ClutchPoints
After fielding one of the very best teams in franchise history in 2024, the Philadelphia Eagles have to do it all again in 2025, retooling their roster around an amended collection of players expertly assembled by Howie Roseman.
Gone are players like CJ Gardner-Johnson, Mechi Becton, and Darius Slay, all of whom played important roles in their Super Bowl win, and in their place are new and familiar faces who will be tasked with filling their voids while keeping Philadelphia’s talent pipeline alive.
Will it be easy? No, but then again, in the NFL, what really is? All a team can do is trust they have let the right players leave at the right time, or at least have the depth needed to overcome a mistake or two along the way, like, say, signing Bryce Huff to a massive contract. While the Eagles may not have any outright holes on their roster, they do have a few interesting positional competitions that should prove compelling down the stretch as Nick Sirianni and company settle on their initial 53-man depth chart, including at the back end of Vic Fangio’s defense.
After fielding a good mix of veteran and rookie contract players in 2024, the Eagles are embracing a youth movement in a major way in 2025, with only one player, Zach Baun, signed to a long-term veteran contract worth over $9 million a year.
That number could have been two, however, if the Eagles hadn’t decided to trade Super Bowl hero CJ Gardner-Johnson to the Houston Texans for Kenyon Green and some Day 3 draft capital.
While that deal has been debated ad nauseam, with most fans landing on the side of it being a bad deal in the short term, regardless of your opinion, the move does create a hole at the safety spot next to Reed Blankenship that needs to be filled heading into the fall.
Technically, Fangio has noted that this position is truly open, with players like Tristin McCollum and Andre’ Sam theoretically in the mix but when it comes right down to it, this looks like a two horse race between former Day 2 picks, with 2023 third round pick Sydney Brown going to war with rookie second round pick Andrew Mukaba for the starting spot.
On paper, Brown and Mukaba are relatively similar players, with the duo both slightly undersized safeties with plus athleticism who fly around like heat-seeking missiles even if they don’t always connect with their targets. Brown has one more year of experience in Fanguo’s scheme, even if he didn’t play much in 2024, but Mukaba holds the advantage in versatility, with the Texas safety playing slot cornerback at Clemson alongside future Eagles teammate Jeremiah Trotter Jr. and Will Shipley.
Could Mukaba become more of a safety in 2025 as Brown ends up a full-time safety? Potentially so, but the Texas product was explicitly drafted to play safety in Fangio’s scheme, while Brown was drafted under this previous regime,...
