PHI at BAL – Preseason review

The Eagles open the 2026 preseason on Saturday night. Don’t expect to see many starters. The team has joint practices coming up with the Patriots and will use that as a way to evaluate their starters in a more controlled setting. The Ravens game will be more about second and third stringers battling for roster spots.

Let’s talk about the opener.

WHAT TO LOOK FOR

The preseason can be tricky. You need to focus on performance over results. Better for a DL to beat a block and get pressure than to be unblocked and get a sack. The goal is to evaluate players. You need to see what they can do, not how lucky they might be.

Coaches will tell you to focus on alignment, assignment and execution to begin with.

Some of these players are very raw so you want to see them show the physical traits that got them drafted or signed.

WE’RE NOT WORTHY

You might see me use the phrase “roster worthy”. This doesn’t mean a player should be kept, but rather that he’s good enough to make the roster. Bad teams sometimes don’t have 53 of those guys. Good teams would like to have 58 or so. You want to cut players that are roster worthy. That’s the sign of a deep team.

PLAYERS

The most intriguing question is who will start at QB, Andy Dalton or Tanner McKee. The team could try to showcase one of them to help with trade value. Or they could go with another reason. Dalton knows the system better so maybe you play him a couple of series and then turn over most of the game to McKee. We’ll see what the Eagles do. I would expect rookie Cole Payton to play the fourth quarter.

Just because one starts the preseason opener over the other doesn’t mean that player has a significant advantage. The team might have reasons that we won’t find out about.

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I hope the QBs play reasonably well so we get a good feel for their WRs. If the QB play is erratic it makes receiver evaluation very tricky for tose of us on the outside. Hopefully a couple of WRs will shine. This would be a good time for Johnny Wilson to come alive.

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Rookie Markel Bell is a player I’m excited to see in action. I hope he starts at RT so we can get a feel for him at that spot. Bell has had a good camp. Tonight he can give us a better feel for whether he can be trusted in a game.

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TE Eli Stowers will hopefully get to see plenty of action. He’s off to a slow start this summer. I want to see him running routes and blocking. It would be great to see him get a catch or two so he gets a chance to make a play. Every rep could be valuable for him. There will be some bad reps and that’s okay. Putting stuff on tape in a game will help him to learn.

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I can’t wait to see Willie Lampkin play. He was great last summer for the Rams. He’s had a good a good camp. Now we get to watch him in action against another team. I hope we get to see him play both center and guard. The other interior lineman I’m curious about is rookie Micah Morris. I think he’s got a good shot to make the team. Getting off to a good start would help his cause.

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A lot of eyes will be on Uar Bernard and Josh Weru. Both will play. The question is how many snaps Bernard will see. This is the first football game of his life. As much as he needs to play, he’s got to be functional to stay on the field. You can’t have him playing terribly because that will affect the guys around him and we need to be able to evaluate them.

Weru is further along in development so I expect him to play more. He has really come on in camp. We’ll find out if that translates to a game.

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New edge rushers Arnold Ebiketie and AJ Epenesa will get a chance to show what they can do. Both are veteran players and both have drawn praise from Vic Fangio. I wouldn’t expect to see a ton of snaps from them.

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Rookie LB Deontae Lawson has opened some eyes with his play recently. A strong showing from him would help his push to win a roster spot. Look to see how physical he is.

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Rookie DBs Maximus Pulley and Kapena Gushiken have both flashed this summer. Pulley is the guy I’m more excited about. He was a big time playmaker in college. I’m curious to see if he can do that at the NFL level. Gushiken is a top athlete so I want to see speed from him.

I don’t know how much the veteran safeties will play. This will be our first chance to see Michael Carter in his new role. I would expect Andre Sam to play a lot.

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Sean Mannion will make his debut as OC. Nick Sirianni talked recently about how he keeps things vanilla so as not to give away plays they want to use early in the season. Don’t expect a dynamic gameplan. Let’s just hope the offense is getting lined up early and that everyone seems to be on the same page. Mannion doesn’t need great plays to call a good game. Hopefully the offense will flow and give the players a chance to make plays.

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Eagles signing LB Brandon George to a one-year deal, per source.

George was on the Chiefs’ IR last year.

— Jeremy Fowler (@JFowlerESPN) August 14, 2026

With Chance Campbell banged up, the team wanted more depth at ILB. George has good size and is highly athletic. He fits the Fangio profile at LB.

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