Philadelphia Eagles: Jordan Howard is perfect 2021 NFL Draft insurance

Jordan Howard has been an NFL player for five years. Considering the average length of an NFL career is 3.3 years, and it takes three seasons on either IR or the active roster to earn a pension, that’s pretty good.

Over his half-decade career, Howard has filled pretty much every role imaginable from bellow to bench warmer and is relatively well-traveled, having played for the Chicago Bears, the Philadelphia Eagles, the Miami Dolphins, the Philadelphia Eagles, and now, the Philadelphia Eagles again, after signing a new contract with the team for the 2021 season.

That’s pretty interesting.

Now granted, it’s not like Howard has the record for most stints with one team over a three year period of time – that surely belongs to ex-Eagle Julian Vandervelde, who was signed and cut 21 times by mostly Chip Kelly – but still, there has to be something about the former UAB/Indiana rusher that keeps Philly coming back for more, right?

Well, assuming his health is finally back at 100 percent, maybe the third time will be the charm for Jordan Howard and the Philadelphia Eagles.

Jordan Howard is good draft weekend insurance for the Philadelphia Eagles.

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In 2016, Jordan Howard was a darn good running back. He ran for 1,313 yards, which ranked second in the NFL, and at 22-years-old, had seven total touchdowns, and was even named to a Pro Bowl during his first professional season.

Was it sustainable? No. Howard’s hard-nosed running style led the Bears to draft a partner in crime for their top rusher on eventual Pro Bowler Tarik Cohen, but Howard remained a viable offensive option – finishing out his career in Chicago with 3,938 total yards from scrimmage and 25 total touchdowns – all the way until he was traded to Philly for a conditional Day 3 draft pick.

And, objectively speaking, Howard remained a solid offensive option for the Eagles paired up with Miles Sanders in a thunder and lightning backfield too. Though Howard’s total yards were the lowest of any season in his career – at least, up until that point – he still averaged 4.4 yards per carry, the most he’d averaged since his rookie season, all the while recording a team-high six rushing touchdowns in addition to a seventh through the air.

Had Howard not suffered a pretty severe shoulder injury that left the power runner with decreased strength on his right side, maybe the Eagles would have extended their big 2019 trade acquisition, but instead, he was allowed to test the open market and sign a two-year, $9.75 million deal with a Miami Dolphins squad looking to add a little LeGarrette Blount-style oomph to their Patriots-esque offensive attack.

Unfortunately for Howard, things didn’t quite work out that way.

Whether due to the lingering effects of his 2019 injury or an unreported issue that was never made known to the public, Howard looked like a completely different player during his bizarre five-game tenure with the Miami Dolphins, averaging a career-low 8.6 yards per game on a brutal 1.7 yards per carry average – one of the worst marks in the entire NFL. Now granted, Howard did still run for four touchdowns versus 35 total rushes, which is undoubtedly one of the better touchdowns/rushes ratios in the NFL, but that statistical anomaly wasn’t enough to keep Howard employed through the 2020 season, as he was released midway through November and landed on the Eagles’ practice squad shortly thereafter.

Howard did eventually make his way onto the field for the Eagles during the month of December, rushing the ball seven times for 27 yards in two games of action for an admittedly good 3.9 yards per touch, but he didn’t get his number called after Week 15 and was left to test a disinterested market following a bizarre fifth season.

Had the Eagles opted to pass on Howard, maybe he would have latched on somewhere else, as he was an incredibly effective player not too many years earlier, but fortunately for the Alabama native’s camp, there was mutual interest in bringing the former number 24/28 back for a third stint with the team – though he’ll surely have to find a new number, as Darius Slay and Anthony Harris already have dibs on his former digits.

But what should fans expect from Howard when he arrives in camp this summer? Is he competing for the RB 2 spot behind Sanders with a player like Boston Scott, or is his roster spot far less secure, especially with the draft a few weeks away?

Simply put, Howard is draft insurance, nothing more and nothing less.

If the Eagles walk away from the 2021 NFL Draft with a premier power rusher like Michael Carter, there is very little chance Howard sticks around in a fourth rusher role, especially since he’s a non-factor on special teams. However, if the Eagles instead opt to avoid drafting a running back altogether, or opt to target a player like UCLA’s Demetric Felton, then there’s a very real chance Howard could be in line to at least have a shot at making the team for Week 1, as the only other “power back” on the Eagles’ roster as it’s presently constructed is Elijah Holyfield, who has zero professional rushing attempts to his name since going undrafted out of Georgia in 2019.

If Howard can’t beat out Holyfield for a roster spot, I really don’t know what to say about his prospects moving forward.

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So is Jordan Howard a magic fix for the Philadelphia Eagles? No. For as much as I would love to see the former fifth-round pick return to his rookie season form, he just isn’t that player anymore for one reason or another. But could he potentially fill a similar role to his first stint with the Eagles after effectively taking the 2020 season off versus his previous workloads? Assuming the Eagles don’t opt to select a younger, cheaper option with any of their 11 picks in the 2021 NFL Drat, I’d say that’s certainly a possibility, which is about all Howard can ask for at this stage of his career.

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