Philadelphia Eagles: Will Jay Ajayi acquire some playing time this week?

Philadelphia Eagles running back Jay Ajayi is ready to return to the field, and the team may be willing to trot him out against the Seahawks.

A little under a week ago, the Philadelphia Eagles had to make one of their more desperate moves this offseason. Aside from inking wide receiver Jordan Matthews to a one-year deal, the Eagles also believed they needed help in the backfield as well.

Darren Sproles’ season has been cut short, while Jordan Howard’s season was put on hold for the moment. As Howard has yet to be cleared for contact in practice due to a shoulder injury, the Eagles were pretty sure they weren’t going to have their No. 1 back for last Sunday’s game.

They were correct. Therefore, the Eagles needed to find a third option to roll with Miles Sanders and Boston Scott. The most logical choice available happened to be Jay Ajayi. Considering that Ajayi has played with the Eagles for about half of the last two years, it only made sense to bring back somebody with familiarity within the offense for cheap.

Since Ajayi joined the team last Friday, though, he didn’t have enough time to get a real refresher on the offense. So the Eagles ended up not playing the veteran running back, despite having him suited up for the matchup against the Patriots. That trend may not continue, though.

When will Ajayi garner some reps?

The Eagles could’ve used Ajayi’s power on Sunday, but their idea to not play him made sense. After not playing football for over a year, Ajayi is more than likely rusty. With a full week’s worth of practice incoming though, there’s a good chance the old Eagles running back gets some opportunities to run the ball this weekend against the Seattle Seahawks.

“Obviously, you sign him late, so it was kind of just an emergency situation if we needed him in that football game,” Eagles’ head coach Doug Pederson said, according to NJ.com’s Mike Kaye. “We’ll incorporate him. If Jordan [Howard] doesn’t practice or whatever during the week, then we’ll definitely get Jay ready to go.”

So far, Howard’s status is unclear for Sunday’s matchup against the Seahawks. As of Wednesday morning, there’s no word on whether he’s been cleared yet or not. Even if Howard does happen to play though, the Eagles could still offer Ajayi some reps, re-creating the three-headed monster from 2017, with Howard filling LeGarrette Blount’s role, and Sanders filling in for Corey Clement.