2. Jordan Mailata, OL
Last season, Jordan Mailata turned into a star during his first four football games EVER. Unfortunately, the star might’ve burned out a bit. The former Australian Rugby standout made a smooth transition to American Football last year and surprisingly did well enough to make the Eagles’ final 53-man roster by the end of the offseason.
Although Mailata would never debut in the regular season, the Aussie continued to improve at the left tackle position in the offseason in preparation for year two. Now the Eagles put Mailata in a tough situation though. After drafting Andre Dillard in the first round of the 2019 NFL Draft, it became clear that the Eagles no longer need Mailata to back Jason Peters up.
Instead, Mailata is off to the right side of the line learning new positions again. Mailata is viewed as a tackle, but he’s also been learning the guard position here and there as well. That’s a lot of change for a guy who just picked up the sport a year ago. So far, it seems like the switch has gotten the best of Mailata because he’s been struggling throughout training camp. We’ll see if he’s still up for the challenge in the next couple of weeks.