3 hours ago, EaglePhan1986 said:

Oh please he was in a run first offense with two pro bowlers who were also at WR. One of those WRs cried if he got less than 6 targets in a game. Dotson is solid as a low #2/3 option at WR.

You clearly don't know ball

1 hour ago, DaBirds said:

I could be wrong but it seems highly unlikely that AJ replacement is currently on the roster.

Wrong.

Its DeVonta Smith. The WR on the roster. Not the 2026 draft prospect with the same name who isn't a WR.

1 minute ago, T-1000 said:

You clearly don't know ball

I’ll come to your seminar sometime John Madden

6 minutes ago, Saltpeter said:

This is an interesting trade for multiple reasons, but I’m particularly interested in the desire to bring in a mid tier contract player, which Howie has seemingly avoided like the plague. Wicks’ contract comes out to, what, 2 years $15 million? Mannion definitely has some pull right now.

It’s interesting when coupled with Elijah Moore and Hollywood Brown, for sure. None of the three are WR1 potential but are all players who can suit up on the active roster on Sunday and contribute. It’s essentially DeVonta Smith as WR1 and WR by committee behind him.

I’m reading too much into it, but my hope is Howie contacted AJ Brown’s agent as soon as that Russini story broke and told them "Open up your preferred destination list because there’s no way we’re doing business with Vrabel or his team”, and Brown gave them more choices.

Either way, the acquisitions give Howie optionality if/when he trades Brown. I prefer the Eagles target a big body WR who can run, rather than a small, shifty WR. I think they need a 50/50, red zone fade WR weapon if AJ Brown is gone.

Just now, Alphagrand said:

It’s interesting when coupled with Elijah Moore and Hollywood Brown, for sure. None of the three are WR1 potential but are all players who can suit up on the active roster on Sunday and contribute. It’s essentially DeVonta Smith as WR1 and WR by committee behind him.

I’m reading too much into it, but my hope is Howie contacted AJ Brown’s agent as soon as that Russini story broke and told them "Open up your preferred destination list because there’s no way we’re doing business with Vrabel or his team”, and Brown gave them more choices.

Either way, the acquisitions give Howie optionality if/when he trades Brown. I prefer the Eagles target a big body WR who can run, rather than a small, shifty WR. I think they need a 50/50, red zone fade WR weapon if AJ Brown is gone.

They should be targeting their WR2 in this draft. Then, the guys they got behind them will be fine. It should be Brown as WR3, and Wicks or hopefully someone else a WR4. However this Wicks trade is still bad. They could have drafted someone better whether it be another WR or a different position. And the instant extension...poor use of resources.

1 hour ago, ManuManu said:

Ok, but this is what you said: Obviously this trade was at the behest of Manion. He knows Wicks better than any of us. The opinions thrown around here are absurd, good or bad.

It seemed to me you were saying all opinions were absurd whether they were good or bad. That made no sense to me.

Fair. I should have said Many rather than The.

4 minutes ago, Alphagrand said:

It’s interesting when coupled with Elijah Moore and Hollywood Brown, for sure. None of the three are WR1 potential but are all players who can suit up on the active roster on Sunday and contribute. It’s essentially DeVonta Smith as WR1 and WR by committee behind him.

I’m reading too much into it, but my hope is Howie contacted AJ Brown’s agent as soon as that Russini story broke and told them "Open up your preferred destination list because there’s no way we’re doing business with Vrabel or his team”, and Brown gave them more choices.

Either way, the acquisitions give Howie optionality if/when he trades Brown. I prefer the Eagles target a big body WR who can run, rather than a small, shifty WR. I think they need a 50/50, red zone fade WR weapon if AJ Brown is gone.

Johnny Wilson woohoo

1 hour ago, eagle45 said:

I think it is completely reasonable to be extremely underwhelmed by likely replacing AJ Brown in part with a WR that has vastly below average athleticism for the position who has been in the league for 3 years and done nothing of note with a linear decline in production since rookie year. Add to that the Eagles track record of identifying unproven talent at WR and it's 100% fair to be skeptical, bordering on completely dismissive.

To counter, I would say that the identifier of the talent was a man who coached him rather than some front office guy. The "vastly below average athleticism” is part of that three year old combine stuff. I am not so willing to dismiss him as you seem to be.

1 hour ago, eagle45 said:

I think it is completely reasonable to be extremely underwhelmed by likely replacing AJ Brown in part with a WR that has vastly below average athleticism for the position who has been in the league for 3 years and done nothing of note with a linear decline in production since rookie year. Add to that the Eagles track record of identifying unproven talent at WR and it's 100% fair to be skeptical, bordering on completely dismissive.

Doing some reading, it sounds like Wicks had some sort of injury during the pre-draft testing process. His broad and vertical jumps were still very elite/explosive and if you look at his highlights in college and the pros, I don't think he looks like the limited athlete the 40 times suggest. At Virginia he was a bona fide deep threat and you can see in the Green Bay clips that he has good juice off the line of scrimmage. I have no idea whether he'll excel here, the drops are a real issue, and there's basically no chance he alone will make us feel better about losing a talent like AJ Brown, but just wanted to add some context to Wicks' on-paper athletic profile.

6 minutes ago, DeathByEagle said:

Johnny Wilson woohoo

Never liked Johnny Wilson nor Ainias Smith as prospects, was quite disappointed the Eagles drafted them. I’d be surprised if Wilson makes it through training camp on the roster, but it’s a possibility if the Eagles choose not to draft WR (or the board falls where they don’t feel they can)

14 minutes ago, just relax said:

To counter, I would say that the identifier of the talent was a man who coached him rather than some front office guy. The "vastly below average athleticism” is part of that three year old combine stuff. I am not so willing to dismiss him as you seem to be.

