Philadelphia Eagles: Mac McCain is back on the market

For the first nine games of the 2021 NFL season, Mac McCain was a member of the Philadelphia Eagles.

A waiver wire claim from the Denver Broncos on September 7th, McCain appeared in one game for the Eagles over his tenure with the team, logging 13 special teams snaps in a loss to the Dallas Cowboys, before being waived yet again to make room for practice squad standout Jordan Howard, who exhausted his call up eligibility over the previous two weeks.

Though Philly reportedly hoped to sign McCain back onto their practice squad if he passed through waivers, the Broncos swooped in and reacquired the cornerback they initially signed as a UDFA out of North Carolina A&T a few months prior, conveniently just a few days before they faced off against the Eagles in a pivotal Week 10 bout.

Fortunately, McCain either didn’t spill the beans on his former team or didn’t offer up anything beneficial, as the Eagles pretty handily beat the Broncos on their home turf and secured their second win in three weeks.

Fast forward to Week 12, and the now-former Bronco finds himself on the waiver wire yet again, but should the Birds be interested in bringing the 23-year-old Greensboro, North Carolina native back for a second tenure with the team? Well, I guess that depends on how Howie Roseman, Jonathan Gannon, and the rest of the Philadelphia Eagles’ brass feel about Mac McCain as a prospect moving forward, as the team already has a ton of young, developmental defensive backs on their roster.

Do the Philadelphia Eagles have room for another developmental DB?

As things presently stand, the Philadelphia Eagles have 12 defensive backs on their active roster.

That is a lot; probably too much, if we’re being honest.

Through the first 11 weeks of the season, 13 different defensive backs have logged at least one snap on either special teams or defense, with seven of those players earning at least one start at their given positions.

And yet, despite drafting a cornerback in the fourth round, trading for a cornerback, signing a free agent cornerback, and then claiming two cornerbacks off of waivers before the season officially started, Howie Roseman has traded for two more cornerbacks, Tay Gowan and Kary Vincent Jr. over the course of the regular season, bringing the team’s grand total of defensive backs up to 13 on the season.

Once again, that’s a lot.

So why are the Eagles adding so many defensive backs? Is it because they have had to rely on practice squad claims over the past few seasons and want to be fully stocked in case disaster strikes? Or could it be that every player brought in isn’t quite as good as the team expected, and thus, it becomes a next-man-up sort of situation? It certainly can’t be because Jonathan Gannon plays six defensive backs on the field at the same time all that often, as the first-year defensive back has a weird aversion to dime defense.

My guess? Because Roseman doesn’t want to draft a cornerback in the first round of the 2022 NFL Draft and would really like to steal a starter on the cheap via an unconventional avenue.

If, for example, either Marcus Epps, K’Von Wallace, Andre Chachere, or even Vincent Jr. shines in practice and looks darn good at the back end of the defense, maybe Roseman won’t have to pay Anthony Harris, or someone similar, $5 million to shore up the secondary in 2022. Maybe the team can give Rodney McLeod a shorter-term extension instead of a longer one and re-evaluate the team’s depth a few years down the line.

Similarly, the Eagles probably don’t want to re-sign Steven Nelson when his contract expires and would instead like to secure a player of similar, if not better value without having to hope another highly touted prospect like Sidney Jones, Eric Rowe, or Rasul Douglas fails to live up to expectations. If, for example, a player like Gowan, Zech McPhearson, or even a re-signed Mac McCain shows enough in practice to garner a longer look, maybe the Eagles can afford to wait a little longer in the draft to sign a cornerback instead of having to reach for a player they aren’t particularly in love with because they have a glaring hole opposite Darius Slay.

Sidebar: Personally, I think the Eagles should finally invest a first-round draft pick in a cornerback like, say, Derek Stingley Jr., but going into a draft with a legitimate hole on the depth chart is the easiest way to end up over-drafting a player who never lives up to expectations.

In a weird twist of fate, the Philadelphia Eagles’ secondary is actually pretty good. They have an elite outside option who might just make it to the Pro Bowl in Darius Slay, a fantastic young slot cornerback in Avonte Maddox who is only allowing 6.7 yards-per-catch, and a veteran safety in Rodney McLeod, who should help to transition the defense from one era to the next. If a few of the team’s young defensive backs can take a step forward and develop into legitimate players long-term, the secondary might just go from good to very good and remain that way for the foreseeable future. If not? Well, Howie Roseman sure has amassed a ton of draft picks, maybe use a few of them on defensive backs.