Philadelphia Eagles are getting the best out of Jordan Howard

During his time with the Chicago Bears, Jordan Howard didn’t get to do it all. With the Philadelphia Eagles, he’s been offered a prime opportunity to prove he is better than what people believe.

Before the 2018 offseason, the last few draft classes for running backs have been top-heavy. You could find a few prospects taken as early as the first or second rounds. Big names have been coming out of the NCAA since the 2016 season with the likings of Christian McCaffrey, Joe Mixon, Saquon Barkley, etc. But just because a running back is taken outside of the first or second rounds, doesn’t mean they can’t precisely be effective.

Philadelphia Eagles’ new running back Jordan Howard has proven that for the past three seasons. In 2016, Howard joined the Chicago Bears as a fifth-round selection out of Indiana. Though he wasn’t the most prominent name in the class, he emerged as one of the league’s rushing leaders during his debut season. Being that he seemingly struggled to offer more of a versatile style outside of his power rushing, the Bears didn’t seem all that interested in using Howard as a full-time contributor out of the backfield. Instead, they favored Tarik Cohen.

Rumors started flying around Chicago about Howard growing frustrated under Matt Nagy’s offense. Since they tend to utilize more passing out of the backfield, Cohen seemed to have taken up a large amount of Howard’s snaps. Was Howard really that one-dimensional? Or were the Bears just unwilling to find out everything that Howard had to offer? The ex-Bears’ running back believes it’s the latter. And in 2019, he’s eager to prove that.

Jordan Howard’s excited to prove the doubters wrong

So far, Howard has been thankful for the Eagles’ willingness to allow him to work on the weaker spots of his game. Going into year four, Howard is looking towards a critical season. As it is the final year on his contract, the Eagles’ new running back will have to showcase his talents to the best of his ability, and it all starts with getting better with pass-catching.

According to 94 WIP’s Eliot Shorr-Parks, Howard mentioned that Chicago viewed him as one-dimensional during his first three seasons. In Philly however, he doesn’t feel the Eagles see him that way so far as the offseason practices progress.

Before OTAs officially kicked off, Howard did mention that he’s been working on those weaker areas of his game with running back’s coach Duce Staley. As Staley has gotten the best out of his guys before, Howard is fortunate enough to have a coach of that caliber out of the backfield. Now, we just need to see it all translate into real-time come August when the Eagles kick off the preseason against the Tennesee Titans.