Did Eagles’ Malcolm Jenkins subliminally call out Sidney Jones?
Eagles’ veteran safety Malcolm Jenkins made a statement after the loss to the Vikings, and it sounded like his disappointment was aimed towards one of his teammates.
It’s safe to say that the Philadelphia Eagles locker room is not thrilled with their current situation. After falling to 3-3, courtesy of a loss on the road against the Minnesota Vikings, the Eagles have to take a good look in the mirror and figure out who they truly are as a team.
There are flaws everywhere. From the slow starts on offense to the coaching, and the struggle to get pressure on the opposing team’s quarterback — the Eagles have issues everywhere. The critical factor that everybody cannot seem to stop talking about, though, is the secondary’s inability to eliminate big plays by locking down wide receivers.
As the Eagles already established themselves as a lousy passing defense, we expected struggles this weekend against Adam Thielen and Stefon Diggs. However, nobody expected to see the Eagles play as bad as they did with Rasul Douglas, and a healthy Sidney Jones on the outside.
At one point, though, Jones wasn’t even on the field. At first, it felt he might’ve gotten hurt again, as he’s been dealing with hamstring troubles. It turns out that wasn’t the case. As he stood on the sidelines with his helmet on and ready to go, the Eagles elected to put Craig James on the field over Jones — and nobody could figure out why.
Perhaps, Malcolm Jenkins has an idea…
Earlier this week, Doug Pederson made a statement, which had many questioning Sidney Jones’ toughness. As the Eagles head coach made it clear that at some point, Jones has to be able to push through his pain, it indicated that maybe Jones’ obstacles go beyond physical pain.
Instead, Jones is dealing with a lack of mental toughness. After hearing that, it was almost a guarantee that Jones was going to play on Sunday, as the former second-round pick has a lot to prove. He struggled in the game early on, but eventually, he was forgotten until it was realized that Craig James replaced him at a point.
After the game, Sidney Jones confirmed that he is fine, and was never dealing with any hamstring pain on Sunday. So many continued to question why Jones wasn’t on the field. Well, Malcolm Jenkins’ bluntly cryptic statement after the loss indicated that maybe the speculation behind Jones having a lack of mental toughness is real.
“This game’s not for suckers,” Jenkins said, standing in front of his locker after the game. “If you aren’t confident on the outside, then we can’t use you — Our defense is going to call for guys to be able to go outside and cover.”
Next. 5 Takeaways following an Eagles Week 6 loss. dark
It was strange timing for a statement like that considering Jones was mysteriously missing at a point on Sunday for no injury-related reason. Obviously, Rasul Douglas made mistakes on the other side too, but the two long touchdown passes weren’t entirely his fault, as Jenkins himself even took the blame for one of them after failing to act as a reinforcement.
There’s surely plenty of blame to go around after that disappointing showing for the secondary. But some major concerns are surrounding the former second-rounder, Sidney Jones moving forward. This was a career-defining week for him, and he failed to step up when needed.