The best hope for the Eagles offense? A defense that left a lot of meat on the bone in 2025
Vic Fangio doesn’t have the same talent on the 2026 roster at his disposal as he did in 2024. But the production needs to be at that level.
A counterfactual to consider in an offseason where we’ve been hyper-focused on Jalen Hurts, A.J. Brown and Sean Mannion’s offense-to-be …
What if DeMarcus Robinson hadn’t caught a 61-yard pass on second-and-11 on the second offensive play of the Eagles’ wild-card loss to the 49ers?
We’re not playing any sort of blame game here. We’re just thinking out loud. Vic Fangio himself flirted with the topic at rookie minicamp a couple of weeks ago.
“There’s the narrative out there that if the offense could have been better, we would have had a more successful season,” the Eagles’ veteran defensive coordinator said. “But we could have played better too on defense in certain games, and we need to take that mindset moving forward.”
» READ MORE: DeVonta Smith won’t replace A.J. Brown. The question is whether the Eagles will need him to.
Maybe he was just being polite. But Fangio made the point more or less unprompted. It’s clearly a message he is going to preach to his unit throughout training camp. If so, it will be more than coach speak.
Football is not a game played in isolation. The question isn’t whether an offense or defense is good enough, but whether it is good enough for the unit on the other side of the football. That’s especially true when you consider the economics of the game: The more resources a team pours into one position, the fewer resources it can dedicate to other positions.
Over the last few years, the Eagles have dedicated a ton of draft capital to the defense. They have been successful enough that they are now making preparations to dedicate a ton of financial capital to extend the contracts of guys like Jalen Carter, Quinyon Mitchell, and Cooper DeJean. Their two biggest capital outlays this season were on the defense in cornerback Riq Woolen and edge rusher Jonathan Greenard. Meanwhile, the offense has suffered a net loss, unless receiver Makai Lemon and tight end Eli Stowers are massive rookie standouts.
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The point isn’t that the Eagles could have won a Super Bowl last year even with the offense as it was by the end of the season. Rather, the point is that the defense is their best hope of winning one this year. The optimistic case for the Eagles in 2026 isn’t Sean Mannion or Jalen Hurts or even a healthy offensive line. It’s a defense that has plenty of room to improve.
Go back to that 61-yard catch by Robinson in the playoffs. It set up the 49ers for the only touchdown they’d score until the fourth quarter. Take away that first touchdown, and the Eagles would have been up 16-3 at the end of the third, all else unchanged.
Even with the Robinson catch, the Eagles were up 16-10 heading into the fourth. The defense allowed gains of 27 (Kyle Jusczcyk catch) and 29 (Jauan Jennings touchdown pass to Christian McCaffrey) and then allowed a 66-yard touchdown drive that ate up 5 minutes, 6 seconds of clock that put the 49ers up 23-19. The Eagles also picked off a pass in between.
Fangio’s defense was quite good last year. Good enough to beat the 49ers and maybe everybody else in the NFC except the Seahawks, if paired with a functional offense. Top five in points. Top 10 in pass yards and takeaways. No need to run home to the mailbox and hide the report card.
At the same time, the Eagles defense wasn’t what it was in 2024. The consistent dominance wasn’t there. The big-play breakdowns were there. They allowed 160-plus rush yards in four games, three of them losses.
There’s a reason the Eagles traded for Jaelan Phillips midway through the season. There’s a reason they tried to re-sign Phillips and then traded for Greenard to replace him. There’s a reason Woolen is here. The fate of the 2026 season will hinge as much on the outcome of those additions — and on next steps from guys like Carter, Jalyx Hunt, etc. — as it will on Hurts, Mannion and Co. The Eagles offense needs to be better, yes. The Eagles defense needs to limit how much better the offense needs to be.
The biggest room for improvement is the addition of Woolen to replace Adoree’ Jackson. If the onetime Seahawks rookie standout can be Darius Slay of a couple of years ago, it might be enough.
There is plenty of downside risk, as well. There is a reason Woolen fell out of favor in Seattle. There’s a reason Phillips was the Eagles’ first option in free agency. He only had a couple of sacks in his nine games here, but he was a force on the edge. Opposing offenses averaged just 3.87 yards per carry when Phillips was on the field, by far the lowest total of any Eagles edge rusher. That’s nearly a half-yard less than the 4.21 yards-per-carry opponents averaged when Phillips wasn’t on the field. In the Eagles’ loss to the Chargers in Week 14, LA averaged 5.3 yards per carry when Nolan Smith was on the field. Greenard is highly regarded. But the market considered him less valuable than Phillips.
The fact of the matter is that the Eagles are living in a world where the current NFC favorites just added the best defensive end in the game after previously trading a first-round pick for one of the NFL’s best cornerbacks. Fangio doesn’t have the same talent at his disposal as he did in 2024. But the production needs to be at that level.
A.J. Brown is officially an Eagle no more! We knew the move was coming for weeks, if not months, but that doesn't make the departure of the Pro Bowl wide receiver and Super Bowl champion any less jarring. The Philadelphia Inquirer's Jeff McLane and David Murphy react to general manager Howie Roseman's trade with the New England Patriots. Listen here.
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