Nakobe Dean’s last Eagles playoff game ended with him on a cart. On Sunday, he wants to soak it all in.
Dean suffered a patellar tendon tear in his left knee during last year's NFC wild-card game against Green Bay that kept him out until Week 6. The linebacker said he "never lost confidence" in himself.
Monday is an anniversary of sorts for Nakobe Dean, but not one to celebrate. When the linebacker takes the field for the Eagles on Sunday — yes, he will play — it will be 364 days after he was knocked from the Eagles’ wild-card playoff victory over the Green Bay Packers.
Dean watched the Eagles win the Super Bowl from the sideline. He danced in place with the help of crutches while streams of Champagne and beer flew around the championship locker room until there was no more alcohol to soak in.
Then, a long rehabilitation from a patellar tendon tear in his left knee began. There were long days of training, and the 25-year-old even dipped his toes in ballet classes to improve his flexibility. But while Dean recovered, the Eagles also drafted his eventual replacement, Jihaad Campbell, in the first round. Then he started the 2025 season on the physically unable to perform list and didn’t debut until Week 6.
Patellar tendon tears are difficult injuries to come back from, but Dean has barely missed a beat. He overtook Campbell and returned to his starting role next to Zack Baun by Week 8. Dean has been one of the best blitzing linebackers in the NFL since he returned. He has four sacks in 10 games after having three sacks in 15 games last season. He has been solid in coverage, too. All eyes will be on Dean and Baun on Sunday as the Eagles face a talented San Francisco offense built around running back Christian McCaffrey and tight end George Kittle.
There are the on-field elements on Dean’s mind. The 49ers, he said, do things no other team does with their use of the fullback and their dynamic schemes. The Eagles will need to have “good eyes,” Dean said, and focus on their footwork and technique while making sure to be physical. But there’s the personal element, too. Dean said football is always personal to him, but Sunday, almost a year to the day from the sport being temporarily taken from him, will have extra significance.
“It’s always personal,” Dean said Wednesday. “You got a timeline to play this game of football that you love.”
Dean has learned that the hard way a few times. The 2022 third-round pick, among the first wave of Georgia Bulldogs to the Eagles’ defense, had his 2023 season ended after five games because of a foot injury. Then the knee injury in the playoffs last year forced him to be a spectator during what would have been some of the biggest games of his career. Then, even as he helped the Eagles’ playoff push this season, he was again forced to the sideline after suffering a hamstring injury against Washington in Week 16.
» READ MORE: Eagles vs. 49ers: These numbers and trends could impact Sunday’s result
Dean said he probably could have played through the hamstring injury, but the rest served him well.
“They want me in the playoffs the best I can be,” Dean said of the Eagles’ decision to sit him down for a couple of weeks.
Dean thinks he’s a better player today than he was a year ago as he prepared for the playoff run. “The more ball I play, the better I see it, the more I understand it,” he said. He’s said he’s not surprised he came back from his devastating injury in this manner.
“When you’re going through an injury, and I got a goal that I set for myself, I’m going to come back and be the best,” Dean said. “I’m not shooting to just get to where I was before. No, I’m shooting to get better and get better every day.
“I’m a human. I have emotions. But I never lost faith that everything would be great. I never lost confidence in myself.”
Dean said the journey helped him grow as a person and football player.
“Everything I talk about, or I’ve talked about in the past before I hurt my knee, I had to stand on it,” he said. “I had to stand on being that positive person who’s taking a day at a time, who puts one foot in front of the other. The message hasn’t changed for me. But I had to stand on what I believed in and what I talked about.”
He has spent part of this week providing perspective to younger players like Campbell and fellow rookie Smael Mondon on what it means to be in the postseason — “a lot of people want to be where we’re at,” he said — and what to expect from the atmosphere at Lincoln Financial Field on Sunday. (“It’s like someone talking about an amusement park that they’ve never been to before and I’ve been,” he said.)
» READ MORE: Eagles-49ers is really a matchup of Nick Sirianni and Kyle Shanahan, savants in their own ways
It’s the playoffs, and every game could be the last. For Dean, that reality is especially true. This is the final year of his contract, and his future with the Eagles certainly is up in the air. The Eagles have a lot invested in Campbell, and Dean has played well enough after returning from his injury to earn a decent contract, one that could come from another team. It is a thought that Dean said has crossed his mind after the Eagles won their Week 17 game in Buffalo.
Dean then reminded himself that he needed to be present. Sunday will mark his first playoff game since he was carted off the Eagles’ sideline last January. He wants to enjoy what’s in front of him.
“I got to live in the moment,” Dean said. “I got a lot of guys that I played with in college. You don’t know what’s going to happen. I’m just enjoying every second, every moment with them, with Zack and my linebacker room, everybody in the locker room. Just living in the moment and not even thinking about it.”
It is, after all, time for “playoff ball,” Dean said.
“It’s time to get to it, time to turn it up a notch.”