There was a time before everything was automated, when general managers still mapped out their models and moves using physical materials, when Howie Roseman arranged the personnel of the NFL’s top-four teams inside his office in an obsessive collage.
Roseman often stared at those names, those positions, those matchups. Questions about his own roster consumed him. How do we compare here? How do we compare there? Since Roseman’s 2016 return to power, the answer for the Philadelphia Eagles has quite frequently been: Pretty damn well. Only the San Francisco 49ers have been to more NFC title games than the Eagles in that span. But there’s only one team responsible for why Roseman has one Super Bowl ring, not two, and the now-digitized contents of its roster have moved from the walls of Roseman’s office to the lobes of Roseman’s brain.
“Now, I think it’s like in my head,” Roseman said Saturday during a roundtable interview inside the auditorium of the NovaCare Complex.
In a gesture that was half comedic, half Welcome-To-My-Misery, Roseman, sitting with his elbows on a table, slid his temples into the sides of his fingers.
“You know, the Chiefs are in my head,” he muttered.
To be the best, you must beat the best. And in Roseman’s words, the Kansas City Chiefs are “the best of the best.” They’re the bane of any contender, the source of any rival fanbase’s bitterness, the dynasty on the brink of the first three-peat in Super Bowl history. Red and yellow confetti hasn’t stopped falling since the Eagles first experienced a haunting last-minute loss in Super Bowl LVII. Now, in New Orleans, they’re the team that can ensure the Superdome’s cannons launch a different color.
To dethrone the reigning champions, Philadelphia’s front office needed to build a roster that could best the one Roseman acknowledged currently embodies “the standard.” To even reach Super Bowl LIX, the Eagles needed to manage a massive transition. Less than half of the players who participated in Super Bowl LVII remain on this year’s roster. Franchise pillars Jason Kelce and Fletcher Cox retired. Jalen Hurts briefly became the league’s highest-paid quarterback, and, partly because of that contract, Roseman’s department was eventually required to repair an injury-riddled defense that received fewer resources in 2023.
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So, how do these Eagles compare to these Chiefs? The Eagles arrived in New Orleans with a roster that features finalists for MVP and Offensive Player of the Year (Saquon Barkley), Defensive Player of the Year (Zack Baun) and Defensive Rookie of the Year (Quinyon Mitchell, Cooper DeJean). No Chiefs player is a finalist for an end-of-year award. An Eagles team that fielded the NFL’s second-most Pro Bowlers (6) recorded the league’s second-highest net EPA (160.0) in 2024, according to TruMedia. The Chiefs, who have five Pro Bowlers, ranked 11th in net EPA (59.0). ESPN’s FPI system, which measures a team’s strength, predicts the Eagles will win Super Bowl LIX.
It’s arguable the Chiefs are 1.5-point favorites based on reputation, based on the repeated viewings of a veteran-laden team that’s vanquished all takers despite the statistical down year of two-time MVP Patrick Mahomes. Datapoints can be debated. That the Eagles returned to at least within striking distance required an overhaul with a success rate that makes even the slot machine savants at the Caesars Casino envious. Consider the six key starters the Eagles acquired across a matter of months:
- Free agency: Signed Barkley, Baun, C.J. Gardner Johnson and Mekhi Becton
- Draft: Selected Mitchell (No. 22) and DeJean (No. 40)
Barkley’s indelible influence has been well-documented. Roseman resisted answering whether Barkley is the single-most influential acquisition in Roseman’s career. The Eagles accepted a calculated risk in fully guaranteeing $26 million within a three-year, $37.75 million contract — making Barkley’s deal the highest-ever annually given to an Eagles running back in history — to secure an age-27 running back with a season-ending ACL tear on his medical record. But Barkley became the record-setting centerpiece of a run-oriented system that ran the ball more times per game than any Eagles offense since 1978, and Barkley, who missed just one game in a sacrificial sidelining, is now only 30 yards away from breaking Terrell Davis’ rushing record when including the regular season and postseason.
“Not a hard trigger to pull,” Roseman said. “I was extremely confident in the player and the person. I’d like to say he’s exceeded expectations, but he’s always been one of the best players I’ve ever seen whenever I’ve watched him. And I’ve always known about what kind of person he is because it’s not hard to find that out. So, I’m really not surprised by any of this. And I don’t say that in an arrogant way. It’s based on who he is. Nothing to do with me. Because this is who he’s always been, and I’m just glad everyone gets to see that. I would just say the person is as good as the player, and I’m not downplaying the player. And that to me makes me proud.”
