Philadelphia Eagles: Dan Orlovsky wants a Gardner Minshew trade

Did you have “trade for Gardner Minshew” on your Philadelphia Eagles preseason bingo card?

No? Well, apparently Dan Orlovsky did, as the noted semi-Eagles fan just introduced that sort of chaotic energy into your end-of-summer plans.

Considering Orlovsky’s most famous football highlight at the NFL level involves recording a safety by running out of the endzone, I guess I’m not too surprised that his decision-making is sus.

… or is it? I mean, the Eagles’ backup quarterbacks aren’t what most would call good, and with Trevor Lawrence in place as the team’s franchise quarterback, Minshew isn’t exactly in the long-term plans of Shad Khan’s football franchise.

Sidebar: Did anyone else catch CM Punk’s debut on the Khan family’s other contribution to American sports, AEW? If not, seek it out here; it was awesome.

Could Gardner Minshew actually be a legitimate acquisition target for the Philadelphia Eagles?

Minshew could present new questions and answers to the Philadelphia Eagles.

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To make a long story short, the single biggest deciding factor in a hypothetical trade for Gardener Minshew is one thing and one thing only: The asking price.

If the Jacksonville Jaguars are willing to move on from the final two years of Minshew’s contract for a seventh-round pick, then the Philadelphia Eagles – and every other team in the NFL for that matter – should be banging down Trent Baalke’s door to get a deal done.

Why? Well that, my friends, should be rather obvious.

Since taking the league by storm as a sixth-round pick in 2019 – selected 11 spots after Eagles’ fifth-round pick Clayton Thorson – Minshew has recorded two straight seasons where he completed more than 60 percent of his passes and thrown two-plus times as many touchdowns as interceptions. While Minshew’s sophomore season featured four fewer starts, five fewer appearances, and a whole lot more losing, his efficiency numbers were up across the board, with his QBR higher than every single quarterback on the Eagles’ roster.

Had the Eagles simply implanted Minshew onto their roster in place of both Carson Wentz and Jalen Hurts, one could make an argument that the Birds may have won a few more games and their massive coaching staff overhaul may not have come to pass, as, statistically speaking, he was the most efficient of the trio.

These aren’t, however, the same Eagles as one season prior. If Minshew were to be traded to the Eagles for a negligible draft selection, it would be solely to serve as a backup for Hurts, where his livelier arm and more creative hairstyle would add some excitement to the quarterbacks room, not to mention sports talk radio.

Would landing Minshew give the Eagles one of the better backup plans in the NFL or be viewed as a safety blanket should Hurts falter in his first season as a starter? Can the answer be both and that not create a war of 2020 proportions for the very soul of the team moving forward?

If winning in the immediate future is the team’s primary concern and they’re willing to forgo having a veteran influence on the bench to help tutor Hurts in favor of a better on-field performer, landing a player like Minshew does fit the bill for what Dan Orlovsky is looking for at QB2.

But what if, however, the Jaguars’ asking price is more like a, say, third-round pick? Then the market, I imagine, would become a whole lot leaner and his fit with the Eagles becomes a whole lot harder to quantify.

Howie Roseman, as Eagles fans know all too well, is a big believer in stocking his roster with a premier option at backup quarterback. On paper, Joe Flacco and Nick Mullens should have been in the categories of top-tier second and third-string quarterbacks respectfully, but in practice, neither has come to the City of Brotherly Love as advertised. The addition of Minshew would certainly fix that issue, as he’s a top-40 quarterback by any conceivable metric, but for a team looking to build a new core of young, ascending players moving forward, investing a Day 2 pick on a 25-year-old backup quarterback is an awfully steep investment.

Then again, Roseman is the very same guy who used a second-round pick on a quarterback less than a year removed from signing his “franchise player” to a $100 million deal, so really, you can never say never when it comes to such a deal, as a quarterback-hungry GM and his picks are easily parted.

So what should the Philadelphia Eagles do? Should they stick to their guns – and scouting reports – and see if Joe Flacco and Nick Mullens can figure things out moving forward? Or should they instead make a call down to Jacksonville, praise the CM Punk signing, and back up the Brink truck for Gardener Minshew’s services? In this humble blogger’s opinion, the answer is simple: Make a call down to Jacksonville, praise the CM Punk signing, and ask about the price. If it’s low, make a move. If it’s high, hang up. And if it’s Andre Dillard, at least ask for Will Richardson back in the deal, as Brett Toth just doesn’t look like an NFL-caliber backup tackle.