Did the Philadelphia Eagles draft Jalen Hurts to keep him from Dallas?

After watching the Cowboys take an interest in Jalen Hurts during the pre-draft process, did the Philadelphia Eagles select Jalen Hurts to keep him from Dallas?

The Philadelphia Eagles were always going to add another arm to their quarterback stable this offseason; it was inevitable.

With all due respect to Nate Sudfeld, if the 2017, 2018, and 2019 season is any indication, it’s better to err on the side of caution when it comes to doubling down on the quarterback position, as any team is just one play away from a potential season without an adequate backup plan.

And when the Eagles didn’t add a single external arm during the first or second wave of free agency, it felt even more inevitable that one of the team’s eight selections in the 2020 NFL Draft would be used on the game’s most important position.

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But honestly, did anyone really think the Eagles would use a second-round pick to select Jalen Hurts?

A runner-up to the 2019 Heisman Trophy after three seasons at Alabama and a signature senior season as the heir to consecutive first-round picks Baker Mayfield and Kyler Murray at Oklahoma, many tabbed Hurts as a developmental Day 2 pick who could ascend to the rank of starter after a few years of seasoning under a veteran signal-caller.

That is not going to happen in Philly.

So, if the Eagles are genuinely content with Carson Wentz as a starter and only intend to use Hurts in emergency situations and as a *gulp* Taysom Hill-style change of pace quarterback, why draft him in the second round? Surely they could have used found another athletic project later in the draft, right?

Heck, Greg Ward was a college quarterback at Houston from 2013-16, why not use him in that very same role in addition to his slot receiving duties?

Well, I have a theory. Mind you, this theory does not come as a result of any insider information, just my gut, some research, and a Charlie Kelly-esque connecting of dots, but I think it’s worth considering: Did the Eagles draft Hurts to keep him away from the Dallas Cowboys?

I know, I know, crazy, right? But think about it. Dallas showed a ton of interest in Hurts during the pre-draft process, holding a very well-publicized virtual visit with the 21-year-old dual-threat quarterback mere days before the draft. Why? Well, they’ve also shown some hesitancy to extend their current franchise quarterback, Dak Prescott to a long-term deal, first allowing him to play out his original fourth-round tendered contract in 2018 and then attempting to exclusive franchise tag him for another season at $31.5 million in 2020.

Could the Cowboys be exercising their options just in case Prescott were to suffer a career-ending injury? I guess anything’s possible, but Prescott appeared in all 16 games in each of his first four seasons with the organization with nary an injury worth noting.

Prescott has played 4,247 of a possible 4,320 offensive snaps since being drafted 135th overall in the 2016 NFL Draft, so Prescott is probably the last quarterback I’d call injury prone.

No, the reason many feel that the Cowboys haven’t committed fully to Prescott is that they simply fear he isn’t a quarterback worth paying the highest sum in NFL history. With $74 million committed to eight players on the team’s roster as things presently stand, giving Prescott a deal in the mid-$30 millions a year would effectively remove the team’s ability to address needs in free agency, or re-sign their own players when they become available.

Had the team not given monster deals to players like Ezekiel Elliott, DeMarcus Lawrence, and Amari Cooper, maybe they could have afforded to keep players like Robert Quinn and Byron Jones in free agency.

Had the team been able to draft a viable alternative in Hurts, they could have potentially parlayed his spot on the roster into a slightly less expensive contract with Prescott – as they already have his replacement in-house – while also being better prepared to avoid disaster if he opted to leave in free agency for an even bigger external payday.

Hurts was compared to Prescott pretty frequently in the pre-draft process, so having two guys capable of running the same scheme at a relatively comparable level would have been a home run for Jerry Jones and company.

I mean think about it, which would you rather have, Prescott, or a quarterback with a pre-made relationship with your new first-round wide receiver on a long-term deal and an extra $30 million a year to address other positions across the roster? When even Lincoln Riley calls Hurts to the Cowboys a sensible fit, you kind of have to take an assumed interest between the two parties seriously.

By selecting Hurts in the second round, Roseman has taken that option away from the Cowboys and all but forced the franchise to extend Prescott to a long-term deal in the reported ballpark of $35 million over four years, as opposed to a wait-and-see approach based on how the two quarterbacks look in new head coach Mike McCarthy‘s system.

Would the Cowboys have definitely taken Hurts in the third round, or used some of their draft capital to move up and procure his services? No, a team like the Pittsburgh Steelers could have beaten them to the punch, but by making the pick himself, Roseman took that option away, forcing the Cowboys to instead draft Hurts’ teammate Neville Gallimore, a 6-foot-2, 304-pound defensive tackle that doesn’t exactly tip the scales in the same way as selecting a potential starting-caliber quarterback.

Fun fact, according to Mike Renner and Austin Gayle of Pro Football Focus, drafting a starting quarterback is worth four times as much as any other player at any other position, so the Eagles were not only able to address one of their needs by adding Hurts, but did so while taking away considerable value from the Cowboys had they made the same pick. Even if Hurts never becomes a full-time starter and is eventually traded for a mid-round pick in 2022, it’s pretty safe to say he won’t go to the Cowboys, where he would conceivably still hold more value even in a backup role behind a then-much older Prescott.

Did Roseman just burn a second-round pick – the very same second-round pick he refused to surrender to leapfrog the Cowboys to draft CeeDee Lamb16th overall – to throw a counterpunch back at Jones and steal his guy? I doubt that was the sole reason for the selection, but I’d also be lying if I said I didn’t think it played into the decision.

After watching Roseman and Jones’ tete-a-tete over potential draftees for some time now, it wouldn’t surprise me if picking Hurts was another Dallas Goedert, except this time, the Eagles didn’t have to surrender an additional asset to stick it to Dallas.

I mean, think about it, in hindsight wouldn’t the Eagles have drafted Tony Romo in the seventh round to keep him from Dallas? What about La’el Collins? He signed with the Cowboys as a UDFA after falling out of the draft entirely due to a precarious draft day situation and could have been selected over, say, Blake Countess in the sixth round to secure his rights. Heck, maybe the Cowboys would have even traded up to ensure they ended up with Donovan McNabb in the 1999 NFL Draft… actually, maybe not in that case, but still, taking away an asset from another team is kind of an asset in its own right, right?

dark. Next. Howie Roseman is an evil genius

Look, for all I know, Jalen Hurts was just the best player available on the Philadelphia Eagles’ board when they went on the clock at 53, and Howie Roseman decided to address one of his team’s very real needs with a second-round pick – killing an ant with an anvil, if you will. However, in doing so, the team effectively locked the Dallas Cowboys into a long-term deal with Dak Prescott that should hamper their salary cap flexibility for years to come. Intentional or not, that’s pretty cool, even if the decision to draft a backup quarterback with a 27-year-old starter locked into a $100 million-plus deal is one of the strangest draft day moves in franchise history.

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