Philadelphia Eagles: Travis Fulgham (almost) saved the season… again

How Fulgham came a play away from saving the Philadelphia Eagles’ season.

After averaging 61 snaps a game from Week 5-10, Travis Fulgham‘s devolution to a part-time player was on full display in the Philadelphia Eagles‘ Week 15 loss to the Arizona Cardinals.

Now granted, the aforementioned game wasn’t Fulgham’s lowest snap total of the 2020 season, as he only played 11 snaps without so much as a target in the team’s Week 14 win over the New Orleans Saints, but after some speculated that a change at quarterback could re-invigorate the pride of Old Dominion’s career, it became abundantly clear things were headed in the opposite direction. For whatever reason, Jalen Hurts has an impressive, dare-I-say Nick-Foles-esque connection with Alshon Jeffery, and riding that pairing for the final two intradivision games of the season just makes sense.

But then again, when the Philadelphia Eagles really needed positive yards on their final drive of the game against ‘Calimari‘ and the Cards, who did Hurts turn to? Not Jeffery, who was untargeted during the last minute of the game, Greg Ward, or even Jalen Reagor, his other favorite target. No, Hurts opted to target Fulgham on two of his final seven throws and was rewarded for his efforts with a pair of first downs and 30 yards through the air.

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Heck, one could make the argument that maybe if Fulgham had been the target again on the Eagles’ final first down of the game (1st and 10 at Arizona 31), maybe Hurts wouldn’t have had to chuck it up on a pair of Hail Marys with 10 seconds left on the clock.

Is this particularly surprising? In a word, no. Fulgham has been a second-half stalwart since making his Eagles debut against the San Francisco 49ers in Week 4 and has scored every one of his four touchdowns in either the third or fourth quarter. But what is surprising is that the 25-year-old – who just so happens to still lead the team in receiving yards at 497 yards – was only targeted during the final minute of the game, without so much as a single pass thrown his way in the game’s first 59 minutes of action.

That, my friends, is a problem.

Say what you will about Fulgham’s overall talent level, his lack of separation, or his sub-par catch rate, but the former sixth-round pick has a pension for hauling in passes while draped all over by opposing defensive backs. Though he lacks deep speed (4.58 40 yard dash), Fulgham’s broad jump, arm length, wingspan, and weight are all within the top-80 percentile according to Mockdraftable, with his top pro comps being players like J.J. Arcega-Whiteside, Tee Higgins, Mack Hollins, and DeVante Parker.

Say what you will about that collection of players, but there’s a reason why the team has been linked to all four in one way or another to fill the ‘X’ wide receiver spot that will eventually be vacated by Jeffery – assuming Howie Roseman doesn’t erroneously opt to guarantee his contract yet again due to a fool’s gold sample size over the final month of the season.

To make the receiver’s usage rate all the more perplexing, Fulgham made the Eagles’ other, other, other key play of the game where he recovered a Haason Reddick fumble at the 13-yard line and effectively saved the team from having to defend Murray and company on a short field, down by six.

So let me get this straight, Fulgham was targeted- by my count – four times on the final drive, caught two of the team’s final three passes, and recovered a fumble, and those were basically the entirety of his involvement in the Week 15 gameplan? How can that be? Is he really only a reliable target when the game is on the line and an otherwise useless performer? Or have the Eagles simply failed to utilize the second-year wide receiver to his strengths and squandered a month of excellent play in favor of a noticeable downtick in production. Is there a clandestine, anti-Fulgham sentiment growing in the NovaCare Center?

As unfortunate as it may be to admit, the Philadelphia Eagles aren’t a team that understands their current position both within the NFC East and the NFL as a whole. In quite literally any other division, the Eagles would have been long-since eliminated from the postseason due to their 4-9-1 record and would have been able to fully shift into ‘player evaluation mode’ to see what they have moving forward. Granted, the team is kind of doing that, as Quez Watkins showed promising signs of life in Week 15, but he played nearly half as many snaps as Alshon Jeffery despite showing legit explosivity with the ball in his hands. With DeSean Jackson back in Week 16, it would appear any chances of Fulgham parlaying his success into Week 16 are slim to none, with his best hope coming in another fourth-quarter shootout. *sigh* I guess there’s always next year.