Jadeveon Clowney: Philadelphia Eagles inquired, but are they serious?

The Philadelphia Eagles are interested in Jadeveon Clowney. Just how interested are they though?

Soon, a significant splash in the NFL trade market could go down. It’s been a long time coming, but at this point, we can’t wait for it to get done already. The Houston Texans’ relationship with their former first-round defensive end Jadeveon Clowney has turned a bit sour.

As the Texans refused to sign Clowney to a long-term deal, the star pass rusher wants out of his situation with Houston. At this point, he has made it clear that he is willing to miss games in the regular season if he is still playing on the franchise tag with the Texans.

Therefore, the Texans are looking for a way to get some value for him before they lose not only his on-field production but also lose a potential high-end draft pick and a valuable player they could’ve gained via trade as well. It’s not going to be easy for Houston to move Clowney, but it is surely do-able as three teams have rumored interest.

The Miami Dolphins seem to have the most significant interest at this point. As their head coach Brian Flores already had a sitdown with the Texans’ pass rusher, he’s trying to do all he can to convince Clowney that South Beach is where he should want to play.

However, there are two teams who don’t have to do that kind of convincing. Those two teams happen to be the Philadelphia Eagles and the Seattle Seahawks. While Miami wants Clowney the most, Clowney prefers Seattle and Philly over the Dolphins as they are more likely to be contenders during the 2019 NFL season.

Are the Eagles are really in on Clowney?

Per usual, Howie Roseman gave a call to the Texans front office to inquire about Clowney’s availability once he found out the defensive end was disgruntled. At this point, knowing that Roseman is making calls for trades is the least shocking news to come out of Philly.

When a big name becomes available, Roseman will always call to inquire — but when that happens, it causes a big stir still. For the last year or so, the Eagles have been linked to several major players who were on the trade block. Yet, they rarely actually land them.

And with Clowney, we could be headed in the same direction. According to Sports Illustrated’s Albert Breer, the Eagles are definitely in contact with the front office in Houston — but the interest doesn’t seem as serious as everybody is making it out to be.

While mentioning that the Dolphins are Clowney’s likely landing spot at this point, Breer made it quite clear that the Eagles are just doing their due diligence as of right now. “Given their depth on the offensive line and Howie Roseman’s affinity for defensive line,” Breer wrote in his mailbag. “I’m just not sure their [Eagles] interest has been that strong yet.”

With the Eagles using a heavy rotation with multiple pass rushers on game day, it doesn’t come as much as a surprise they aren’t buying high on Clowney right now. Recently, they locked Brandon Graham into an expensive three-year deal. They signed Vinny Curry back, and also are still really high on their 2017 first-rounder, Derek Barnett.

Landing Clowney this season would be an amazing scenario for the Eagles — but it seems less likely to happen at this point as Miami becomes the clear leaders for the trade. Unless the price decreases before the start of the season, nobody should bank on the Eagles’ ability to land Clowney for the 2019 NFL season.