In past years, the Eagles have always gone into the season with four safeties. Two of this year's class will be locks: Brian Dawkins at free safety, and, as Jim Johnson has reiterated, Quintin Mikell at strong safety.
Additionally, the Eagles will probably also take Quintin Demps, a rookie free safety who has shown some special teams ability, into the season. Demps is considered a likely candidate to be Dawkins's replacement in the future.
As for that fourth spot, well, nothing is certain.
Sean Considine, who lost his starting position at strong safety to Quintin Mikell over the course of last season, is still a strong bet to make the team. However, J.R. Reed and Marcus Paschal won't be making things easy.
J.R. Reed finally got good starting time last season, recording a solid 31 tackles, 27 of them solo. He also helped out on special teams as a kickoff returner.
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Marcus Paschal, a rookie free agent signing in 2007, was a big surprise to most when he was promoted from the practice squad on November 7th. He ended up playing in three games, none started, and recorded one tackle.
While the Eagles must have seen enough potential from him for them to be confident enough to bring him up, the addition of Quintin Demps should pretty much close the door on the prospect of seeing him don midnight green any time in the near future.
Come training camp, I see one battle at safety to stand out. It will be between Sean Considine and J.R. Reed. If the Eagles choose to go with four safeties like they had done in the past, only one of those players will make that team. Right now, Considine is the favorite. But until the pads come, you can never really know.
In the past, safety has always been a given for the Eagles, a position that was taken for granted. However, with Brian Dawkins dealing with family issues and therefore under performing all of last year, the Eagles were forced to draft a safety for the second year in a row.
This year, with Dawkins back in full health and a promising batch of youngsters waiting to prove that they can contribute, the Eagles are looking to prove that their safeties can be dominating once again.
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about 1 month ago
This Mikell's job to lose. I'll probably write something about this tonight if I have the time, but Jim Johnson made it clear Q is the number one right now.
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