Saquon Barkley hopes for Monday night return to Eagles lineup: ‘I would love to be out there’
Barkley missed two full games and most of a third with a hamstring injury sustained in Week 4 against the Rams.
The last couple of weeks of this Eagles season have reminded Saquon Barkley of his early career with the New York Giants.
The 29-year-old running back, who was drafted by the Giants in 2018 out of Penn State, experienced his fair share of injuries while playing for the Eagles’ division rival. He sprained his ankle in 2019, sidelining him for three games early in the year. Barkley tore his ACL just two weeks into the following season.
Since arriving in Philadelphia in 2024, Barkley has been mostly healthy. But over the past two weeks, he has been sidelined with a hamstring injury, which he sustained early in the Week 4 loss to the Los Angeles Rams. He dropped out of the Week 2 win over the Tennessee Titans with a stinger, too.
The injuries are painful, and so are the absences, Barkley said Thursday.
» READ MORE: Eagles edge rusher Jalyx Hunt eyes return, says injury could have been a lot worse
“It [stinks],” Barkley said. “You feel like you want to be out there and try to help your team. There’s really nothing you could do being on the sideline, but keeping that in mind, just try to be the best leader I can during that time, and also most importantly, try to get as healthy as fast as I can, and really do whatever it takes to get healthy as fast as I can.”
Barkley is trying to get healthy in time for the Eagles’ Monday night matchup against the Dallas Cowboys as they try to snap their four-game losing skid. While he said that he would “love” to play against the Cowboys, he wouldn’t definitively say that he will play.
“I would be doing myself a disservice to sit here and say that Monday night, I’m guaranteeing myself to play,” Barkley said. “I do know that I have all trust in the trainers and all trust in [head athletic trainer] Tom [Hunkele] and [senior athletic trainer Jerome Reid].
“To be honest, I was trying to go last week. It sounded great in my head, and then you sit and you’re like, ‘Maybe they were right.’ But I’m happy to have the opportunity to go out there and test it, and God willing, just continue to trend in the right direction throughout the week, and to be able to go and play Monday night, I would love to be out there.”
A prospective Barkley return could help the Eagles’ lifeless run game get going again. Over the last two weeks in his absence, the Eagles have combined for 57 rushing yards on 31 attempts, which is their lowest total yardage in a two-game span since the 2005 season (43 yards), according to Stathead.
But Barkley still has belief in the offense, especially on the ground. He expressed confidence in the outside-zone run game that is at the foundation of Sean Mannion’s offense, even though the team’s execution of the scheme has been inconsistent.
» READ MORE: The Eagles are 4.5-point underdogs at home against Dallas. Here’s what the sportsbooks are saying.
Barkley noted that after the Eagles’ latest loss to the Carolina Panthers, he was impressed with how Mannion conducted the next offensive meeting with a dose of honesty.
“It’s easy when things ain’t going right to be like, ‘It ain’t my fault,’ and that’s so far from the truth,” Barkley said. “And when you’re open and honest with each other, and that film doesn’t lie. Film never lies, and when we’re doing it as a group and as a whole, and seeing that like, OK, everyone will say this and say that, like, yes, and Sean’s going to own it, and Coach [Nick Sirianni] is going to own it. There’s times where they could put us in better positions, but there’s times where we’ve got to make plays too.”
The Eagles need players to step up and make those plays, even in the absence of key starters. Barkley isn’t the only one who has missed time this season. Jalen Hurts is likely out for the year, DeVonta Smith has missed time this season with a hamstring injury, and both backups to Barkley, Tank Bigsby and Will Shipley, are on injured reserve. That’s just a sampling of players who have been listed on the injury report this season.
Plus, the Eagles lost All-Pro right tackle Lane Johnson to retirement and Cam Jurgens to the Baltimore Ravens in a trade, signaling a shakeup to the offensive line.
Again, Barkley can draw on his experience with the Giants, which included some injury-riddled seasons, as he navigates this year with the Eagles. He hasn’t lost his sense of positivity.
» READ MORE: Is the Sean Mannion offense really fixable? | Best of unCovering the Birds
“The beautiful thing in this situation, everything that we want is still there,” Barkley said. “Sometimes it doesn’t look the way you want it to look, but right now, you’re not looking too far ahead, but the NFC East is struggling, and the NFC East is really asking for someone to take it over. And it’s going to be a team that figures it out and starts playing at a high level.”
Easier said than done, of course. But Barkley is prepared to embrace the underdog mentality the city knows well.
“It’s so easy to come in this building and put on a smile and come to work when the world’s patting you on the back and you’re 13-4 and you’re the hottest thing and everyone’s scared of the Eagles,” Barkley said. “It’s a little challenging when it’s the opposite way, and to be completely honest ... that’s what Philly’s about. We kind of have to take that underdog mentality.
“No one kind of believes in us anymore, but there’s a reason why there’s a statue of a fictional boxer, and his name is Rocky, and that’s what this town’s about. And I feel like they’re going to back us up, but also it takes us to take that mindset, and the leadership’s going to have to step up, and positivity is going to have to be at an all-time high.”
Even with all the injuries and ineffectiveness through six games, Sean Mannion is still a believer in the Eagles’ offense, saying the problems are “totally fixable.” The Inquirer’s Jeff McLane and Marcus Hayes have some thoughts on the state of Mannion’s group, as well as a defensive unit that’s also been underwhelming this season. Listen here.
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