Philadelphia Eagles: No futures contract for John Hightower

(Photo by Mitchell Leff/Getty Images)
(Photo by Mitchell Leff/Getty Images) /
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When an NFL team’s season comes to an end, be that after Week 18 or as Super Bowl champions, teams are afforded an opportunity to sign their practice squad players to futures deals.

These contracts, which are usually for the minimum-salary with little to no guaranteed money, keep a player around into the next season and prevent would-be poachers from stealing them away should a need come up in the playoffs.

Complicated, right? Well, it doesn’t have to be, just think of it as pre-free agency for players like Mac McCain, JaCoby Stevens, and Noah Togiai, who saw action for the Eagles during the regular season but never quite ended up with a full-on contract like Jason Huntley earned in Week 18.

Normally, the announcement of futures contracts is a fairly mundane, not so noteworthy event that only true NFL nerds care about but this year, it’s more about who the Philadelphia Eagles didn’t sign than who they did, as a notable former draft pick might have just spent his final day at the NovaCare Center.

One former Philadelphia Eagles wide receiver could be on the outs with the franchise.

Once upon a time, John Hightower was considered one of the biggest steals of the 2020 NFL Draft. Evaluators loved his speed, his height, and projected him out as a developmental flanker with big play potential on vertical concepts.

Unfortunately, that potential never quite translated onto the field for the Philadelphia Eagles.

While Hightower put a few nice plays to tape during his rookie season, including a 50 yard bomb versus the Baltimore Ravens and a 59 yarder against the New York Giants the following week, his play and thus playing time was incredibly inconsistent, which sent his future with the team into slightly murky waters.

I’m not talking Schuylkill River murky, but maybe the Wildwood surf after an early June storm.

Entering his second season with the team, the calculus to make the final 53 man roster wasn’t that different from the year before. Sure, DeVonta Smith was added in the draft and he was guaranteed one of the team’s wide receiver spots, but both Alshon Jeffery and DeSean Jackson were gone, which theoretically was a net positive for bottom-of-the-roster receivers looking for a chance to keep their NFL dreams alive.

Unfortunately for Hightower, two developments all but eliminated his chances of sticking around long-term: Quez Watkins and Howie Roseman’s desire to only keep five wide receivers.

Hightower duked it out, caught three passes for 21 yards in the preseason finale, and was ultimately waived alongside Travis Fulgham in favor of a lean, mean receiving corps featuring Smith, Watkins, Jalen Reagor, Greg Ward, and JJ Arcega-Whiteside, the latter of whom caught nine passes for 131 yards over the 17 game regular season.

For the entirety of the regular season, fans openly pondered if this would be the week we’d see Hightower elevated from the practice squad, as the Eagles’ receiving corps was basically Smith with the occasional cameo from Reagor or Watkins but alas, it just wasn’t meant to be; Hightower finished out the season with only 11 total snaps in one single game of action – two in offense and none on special teams – and didn’t log a single snap save a 17 yard kick return and a brutally ugly fumble on the final play of the game versus the Los Angeles Chargers in Week 9

Did that fumble end Hightower’s career right then and there, or did the team simply prefer to roll with Deon Cain, a player Nick Sirianni coached in Indianapolis on a futures deal? Either way, if Hightower is on a roster for training camp in 2022, it probably won’t be in Philadelphia, as the soon-to-be third year pro should draw at least some interest from teams looking for a 25-year-old who ran a 4.43 40 coming out of Boise State.

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In a perfect world, John Hightower would have worked out with the Philadelphia Eagles. He would have built on those big catches, closed out the 2020 season in style, and became a rotational outside receiver in his second season with the team. Instead, he had one bad play on one of his only plays and now has to continue on with his NFL career elsewhere. For his sake, let’s hope he lands on a team that gives him an opportunity to shine.