Why Josh Huff is going to make the 53 man roster

Okay, so, Josh Huff was super disappointing last year. Nobody is going to argue with that. I want to qualify it with one point, however: absolutely nobody on the offense was impressive last year. Even mainstay guys that have looked great in Kelly's offense previously struggled. Jason Kelce looked like a shell of himself. Jordan Matthews struggled with drops and getting open against defenses that knew he was running the same crossing route over and over and over again. There are other examples. My point being, I think the jury is still out on Josh Huff.

Alright, so I probably lost about half of you already. For those of you that stuck, here's specifically why he is going to make the roster, and he's definitely going to play a chunk of snaps every week on Sundays.

Josh Huff is De'Anthony Thomas.

Okay, not literally. But seriously, their playing styles are so similar it astounds me that I haven't heard the comparison made before. I am not the first analyst to say that the De'Anthony Thomas role will be very much needed on the offense this year, but to the best of my knowledge I am the first to say it will be filled by Josh Huff. Back during the draft, Greg Cosell and Fran Duffy did a series of super great video breakdowns on our draftees. In this link, they break down Wendell Smallwood. Pay attention to what Cosell says about 30 seconds into the video.

"First thing that I thought of was De'Anthony Thomas..."

Alright, so I wholeheartedly disagree with the comparision, I do not believe that Smallwood will see a role anything like DAT's, but still, Cosell is saying he thinks the role that DAT filled will be a part of the offense this coming year.

I'll break down for you why Josh Huff is going to be given every chance to be that guy this year. 

1) Measurables

The role that DAT carved out on the Chiefs was one where he was required to be extremely quick in small areas. Chiefly, he was used on bubble screens, tunnel screens, jet sweeps, and orbit motion passes. Thriving in these areas requires fast feet and ability to work in traffic. Basically, explosivity.

For a player to be explosive, many measurables may be considered. It is the opinion of this writer that the following four are of the utmost importance: height and weight, 10-yard split, broad jump, vertical jump.

	Josh Huff	De’Anthony Thomas
Vitals	5' 11" – 206 lbs	5' 8⅝" – 174 lbs
10 yard Split	1.53 s	1.58 s
Broad Jump	116”	124”
Vertical Jump	35½"	32”

So, the numbers speak pretty well for themselves. Josh Huff is of a similar athletic profile than DAT, and actually a bit better in some aspects. His forty time, not listed, is slightly slower than DAT's. And his extra weight may slow him down some. However, his 10 yard split is a few hundredth's of a second faster than DAT's and that speaks to his short range athleticism.

2) Ability in the open field

So, the lone bright spot of Josh Huff's season last year was probably this play against Tampa Bay. The skills he puts on display here are talents that simply cannot be taught: superb ball carrier vision, stop-start ability unrivaled by many, acceleration up the field, and many more.

Now, check out this gorgeous play from Kansas City's game in London against Detroit last year. The offensive line and runningback playfake out a zone run to the right, leaving the backside defensive end unblocked. That 'backside defensive end' also happens to be Ziggy Ansah, maybe the best 4-3 end in the game currently. An old coaching adage goes, if you can't block a guy, leave him unblocked and read him. This play does something a little like that.

DAT motions from left to right and then back to the left preplay. At the snap, he is aligned directly behind Alex Smith, who is under center. The two tight end look allows him to have two lead blockers on the perimeter, and his acceleration and quick feet get him around Ansah and headed up the sideline. Beautiful stuff.

I think, in a similar situation, Josh Huff executes that just as well as DAT does.

3) Training Camp Twitter tells all

So, it can be incredibly hard to glean much of anything from the twitter accounts of our favorite beat writers during these early days of training camp when we are desperate for literally any tidbits of information about our beloved Eagles. However, if you weed through the garbage and monotonous mention of drops galore, you can sometimes get a few pieces of information that tell a little about the team that will be fielded this year.

Firstly, I will attach a video courtesy of Ed Kracz, an Eagles beat writer for Calkins Media. It's from his Twitter account, @kracze

Wentz with a dump off to Sproles #Eagles pic.twitter.com/qrVlt4rpOb

— Ed Kracz (@kracze) July 30, 2016

Okay, so, a few things to say. Firstly, he gets in wrong in the caption, that isn't Sproles, it's Huff. So, that makes it important to us. Also, considering nothing else, we see Josh Huff motioning behind the line of scrimmage pre-play, and positioning himself for a tunnel screen behind releasing offensive linemen. So, that's pretty similar to how we've seen DAT used in Kansas City.

The smoking gun lies here, though.

That is from Week 10 last season. Does the play look familiar? Yeah? That's because its the exact same one as the one from Ed Kracz's Twitter.

In conclusion, Josh Huff is going to make the team this year, barring any crazy circumstances. Moreover, if you want to know what kind of role he is going to see, it would be wise to go back and watch De'Anthony Thomas' role in the Chiefs offense for the past two years. 

This is a link to the Chiefs SBNation blog that outlined the impact DAT had on the Chiefs offense a few years ago, even when he didn't touch the ball. A good read.

Also, I'm aware that the YouTube videos redirect you to the YouTube homepage. The NFL is the NFL, and their joy comes from making their product harder to reach for consumers. My apologies for this.

Go Eagles!

A New Regime, A New Year!

Rejoice, Eagles fans!

The season is right around the corner. I have read a handful of articles recently by beat writers and bloggers that characterize this Eagles team as "not exciting." There are some arguments for that; this is more or less a placeholder year at the QB position, the team is lacking in the skill position department, the defense will likely go through some bumps in the road in the transition from the 2-gap 3-4 to Jim Schwartz's 4-3 attack style defense, etc. However, I think most fans will be able to find enjoyment in the week to week as we see the Doug Pederson offense be installed and grow from week to week. For what it's worth, Doug may not be a super exciting guy, but if you make a point to watch last years Kansas City games, the offense is actually pretty fun. Gasp! I know, that doesn't fit the narrative, but seriously, I mean it.

I hope to write throughout the season this year, whereas I failed in that aspect last year. There were several reasons for that. Personal reasons, which don't matter to any of you so I won't bore you. But also, it was an incredibly frustrating and boring year to catalog and follow the Philadelphia Eagles. The offense was stagnant, any articles I could've written had been written ten times before, and probably masterfully by Sheil Kapadia back when he worked for Birds 24/7. This is because the team really didn't change at all from the fall of 2013 to the fall of 2015. Moreover, the team was hard to watch, let alone write about.

I loved what Chip Kelly brought to the team in his first year, but his total lack of ability to adapt and make necessary, albeit painful, changes at key times led to his demise. To make a point of just how poorly Chip was performing on and off the field, Jeffrey Lurie fired him after three seasons. Billy Davis said recently just how shocked he was by that, considering Lurie's reputation for having a long-leash, hands off approach to the team. For what it's worth, the best article I've read this offseason is this one, where Billy Davis genuinely opens up and gives honest answers about his thoughts on last season. Check it out if you have a minute.

So, the real reason I'm so excited about this coming year? At the very fundamental, the offense is not going to be the Chip Kelly offense. For better or for worse, the change will be refreshing to see, and give me loads to analyze and write about. I will make a point to write at least once a week throughout this season, bringing high brow football analysis to you in language anyone can follow.

Go Eagles!