It's 3 year old combine stuff followed by 3 years of NFL production that did nothing to dispel it. It would be one thing if the guy came into the league and established himself as an explosive playmaker. If you want to project that he can conveniently be someone here that he wasn't in GB, then it's not unreasonable to reach back to the combine to see what the raw materials are.

Malik Benson was supposed to be 153 but my finger slipped. You may clap now 👀

54 minutes ago, Saltpeter said:

This is an interesting trade for multiple reasons, but I’m particularly interested in the desire to bring in a mid tier contract player, which Howie has seemingly avoided like the plague. Wicks’ contract comes out to, what, 2 years $15 million? Mannion definitely has some pull right now.

Mannion will be a part of it but there'll be some deep analytics behind it too, guarantee there's some ridiculous obscure metric that is really useful in Mannion's proposed scheme that Wicks is near the top of the NFL per route run or something, I don't think Howie trades two picks for Wicks level production without something else behind it.

32 minutes ago, eagle45 said:

It's 3 year old combine stuff followed by 3 years of NFL production that did nothing to dispel it. It would be one thing if the guy came into the league and established himself as an explosive playmaker. If you want to project that he can conveniently be someone here that he wasn't in GB, then it's not unreasonable to reach back to the combine to see what the raw materials are.

You seem to have made up your mind. I have not. You may well be right. We’ll see.

2 hours ago, DaBirds said:

I thought Dotson was open quite a bit. If you throw the ball 9 times it’s hard for the 4th option (if you count Goedert) to get looks.

I don’t hold a lack of production against Dotson here. That’s the nature of being the third receiver here. I do hold his lazy, bad route running against him. And we all should accept there’s a reason Washington soured on him so quickly despite having a massive need at WR.

I’m not proclaiming Wicks is a world beater and fixes our WR corps in the event AJB is traded, but I think we’re getting a productive player who can help our WR learn the offense and can do some of the dirty work our other WRs are incapable of. I have no issue with him being our No. 3 receiver. If he’s our 2, that’s disappointing unless he becomes much better at the catch point. Even then, the hope is that he’d just be a placeholder while a draft pick develops.

1 hour ago, dukebowden said:

Doing some reading, it sounds like Wicks had some sort of injury during the pre-draft testing process. His broad and vertical jumps were still very elite/explosive and if you look at his highlights in college and the pros, I don't think he looks like the limited athlete the 40 times suggest. At Virginia he was a bona fide deep threat and you can see in the Green Bay clips that he has good juice off the line of scrimmage. I have no idea whether he'll excel here, the drops are a real issue, and there's basically no chance he alone will make us feel better about losing a talent like AJ Brown, but just wanted to add some context to Wicks' on-paper athletic profile.

He plays to his timed speed...

6 minutes ago, ManuManu said:

I’m not proclaiming Wicks is a world beater and fixes our WR corps in the event AJB is traded, but I think we’re getting a productive player who can help our WR learn the offense and can do some of the dirty work our other WRs are incapable of. I have no issue with him being our No. 3 receiver. If he’s our 2, that’s disappointing unless he becomes much better at the catch point. Even then, the hope is that he’d just be a placeholder while a draft pick develops.

Should be WR4 at best. I'll have a huge issue if he is 3. So will our offense.

I’ll say one thing about Jalen…for his whole career, his critics have said he’s been surrounded by the most talented offense in the nfl.

If they trade AJ before the season….this WR situation, this OL, and Barkley/Goedert being a combined 60….Hurts is NOT going to be surrounded by a talented offense. So whatever he does accomplish, I’ll give him full credit.

I’d expect some ugly output on offense.

4 minutes ago, HazletonEagle said:

Should be WR4 at best. I'll have a huge issue if he is 3. So will our offense.

We’ll agree to disagree. I think he’s a better player than you do, and apparently by a significant margin.

I wish we somehow had gotten the deal done with Darnell Mooney instead of Hollywood Brown.

6 hours ago, Miami said:

This offense is different I think. Lots of stuff on the edge. Both Mundt and Wicks can block so Hurts should have easy dump-off passes if they are in the flat. Nothing fancy but will move the chains and make Hurts' job easier. And allow us to run big packages to wear down the defense.

That sounds the same as last season…

Interesting considering his, to put it politely, inconsistent hands.

41 minutes ago, just relax said:

You seem to have made up your mind. I have not. You may well be right. We’ll see.

You are thinking Mannion sees unrealized potential.

My belief is, this is a Pascal type signing when Siri first got here. Its a veteran WR who is familiar with the new offense that will help the other WRs acclimate and helps justify his roster spot by blocking. But Pascal had good hands...

Its not due to some belief in upside. Its simply a player coach who will do the dirty work. Thats fine as a WR4. But still wasnt worth the 2 draft picks and extra money on the extension.

Wicks can't catch. And he plays to his 3 year old combine turtle speed. Hes not good. Hes not getting any faster. And he's not going to become good. And Mannion is probably smart enough to know that.

5 minutes ago, ManuManu said:

Interesting considering his, to put it politely, inconsistent hands.

That seems not uncommon. There's some WRs in this draft who are the same way. Can make great plays but consistency is the issue. Concentration drops maybe.