Philadelphia Eagles: Jordan Howard’s return screams of desperation

Jordan Howard is back with the Philadelphia Eagles, but not for the right reasons.

Growing up, most people are taught that getting back together with an ex girlfriend/boyfriend is usually a bad idea. That a couple breaks up for a reason, and that it’s probably for the best to keep it that way. Well if Howie Roseman and the Philadelphia Eagles were ever informed of that logic, they sure as heck don’t like listening to it.

According to the good ol’ fashioned NFL waiver wire, the Eagles are in the process of signing Jordan Howard to their practice squad. Howard obviously played a fairly large role on the Eagles last year, before his season was ultimately derailed due to a shoulder injury. Howard departed for Miami in the offseason, but really struggled to find a spot in their RB room.

With Howard set to the rejoin the Eagles, this now marks the eighth player currently on the roster who had at least one previous stint with the team. Roseman has borderline trademarked the concept of bringing back former players, and for the most part, it’s not worked out well for him.

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Howard currently has 33 rushing yards on 28 attempts this season. He looked noticeably slow and lethargic playing for the Dolphins, and ultimately lost his job to the likes of Myles Gaskin, despite being signed to a pricey contract during the offseason. As I’m sure most of you remember, Howard missed the majority of last year’s second half, as he battled some sort of mystery shoulder injury. It was never explicitly revealed what the injury was, but it looks to have seriously derailed both his conditioning and his overall physical shape here in 2020.

The current version of Jordan Howard is very, very different compared to what he was in 2019, hence why not a single team put a waiver claim in on him.

Bringing back Howard isn’t a move that makes sense for the Eagles in the grand scheme of things, it’s a move based out of emotion and reminiscing. At 3-5-1 the team should be experimenting with younger backs like Jason Huntley and Elijah Holyfield, not re-investing snaps into a guy they deemed not worthy of an extension less than a year ago.

To really put things into perspective, Howard has just the lone 33 yards of total offense since Week 9 of last year. Including the Eagles’ playoff game, that’s 17 consecutive weeks of football where Howard has been a complete non-factor.

1.94 yards per week, for the folks counting at home.

Similar to how the team signed Jay Ajayi midway through last year’s season, bringing back Jordan Howard screams of desperation and clinginess. Albeit he’s only being signed to a practice squad spot, so it doesn’t really matter all that much, but it’s still reflective of an organization that is clueless in terms of where they stand as a football team.

The Eagles coaching staff is in disarray, their defense just got exposed by the New York Giants, their offensive line is a disaster, and their passing game is in shambles. Adding Howard fixes none of these issues, and it sure as heck doesn’t help them moving forward beyond 2021. With multiple, younger RBs already present on the roster and on the practice squad, this move is only going to further stunt their growth.