Philadelphia Eagles: Miles Sanders’ trip to IR is a predictable bummer

When Miles Sanders went down early in the Philadelphia Eagles‘ bout against the Las Vegas Raiders, it looked bad.

Sure, Derrick Gunn, Ian Rapoport, and the rest all downplayed the injury based on internal info from the Eagles’ camp, with the former suggesting the injury may only hold out the PSU rusher for 2-3 weeks but again, the eye test looked bad.

Could that time frame still hold? No, because Sanders was just officially placed on IR and thus won’t be eligible to return to the field until Week 11 at the earliest.

Predictable? Yes. Still a massive bummer? Yes as well.

The Philadelphia Eagles finally have clarity on Miles Sanders’ status.

For as long as Miles Sanders was still on the active roster, the question would undoubtedly be asked over and over again, week after week: When will 26 be good to go?

That is now off the table.

With a minimum of three weeks on IR, whether he’s healthy tomorrow or in 21 days, Sanders is out of the Philadelphia Eagles’ immediate plans right when their schedule enters a make-or-break period that will define their chances of making the playoffs.

That’s the bad news.

The good news is Nick Sirianni will finally – hopefully – actually address his running game with a meaningful plan, even if the available options on the table aren’t quite as good as Sanders.

Will the Eagles turn to the dynamic trio of Jordan Howard, Kenneth Gainwell, and Boston Scott to shoulder the load (read here)? Or will they instead look to pull off a low-level trade like the New Orleans Saints just did with the Houston Texans for Mark Ingram? Or will they instead look to poach a practice squad rusher who fits their scheme, maybe a player like long-time favorite of the blog Jaylen Samuels, who just signed with the Houston Texans’ practice squad on Thursday?

Kerryon Johnson was released from the San Fransico 49ers’ practice squad earlier this month. Why not wheel that one back and see if he’s fully healthy?

Ultimately, the Philadelphia Eagles are a worse team without Miles Sanders. He is undoubtedly one of the team’s top-3 offensive players and even though the volume hasn’t been there, he’s still found ways to be a productive cog in an awful offense. But with Sanders now on IR, at least Nick Sirianni and company will be forced to formulate a plan at running back to field a competent ground game moving forward, which is more than you can say about his approach to the position thus far.