Philadelphia Eagles: Kyzir White can right Jatavis Brown’s wrong

Technically, the Philadelphia Eagles already addressed their linebacking corps this offseason.

For all the love Haason Reddick is getting for his ability to rush the passer, the team announced him as a linebacker and will likely start him at strongside in base packages. Granted, that’s not to say Reddick still won’t get plenty of opportunities to disrupt the pocket, as you don’t put up two straight double-digit sack seasons by mistake, his role feels destined to be dynamic, not tied down to one specific spot.

If that was all the Eagles got, it would be a fine free agent haul. T.J. Edwards showed out well last season, as did Davion Taylor before his season was cut short due to injury. With some luck, a plug-and-play linebacker could fall to Philly in the draft, and the team could start to finally recapture their 2017 glory, when they had not one, not two, but three quality NFL linebackers.

…or, Howie Roseman could go out and actually sign a veteran linebacker to fill out his depth chart, in a move that will surely make more than a few fans happy.

Kyzir White, let’s hope you work out better than the last linebacker the Philadelphia Eagles signed from the Los Angeles Chargers.

Let’s hope Kyzir White actually sees the field for the Philadelphia Eagles.

Do you remember Philadelphia Eagles legend Jatavis Brown? A former fifth-round pick out of Akron, Brown turned in three good seasons with the Chargers under defensive coordinator Gus Bradley and, after having his playing time largely taken over by 2019 draftee Drue Tranquill – and Kyzir White – parlayed that success into a modest one-year, prove-it deal worth up to $1.047 million with the Philadelphia Eagles in 2020.

While he didn’t have prototypical size at 5-foot-11, 222 pounds, coaches loved his ability to fly around the field and make big play tackles, and the hope was that he could fill the weakside linebacker role in Jim Schwartz’s defense until a drafter player was ready to roll.

…what? You don’t remember Brown? Well, that would probably be because he retired from football a few months later and never appeared in a game for the Eagles in the pre or regular season.

Needless to say, Brown’s signing was as much of a disaster as a one-year stopgap could be. Unlike, say, L.J. Fort, Zach Brown, or Eric Wilson in 2021, who all at least played a few games before being released, Brown dipped well after all the good free agents were signed and left the Eagles forced to rely on players like Alex Singleton and Nathan Gerry in bigger roles than they were ready for.

If Kyzir White just appears in a game, he would already be an upgrade over Brown, and if he plays as well as he did in 2021, he’ll be better than Fort, Brown, and Wilson too.

The younger brother of former first-round pick Kevin White, Kyzir also played his college football at West Virginia, splitting his time between safety and linebacker as a box performer before making the jump to the middle of the defense full time as a fourth-round pick of the Los Angeles Chargers. Though he’s largely retained his safety weight, clocking in ten pounds lighter than his former teammate Brown, he has good height at 6-foot-2, and the athletic measurables many teams now look for in a coverage-focused weakside linebacker.

In 2021, playing under Jonathan Gannon’s good friend Brandon Staley, White had a breakout year, recording 119 tackles and playing almost 90 percent of the Chargers’ defensive snaps. Though he gave up 76.3 percent of the passes thrown his way, he only surrendered 358 yards and was responsible for two touchdowns, which is three less than Steven Nelson surrendered for the Eagles.

While only time will tell if White finally fixes the Eagles’ weakside linebacker problem for good, he’s at least a coverage-focused player who should come darn close to reaching the incentives in his contract, which could be worth up to $5 million.

Will the addition of Kyzir White work? Only time will tell; it’s entirely possible he’ll be starting Week 1 at weakside linebacker next to T.J. Edwards and Haason Reddick, and the Philadelphia Eagles will have much, much, much, much, much improved prospects in the middle of their defense than a season prior. It’s also possible that Davion Taylor or even a highly drafted rookie – Football Gods willing – could beat out White, and he could be relegated to defensive subpackage duties when Jonathan Gannon needs to go all-in on coverage specialists. In a way, preseason signings are like a box of chocolates; you never know what you’re going to get. Sometimes a team signs a $1 million guy, and he becomes a franchise stalwart, and other times, that $1 million man retires in August and never plays football again.