For the signing of Saquon Barkley alone, the Philadelphia Eagles come out of the 2024 season as winners in the player movement stakes.
When the New York Giants were unwilling to re-sign their star free-agent running back, the Eagles swept in and secured his services for what now looks like an absolute bargain at around $12.6 million (£10.15M) per year.
Barkley became only the ninth running back in NFL history to rush for 2,000 regular-season yards and he is now powering their push for playoff glory, with only the Kansas City Chiefs standing between them and the franchise’s second-ever Super Bowl.
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But Philadelphia’s success with talent acquisition goes way beyond their savvy securing of Saquon. And it stretches back farther than this past off-season.
Ever since Howie Roseman assumed general manager duties in 2015 – allowing for some semantic fluctuation of his exact title after that point – they have been the smartest operators in the league.
The list of Roseman’s wins in the free-agent and trade markets is extensive.
There’s the 2022 trade for AJ Brown, one of the NFL’s best receivers whose acquisition from the Tennessee Titans helped the Eagles reach the Super Bowl that season.
Cornerback Darius “Big Play” Slay was brought in from the Detroit Lions in 2020 in exchange for third- and fifth-round draft picks. He’s doubled his Pro Bowl selections to six since arriving.
Roseman also negotiated to move up in the 2023 draft, allowing the Eagles to pick Jalen Carter, how is now one of the three best defensive tackles in the NFL.
And there was also the eyebrow-raising move to take Jalen Hurts in the second round of the 2020 draft, despite the fact they already had a big-money franchise quarterback in Carson Wentz.
How did that work out? Wentz flopped, Hurts stepped in and shone, leading the Eagles to now two Super Bowls. And Roseman still managed to get a first-round pick back for Wentz when he traded him to the Indianapolis Colts.
But back to this past offseason, because there is no greater encapsulation of Roseman’s team-building skill.
Barkley wasn’t the only free agent to arrive at Lincoln Financial Field. There was also Zach Baun, who had been a middle-of-the-road linebacker who’d spent most of his time with the New Orleans Saints on their special teams unit.
Evidently, Roseman saw potential in the 28-year-old and handed him a one-year deal. He was right. Baun was arguably the best player in the league in his position this season, earning First Team All-Pro honours.
Roseman played the 2024 draft masterfully, too. The Eagles took cornerback Quinyon Mitchell in the first round with the 22nd overall pick. In an impressive rookie campaign, he ranked ninth in the NFL for pass break-ups and has earned the nickname “Quinyonamo Bay” for his ability to lock up wide receivers.
In the second round, the Eagles made one of the best-value selections of the entire draft when they took another corner, Cooper DeJean, who’d been a projected first-rounder. DeJean ranked fourth among all cornerbacks in 2024 according to PFF, while also moonlighting as a punt returner.
Will Shipley, whom the Eagles took with the 127th overall pick, has had to play second fiddle to Barkley all season, but the rookie running back enjoyed a breakout game in the NFC Championship victory over the Washington Commanders, rushing for 77 yards and a touchdown.
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Roseman, who started working for the Eagles in 2000 as an intern before working his way up into his current position of influence, gave an insight into his team-building philosophy when discussing the Barkley signing last year.
"From our perspective, you get to a situation where you kind of try to find, is something being undervalued?" he told Mad Dog Sports Radio.
"Is there a way to zig when everyone's zagging? Or I don't know if it's the opposite, and you're freakin' zagging when zigging. But I think that it's hard to find difference-making players and people, and it's hard to find them for a cost.
“Those guys, they go for a lot of money, and we felt like there was an opportunity to get one of those guys in Saquon and bring him to the team."
The architect of one Super Bowl win and the constructor of a team that came within a whisker of another two years ago, Roseman has proved himself to be just as great a difference-maker as any of the players he’s acquired.
A win over the Kansas City Chiefs in their Super Bowl rematch of February 9 would be the final flourish on his greatest team-building masterpiece yet.
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