Saquon Barkley Defended by Eagles' CJGJ: 'It's Football, Bro. S--t Happens'

Safety C.J. Gardner-Johnson stood up for running back Saquon Barkley following his miscue during the fourth quarter of the Philadelphia Eagles' 22-21 loss to the Atlanta Falcons on Monday night.

While holding a three-point lead, the Eagles were one first down away from icing the game on their penultimate drive, but Barkley dropped a pass that almost certainly would have ended it.

That stopped the clock, forced the Eagles to settle for three and gave the Falcons the ball back down by six with 1:39 remaining.

Quarterback Kirk Cousins remarkably drove the Falcons down the field in about one minute despite having no timeouts, and he threw a touchdown pass to wide receiver Drake London with 34 seconds left.

That proved to be the game-winner, as Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts threw a game-ending interception on the ensuing drive.

While Barkley's drop undoubtedly opened the door for the Atlanta comeback, Gardner-Johnson made it clear to Brooks Kubena of The Athletic that the loss shouldn't be pinned solely on Barkley, saying: "It's football, bro. S--t happens. You can't fault a guy for making one mistake. I mean, it's other things that led to a loss, but you can't fault one guy and put one game, one thing on somebody's shoulders for the whole game."

Perhaps nobody was harder on Barkley after the game than himself, as he told reporters: "I dropped the ball. I let my team down today. The defense should not have been put in that position."

Although the catch is one that Barkley almost always comes up with, it is fair to wonder if the Philly coaching staff should have made a different call in that situation.

Atlanta had already exhausted all three of its timeouts, so keeping it on the ground with Barkley or Hurts could have not only given the Eagles a chance to pick up the 3rd-and-3, but it would have at least run 40 seconds off the clock had Philadelphia failed to get the first down.

Cousins and the Atlanta offense worked down the field with lightning speed and machine-like efficiency, but starting the drive with less than one minute left rather than 1:39 could have changed things.

Even with the Eagles having to settle for a field goal, the odds were very much stacked against the Falcons getting the go-ahead score, especially since Cousins was under siege for much of the game.

However, the Eagles generated essentially no pressure on the drive, and Cousins picked the secondary apart, completing passes of 11, 21 and 26 yards to get inside the red zone.

Pass defense was a major issue for the Eagles last season, as they ranked 31st in the NFL in passing yardage allowed per game at 252.7.

The front office seemingly thought it may have fixed those issues by hiring Vic Fangio as the new defensive coordinator and selecting defensive backs Quinyon Mitchell and Cooper DeJean in the first and second round of the 2024 NFL draft, respectively, but the same problems reared their ugly head Monday night.

Now, regardless of who is most to blame, the Eagles have lost seven of their past nine games including the playoffs dating back to last season.

Things don't get any easier for head coach Nick Sirianni and the Eagles either, as they must go on the road to face the New Orleans Saints in Week 3.

Over the course of a 2-0 start, the Saints have looked like an offensive juggernaut under new offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak, hanging 47 points on the Carolina Panthers in Week 1 and 44 on the Dallas Cowboys in Week 2.