Philadelphia Eagles: Defensive shortcomings fall on GM Howie Roseman

For as great as Philadelphia Eagles general manager Howie Roseman has been at building his team over the past few seasons, his failure to put assets into the defense has doomed that side of the ball.

Simply put, the Eagles don’t have a good defense. From their atrocious secondary to their inability to generate a consistent pass rush, Jim Schwartz’s unit has struggled in nearly every facet this season.

The warning signs were there this past offseason.

The team finished last season with the 30th-ranked pass defense in the NFL, yet, Roseman didn’t have any notable offseason moves to help improve the secondary.

Roseman also traded away one of the team’s best pass rushers from a year ago in Michael Bennett for a 2020 fifth-round pick and then lost defensive end Chris Long to retirement. While Roseman did bring in Vinny Curry and Malik Jackson to help mitigate those losses, it clearly hasn’t panned out in the way he and the fans expected it to.

Now, the Eagles are enduring a historically bad season from their defense. Per Reuben Frank of NBC Sports Philadelphia, this team has allowed five touchdown passes of 40 yards or more in their first six games, the worst output an Eagles defense has had through six weeks since 1965.

While some of the blame can fall on the injuries the defense has dealt with, the bulk of it should fall squarely on Howie Roseman’s shoulders. He had opportunities to make moves to improve the defense throughout the offseason, but he opted to place almost every asset at his disposal into the offense. An offensive unit that is now struggling to keep up with teams due to the defense’s inability to stop anyone.