Barkley’s highly publicized departure from the New York Giants underlined the rarity of such a talent hitting the open market. Barkley, the No. 2 pick in 2018, said his draft status prevented him from ever really establishing any other relationships during the draft process with personnel staffers from other organizations. “A lot of those conversations were like, ‘Yep, we’re not going to be able to get you,’” Barkley said. Back then, Barkley said he went out of his way to sit down with the Baltimore Ravens and Indianapolis Colts — but only because their tables were open at the time.
Should it be expected that Roseman hits on his splash signing? There have been times when he hasn’t, such as Nnamdi Asomugha in 2011. (More on Bryce Huff later.) However, the 2024 offseason was distinct when considering the return the Eagles saw from their more speculative investments.
Some of the success required luck. Baun’s sudden spike as a first-time inside linebacker was unexpected by everyone involved. Roseman, who initially viewed Baun as an edge rusher, revealed that his initial expectations mostly involved believing “the floor is, he’s going to be the best special teams player we have.”
But the organization’s coaching staff also supplied strength and structure. Roseman credited Becton, a 2020 first-round pick jettisoned by the New York Jets, for joining the team with no guarantee of a starting spot, developing under offensive line coach Jeff Stoutland, then burgeoning into a reliable right guard after winning a position battle in training camp. Gardner-Johnson, who spent the 2023 season with the Detroit Lions, led the Eagles with six interceptions after returning to the franchise and playing under seven-time defensive coordinator Vic Fangio. The 66-year-old coach’s usage of Gardner-Johnson, Baun and rookies Mitchell and DeJean restored order to a secondary that in 2023 surrendered the league’s third-most passes of 15-plus yards, per TruMedia. (The Eagles surrendered the fewest in 2024.)
If Mitchell or DeJean played like average rookies or experienced first-year slumps, it’s possible the Eagles aren’t still playing in February. Any front office would consider it a victory to have drafted one defensive rookie of the year finalist. No team has fielded two top-five vote-getters for the defensive award since at least 2000.
Mitchell, the first cornerback off the board, entered the season with reasonable odds. DeJean, who was sidelined with a fractured fibula during the draft cycle, also missed 11 training camp practices after injuring his hamstring working out in Iowa during the summer. The Eagles initially struggled while leaning early on veteran Avonte Maddox to fulfill their nickel safety slot. Roseman said DeJean’s injection into the lineup after the Week 5 bye week was “one of the reasons” why “the bye week was a huge turning point for our football team.”
The financial and draft-oriented factors shouldn’t be ignored. Roseman called the construction of this season’s defensive roster a “three-year” process that began with the 2022 draft. Jordan Davis (No. 13) and Nakobe Dean (No. 83) were regular starters this season, and, paired with 2023 selections Jalen Carter (No. 9) and Nolan Smith (No. 30), the Eagles entered the 2024 offseason with financial flexibility with four future starters playing on rookie deals. Kelce’s and Cox’s retired contracts will still carry a combined $26.5 million dead money hit in 2025, according to Over the Cap. Philadelphia’s hit rate on its Day 2 picks (Cam Jurgens was a second-round pick in 2022) provided unique stability where there’s generally an expected margin of error.
Smith’s recent emergence — a career-high 6.5 sacks with 10 starts, plus four sacks in three playoff games — helped negate the inauspicious start of Huff’s career with the Eagles. Roseman awarded Huff $34 guaranteed within a three-year, $51.1 deal after dealing Haason Reddick to the Jets for a conditional 2026 third-round pick, and Huff totaled 2.5 sacks and three tackles for loss while playing 39 percent of the team’s total defensive snaps, partly due to a midseason wrist operation. If Huff doesn’t eventually improve, his contract becomes a significant hindrance on an Eagles cap situation that has substantially less wiggle room in 2025 ($13.8 million in effective space, per Over the Cap).
Roseman said he thinks “the story’s yet to be written on Bryce” — “I’m stubborn,” he admitted. Roseman said he reviewed the tape from the NFC title game and spoke with defensive end/outside linebackers coach Jeremiah Washburn about how Huff “got home” in all three of his pass rushes against the Washington Commanders. (Huff didn’t officially log a sack or quarterback hit in the game.)
“I believe in the player,” Roseman said.
It’s part of the obsessiveness that’s helped fuel the most successful eight-year run in the organization’s history. Roseman said that last Thursday night, he attended his son’s basketball game, came home at 9:30 p.m. and flipped on tape from the Senior Bowl and East-West Shrine Bowl practices in his home office. His wife, Mindy, walked in and asked: What’s going on right now?
A process that once wasn’t as digitized. An anxiety that haunts the inner-chambers of Roseman’s head. A belief that this roster of Eagles can do what the 2022 team could not.
Beat the Chiefs.
(Top photo of Nick Sirianni and Howie Roseman: Chris Szagola / AP Photo)
