Vic Fangio assesses Adoree' Jackson's debut with Eagles
Is the Eagles’ plan for Adoree’ Jackson to start Week 2 against the Chiefs?
“Right now?” DC Vic Fangio said on Tuesday. “Yes.”
You wouldn’t certainly understand if the answer to that question was no. Because the 29-year-old Jackson had a really rough Eagles debut in the 24-20 win over the Cowboys.
In the opener, Jackson allowed 5 catches on 7 targets for 103 yards, per NFL NextGen Stats. And when Jackson was covering All-Pro CeeDee Lamb, the Cowboys attacked, targeting Lamb on 5 of his 8 routes against Jackson, resulting in 3 catches for 72 yards. Jackson also missed a couple tackles.
What did Fangio see from Jackson?
“He has to make sure he’s a master technician and not let his technique falter,” Fangio said. “They have good receivers, and if you don’t go about your job the right way from a technique standpoint, those good receivers become impossible to cover.”
Fangio had previously said the winner of that CB2 job would have a long leash so now we’ll actually find out if that’s true. During Thursday’s game, Jackson had to exit briefly to be evaluated for a concussion and Jakorian Bennett filled in for seven snaps. That wasn’t enough, Fangio said, to really evaluate Bennett.
The Eagles’ CB2 job began in the summer as a battle between Jackson and Kelee Ringo but then the Eagles acquired Bennett in a trade with the Raiders. The Eagles probably hoped that Ringo would win the job but that didn’t happen. And one game into the regular season, that spot is still a problem area.
Going the distance
Eagles defensive tackle Jordan Davis lost 26 pounds this offseason and worked hard to improve his conditioning level.
That showed up in Week 1.
“Very much so,” Fangio said. “I don’t think he could have played that amount of snaps as well as he did previously.”
Because Jalen Carter got ejected on Thursday night before the Eagles’ first defensive snap of the game, Davis had to play a ton against the Cowboys. He played 53 snaps (86.9%) against the Cowboys. That’s the highest percentage game in his career and the second-most snaps Davis had ever played.
In addition to Carter’s expanded workload, Byron Young ended up playing 22 snaps in his first action with the Eagles.
“He did good,” Fangio said. “He gave us some energy, ran to the ball hard, almost had that pick on the deflection, was involved with the fumble. I don’t know who they ended up giving that to, but if it was a sack, I think they would’ve halved it. So, he did fine and hopefully that’s something for him to build on.”
The plan at safety
After battling for a starting job during training camp, Sydney Brown and Drew Mukuba split the position in Week 1. Brown was a starting safety in the base package and Mukuba played safety in the nickel package.
Mukuba played 51 snaps, while Brown played just 14.
“We thought going into the game, we would be in base more than we were, but they chose to pretty much make it a three wide receiver game,” Fangio said. “So the reps got distorted that way.”
The Eagles used their second-round pick to take Mukuba out of Texas so it seems like just a matter of time before he’s just the full-time starter at the position. But his first NFL action wasn’t perfect, according to Fangio.
“He did OK,” Fangio said. “He had a couple major busts that hurt us and could have hurt us even more, so looking for him to improve this next week.”
Vic Fangio assesses Adoree' Jackson's debut with Eagles
