brings some physicality and some attitude so I was really excited that uh he that he's coming back I don't necessarily want him to just be you know a split field safety like I want I want you to be able to move him around and that requires other moves of other pieces you can use interchangeably too so we'll see what the Eagles do from there yeah I agree I agree I think that's probably about it isn't it Shang I've looked at the time realized uh yeah yeah two more linebackers and then we'll get out of here real quick so they they also got quick Julian aquara one year 1.3 million he was a third round pick by the lions in 2020 dear I missed that one completely wow all right G to Google him frantically I totally missed that one I knew you g to talk about the other one I didn't real there was another guy right that's terrible fan me been watching too much Deon white film I mean he had Johnny he had five sacks in 2021 and 21 pressures but he only played 120 snaps last season so fell out of favor in Detroit wow I did not know that right no I did know that I'm being stupid I think I did know that might be your pronunciation of how you said his name in my head I'm talking about someone else and they signed the other Lineback as well didn't they though that's the one I was going to watch next after Burks yeah that's the one I saw he didn't he get the most money was he the one that got 2.5 yeah onee deal worth they use the phrasing worth up to 2.5 million yeah in yeah he so he was a third round pick in 2018 played four years in green Bay and then two in San Francisco so he brings that Intel from Behind Enemy Lines his best season was last year in San Fran he had 46 tackles one sack and one interception played in 15 games he started five of those uh he played 188 special team snaps as well so uh in Burks and and in Bon you have two guys that bring some special team skills and maybe some situational uh linebacker skills as well yeah I've noticed sh a lot of these sign are all high draft picks there like a little bit of Harry Roseman style was to go and get like failed not failed but third rounders you didn't make it as much and see if they can turn their talent into something um which I think is fair enough I think that's fair enough yeah how how how is like let's go sign guys that were drafted in the third round to play linebacker five years ago so we don't have to draft a linebacker in the third round this year I think that's the whole philosophy bring back Davon Taylor that's what I say don't please don't never draft one of the worst draft picks of all time anyway I think that's enough free agency talk Shane uh the people who wanted it in depth you got Deon white in depth and then we're going to move on to draft soon so uh exciting there could be one or two more signings or trades um see you never know keep an eye out keep an eye out for some of the keep an eye out for my Twitter for a few more film breakdowns I will get to a few more players um and yeah and I think we'll move on to the draft shortly all right yeah that sounds good so that's going to do it for for this episode of on the Shane page you have heard us talk about every free agent the Eagles have signed up until this point uh we'll start to slowly transition to draft stuff over the next few weeks and we'll get you some Eagles targets and things like that uh but that is going to do it for this episode if you enjoy the episode please like rate review thumbs up on YouTube all of that we enjoy hearing from you guys uh and you know we enjoy telling uh the rest of the BGN people like look they like our show a lot too so do a do us a solid leave us a festar rating and review mention the podcast we really appreciate it uh and we will catch you guys next week for another episode of on the Shane page go Birds