https://www.nbcsports.com/nfl/profootballtalk/rumor-mill/news/eagles-plan-to-get-more-than-one-target-this-week-for-a-j-brown
For the first 58 minutes and nine seconds of Thursday night’s opener, not a single pass was thrown in receiver A.J. Brown’s direction. He finished with one target, one catch, eight yards.
The limited production from the team’s No. 1 receiver becomes an obvious talking point as the Week 2 Super Bowl rematch with the Chiefs approaches.
“When you game plan, obviously the number one guy is going to be A.J., [receiver] DeVonta [Smith], [tight end] Dallas [Goedert],” Eagles offensive coordinator Kevin Patullo told reporters on Tuesday. “In the pass game, they’re going to get the targets. Going in, we had a fair share of things that were going to go to him as the primary, and sometimes games play out like that and that’s kind of how it was.
“[W]e don’t ever want to force it. If it’s one of those games where you’re trying not to force it and you’re being productive and you’re staying on track, the guys understand. He played his butt off, too. He knew what was going on and just the way it was, and then we were moving the ball and being efficient.
“I think when you look at it, you always put that in mind when you start the game plan. Like this week, ‘Hey, he’s the guy, this is where we want to go with it.’ Once the game starts to unfold, you just kind of play it accordingly.”
In his time with the Eagles, Brown had been targeted once only one time before, in Week 18 of the 2023 season against the Giants. In that game, he was involved in only 12 snaps. Against the Cowboys, he played 55 downs.
Earlier in the week, coach Nick Sirianni addressed the question of Brown’s greatly reduced involvement.
“I know you guys have asked a lot about the ‘roles’ talk,” Sirianni told reporters. “This is something that we constantly talk about in the roles talk is, ‘Yeah, A.J., DeVonta [Smith], Dallas [Goedert], the pass game runs through you, but there are going to be games like this where you might not get the touches that we want you to get and we know that you want to get because it can help us win the football game. In those moments, what are you doing to change the football game without the ball in your hands?’
“One thing I shared with the team is, we’re in a four-minute drill at the end of the game, and A.J. Brown has yet to touch the football, and we’re in second and 14, I believe [editor’s note: second and 11], and we throw a pass to him that sets us up for a third and three. . . . Jalen [Hurts] scrambles on third and three and then the game’s over, we get to take knees.
“What about that mental toughness by A.J. Brown to go, ‘OK, the ball hasn’t come to me in three quarters.’ That might be the first time that’s ever happened to him in his career as a football player because he’s such a good player and you’re always trying to find ways to do that. But he makes a play in a critical moment when his number was called. You look for moments like that to really show and preach the stuff that’s important to your core values and your culture. That was just a great example by one of our captains of, ‘Hey, it didn’t go exactly the way you wanted it to go, or any of us envisioned it going, that’s life, that’s football, but when called upon and the ball did come your way, you made this huge play.’ And was it a first down? No, but it set us up to get the first down where it Dallas’ offense didn’t come back on the field, and you set us up to get that and make this huge play when maybe the ball wasn’t going your way all night.
“That’s why A.J.’s special because even in a game like that, he does things without the ball to help us win and he makes a play in a critical moment. Great throw by Jalen and great route and catch by A.J. and made a play in a critical moment to help us win the football game.”
That’s fine, if it’s truly just a one-game thing. If it continues — and if the Eagles don’t keep winning — it will become a much harder sell that Brown’s $32 million average salary is being invested in blocking and being a good teammate and making a late-game catch that sets up a third-down conversion.
https://www.nbcsports.com/nfl/profootballtalk/rumor-mill/news/eagles-plan-to-get-more-than-one-target-this-week-for-a-j-brown
