Bowen: Little reason to get excited about DeSean report

ESPN's Adam Schefter enlivened Sunday morning for Eagles fans with a report that the team is "expected" to pursue wide receiver DeSean Jackson in free agency next spring.

If you read the report and not just the Twitter headline, and then listened to Schefter on the pregame show, it seems this was based on stuff he's hearing from other teams and what Schefter thinks makes sense.

So, gossip and speculation, really.

Here are the pluses and minuses of such a move.

Why the report could make sense: Howie Roseman does have a very strong resentment of the things Chip Kelly did to deplete talent gathered by the previous regime. And right now, the potential list of free-agent wide receivers doesn't look imposing.

Why the report might not make sense: Jackson is 30 and wide receivers  30 and older tend to be guys who really take care of their bodies, spend a lot of time at the facility in the offseason, etc. This has never been DeSean. He has been limited by injury quite a bit since leaving the Eagles, hasn't come close to another Pro Bowl season. Last year, he played in 10 games and caught 30 passes. He is doing better this season, 38 catches for 585 yards going into this week. But his yards per catch seem destined to decline for the third season in a row. He does not return punts anymore.

Ultimately, a lot might depend on who else is available and the price tag. There doesn't seem to be any good reason to take this report as anything more than speculation about something that, from a distance, might make sense. It's a long, long, long way from actually happening and probably won't happen.