From free agency to Dallas Goedert, five takeaways from Howie Roseman’s owners meetings media session

PALM BEACH, Fla. — Standing in the courtyard of a Florida resort, Howie Roseman got his chance to contextualize the first wave of the offseason.

The Eagles general manager discussed plenty of topics, from a series of free-agency signings, Dallas Goedert’s uncertain future with the team, and the rationale behind moving on from players like Darius Slay, C.J. Gardner-Johnson, and others.

Here are five takeaways from Roseman’s media session at the NFL’s annual meeting:

The Eagles lost five major contributors this offseason from the roster that won Super Bowl LIX, with Milton Williams, Josh Sweat, Darius Slay, and Mekhi Becton leaving in free agency, and C.J. Gardner-Johnson getting traded to the Houston Texans.

When assessing those departures, Roseman pointed to the Eagles’ balance sheet years down the road as the primary reason.

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The team will have eight players with a salary north of $15 million next season, a number that could even grow in the next couple of years as players currently on rookie contracts become eligible for extensions. Retaining that group, which includes Jalen Carter, Nolan Smith, Cam Jurgens, Quinyon Mitchell, and Cooper DeJean, has been part of the calculus for Roseman this spring.

“From the 2022 to the 2024 drafts, we have eight starters who were on the Super Bowl team and none of those guys have long-term contracts,” Roseman said. “In those drafts, we probably have five or six players that will be competing for starting jobs, so you have a lot of players coming through that aren’t under long-term contracts. Plus a lot of guys who are on long-term contracts.”

“We never want to be in a situation where we have one year where we’re getting rid of 20 guys,” he added. “We’ve been very fortunate to be aggressive in keeping our guys and signing guys in free agency, and it’s also got to align with the draft and having young players. That’s the important thing to do, draft well and keep your players, and we have to make sure going forward that we have the opportunity to do that as well. A lot of those players that we’re talking about are good young players that we’re excited about, and so we had to make some tough decisions here and it seems like a moment to do that from a big-picture perspective.”

Roseman also addressed the uncertainty surrounding tight end Dallas Goedert, who is entering the final year of his contract and has been dangled in the trade market this offseason.

“There’s no update,” Roseman said. “Obviously, Dallas has been a tremendous player and person for us. We have tremendous respect for him in both those regards as a player and a person. The opportunities that we got in free agency in Harrison Bryant and [Kylen] Granson were just opportunities we felt were good for our football team. Dallas is a unique player, really that’s kind of where we stand on it.”

Goedert is set to make $14 million next season and count for $11.8 million against the salary cap, but he doesn’t have any guaranteed money remaining on his deal and could be off-loaded as a result. Similar to the Gardner-Johnson trade, the Eagles would save cash spending in future years by either off-loading Goedert or reaching an agreement on a restructured contract to lower his salary rather than gaining much short-term cap flexibility.

Speaking of balancing a top-heavy roster, Roseman’s days of divesting resources from the linebacker position in favor of spending big elsewhere are now behind him.

After signing Zack Baun to a three-year extension with an annual value of $17 million before the start of free agency, the general manager acknowledged his roster-building approach will have to shift some but said it wouldn’t change his well-established prioritization of building along the line of scrimmage.

“It points to a sacrifice somewhere else,” Roseman said. “So the sacrifice doesn’t have to be in the team-building philosophy or the vision that you have in building a team, but you have to then understand where that’s coming from. So some of these moves are coming from other places that maybe aren’t reflected on the line of scrimmage. Obviously, we lost a couple of defensive linemen, but you’re going to have to get it from somewhere else, and then what are you doing to supplement those spots that are important to building the team?”

“I think when you talk about Zack or Saquon [Barkley] and you say ‘running back’ or ‘linebacker’ and traditionally we haven’t done that, these are difference-making players,” Roseman added. “These are guys who are some of the best players on their side of the ball in the league. Those guys are impossible to replace. So, from our perspective, yeah, we had to make some tough decisions that didn’t feel great at the time but they were to keep guys here over a period of time so we can do our best to try to compete for another championship.”

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Roseman also conceded that the front office probably cost itself by not pushing to extend Baun before the end of the season. The Eagles have shifted considerably away from working on in-season extensions the last few years because of Roseman’s fear of upsetting the dynamics of a locker room midway through the season.

“In the past, we had signed some guys during the season,” Roseman said. “And the conscious decision is basically: The team is going so well, you don’t want people to think we’re picking favorites and make other people become independent contractors and go, ‘Well, if they’re signing him, they’re not going to sign me, in which case I’ve got to play for myself.’ Those things, at the end, probably cost you money and they probably change the nature of it.”

Similar to the move that landed the Eagles Baun last year, Roseman spent the first wave of free agency targeting players on low-cost, one-year deals with the hopes of finding value around the margins of the market.

Here’s what he had to say about a handful of those signings:

On running back AJ Dillon, “It’s very rare that you find a 250-pound back with quick feet. Obviously, we have a tremendous amount of confidence in Saquon and a tremendous amount of confidence in Will [Shipley] as well. Just for us, there’s an opportunity — he was out of football last year — that came to us and that we felt like a high-character, talented player and just a little different style that he has.”

On edge rusher Azeez Ojulari, “It’s fairly apparent that we spend a lot of time scouting SEC players and certainly Georgia defensive players. So this is a guy that we felt like we were very familiar with in college and competing against him in the NFC East. It’s a position that we obviously lost a couple of guys who are hugely important to our success. As free agency went on, we felt like it was a good opportunity for the both of us.”

On cornerback Adoree’ Jackson, “We’ve had interest in him before. Really, a guy that is still extremely fast, extremely twitched up, has playmaking ability, and I don’t think it’s a secret, probably still hasn’t really played his best ball yet and has played well. Feeling like, similar to some of the guys maybe that we lost from a skill set and trying to replace that. Always looking for speed and cover corners.”

The Eagles also have a looming decision surrounding defensive tackle Jordan Davis. The team has until May 1 to exercise the fifth-year option to keep the 2022 first-round pick under contract through 2026. If the Eagles decline the option, Davis can become a free agent next offseason.

While Roseman didn’t address the fifth-year option specifically, he did give a vote of confidence regarding Davis despite his limited production rushing the passer to this point in his career.

“When you watch these guys perform and improve the whole body of the season, because that’s what you’ve really got to do ... you just see a guy who elevated in the postseason,” Roseman said. “Really counting on him to continue to develop. And that’s what this is, all of us in all of our professions, you continue to develop and continue to get better, and that’s what I think we’re seeing with Jordan.”

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