Eagles notebook: The biggest test yet for Quinyon Mitchell

Eagles notebook: The biggest test yet for Quinyon Mitchell originally appeared on NBC Sports Philadelphia

Quinyon Mitchell has been fantastic during his rookie season but will face another huge test on Thursday night against the Commanders.

He’s going to get a full game against Terry McLaurin.

“Just watching the tape, knowing he’s going to be on my side the whole time,” Mitchell said. “Just getting a good feel of what he’s going to do.”

Because the Commanders are running Kliff Kingsbury’s Air Raid system, their receivers don’t move around the formation very much. That means that McLaurin lines up on the left side for most of his snaps.

Here’s a breakdown of his snaps by position from ProFootballFocus:

LWR: 392
RWR: 28
Slot: 89

As the Eagles’ starting RCB, Mitchell knows he’s going to match up against McLaurin all game on Thursday night.

“He’s a good receiver, good veteran guy, he gets open, really explosive,” Mitchell said. “My approach is still going to be the same. Watch film, just prepare well.”

McLaurin, 29, has had over 1,000 yards in each of the last four seasons but now he finally has a good quarterback and his numbers have taken a jump. In 10 games this season, McLaurin has 47 catches for 711 yards and 6 touchdowns. He’s third in the NFL in receiving behind Ja’Marr Chase and Justin Jefferson.

Vic Fangio pointed out that the Eagles have helped Mitchell when he’s faced some top competition, but the rookie has been impressive against some top receivers this season. Here’s a look at his success against some of them, per PFF:

CeeDee Lamb: 1 target, 1 catch, 5 yards
Ja’Marr Chase: 2 targets, 2 catches, 16 yards
Malik Nabers: 2 targets, 1 catch, 9 yards
Amari Cooper: 2 targets, 1 catch, 10 yards
Mike Evans: 4 targets, 2 catches, 19 yards
Chris Olave: 2 targets, 2 catches, 23 yards
Drake London: 2 targets, 1 catch, 5 yards

“I’d say it started in training camp, going against A.J. (Brown) and DeVonta (Smith),” Mitchell said. “Really preparing me for these moments week in and week out. Just preparing ourselves.”

An eye for talent

Eagles linebacker Zack Baun has been one of the biggest surprises in the NFL this season and he was just named the NFC Defensive Player of the Week for his performance against the Cowboys on Sunday.

This week, defensive coordinator Vic Fangio gave a little background about how the Eagles scouted Baun during free agency this offseason.

“When I evaluate players, there’s no check box, things you check off,” Fangio said. “You just watch the tape, watch the movement patterns, watch the player play.

“And Howie (Roseman) brought him up to me first, but he had a vision for him as a backup outside linebacker/special teams demon. And after I watched it, I said no, I think he’s an inside linebacker.”

Fangio was right.

Baun hasn’t just been serviceable; he’s been one of the best linebackers in the NFL. Roseman wasn’t the only person who thought Baun’s better fit was on the edge. Heck, even Baun seemed to think so when he spoke to reporters early in the spring. He enjoyed getting a chance to rush the passer late in his time with the Saints and it seemed like his next gig would involved his ability as an edge rusher.

So give Fangio credit for bucking the trend and seeing Baun’s potential as an inside linebacker. He’s been great this season.

Blinded by the light

One of the silliest storylines since the win over the Cowboys in Dallas has been hearing Jerry Jones talk about the sun and his refusal to use curtains to block it at AT&T Stadium.

During the game on Sunday, the sun became an issue when CeeDee Lamb didn’t catch a touchdown pass because he simply couldn’t see the football. Eagles offensive coordinator Kellen Moore said the sun was an issue for Jalen Hurts during that game too.

“Yeah, in general for everyone, yeah,” Moore said. “For everyone. I’ve been there. I was there a long time, so…”

Moore played for the Cowboys and then coached there from 2018-22, so he’s as familiar as anyone with the sun shining through at AT&T Stadium. How did he handle it as a play caller in that stadium?

“Yeah, like any, stadiums all have different circumstances,” Moore said. “That one, the sun plays a decent role, so you just have to call plays according to it, knowing certain parts of the field at times can be a little bit challenging. We had it in the first quarter, towards the end of the first quarter in the red zone. And then second quarter, we were going the other way.”

Making the most of scramble drills

Both of Jalen Hurts’ passing touchdowns on Sunday against the Cowboys — one to Goedert and one to Johnny Wilson — came on off-schedule plays. And, in general, those scramble drills have been effective for the Eagles during Hurts’ time in Philly.

While the Eagles put a lot of work into their scripted plays, they also work on their scramble drills too. And they have their own rules for how to handle them.

After seeing two touchdowns come from scramble drills against the Cowboys, I asked Nick Sirianni this week about the biggest keys to those plays and he gave an in-depth answer:

“There are a lot of things. I think, without giving away too many of our secrets, the best way to explain it on my end is kind of like in basketball you’re trying to space the court and find the open spots and free yourself up, right? So, you don’t want to get two guys in the same spot. You want to make the defense cover the entire field. It’s about space distribution with the receivers. There are different things that you do to free yourself up. You’ve got to be aware of the boundaries so you don’t get pushed out of bounds. There are different ways to free yourself up to unlock against a guy that’s covering you.

“Then it’s really just like how we all kind of grew up playing football. When we’d go to somebody’s yard and there wasn’t anybody drawing up plays there. Somebody is running around, you’d count to five-Mississippi and then the guys come and rush you and you would run around and everyone would try to free up. So, it’s just trying to find space in there and find ways to get the ball. And then with Jalen, I think he’s done a really nice job of escaping different ways. You know, escaping around the pocket, both right and left. Escaping up through the pocket, which makes it very difficult for the defense. It feels like we’ve made a lot of plays, particularly yesterday, on our scramble drills.

“That’s something that we work all the time at practice. That’s always an emphasis of ours at practice because we know those plays lead to explosives. We also know those plays come up — you can’t explain when they’re going to come up. They’re going to happen when you’re off rhythm and not on time. It’s the second play. So, we put a lot of emphasis on that. We put a lot of emphasis on what our rules are there, and the guys have done a really nice job executing, starting with Jalen and the guys distributing themselves throughout the field to get themselves open.”

The reason for Huff’s workload

Bryce Huff has been listed as a full participant with a wrist injury for the last couple of weeks but the Eagles say that injury is the reason his playing time has been way down the last few weeks.

Huff played just 6 snaps against Jacksonville and just 12 against the Cowboys.

Fangio this week gave a little more detail about the injury.

“He’s got a big cast on his hand, leaves his thumb totally immobilized,” Fangio said. “And really, his palm is immobilized. So he’s just got four fingers dangling there with no thumb or palm to help him. On the less obvious downs, it just makes sense to put a guy in there that’s 100 percent.”

With Huff limited, rookie third-round pick Jalyx Hunt played 25 snaps against the Cowboys and even saw the field before Huff. Both guys made plays against the Cowboys. Hunt deflected a pass that nearly turned into an interception and Huff had a strip-sack on Cooper Rush.

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