The Bodyguard is being replaced for the rest of this year and maybe for the foreseeable future. Jason Peters will undergo season-ending surgery to fix his nagging toe injury, according to Doug Pederson. The Philadelphia Eagles head coach revealed that Nate Herbig would take over at right guard.
“Jason Peters is going to miss the rest of the season,” Pederson told reporters on Friday. “He has elected to have surgery on his foot, on his toe. It’s an injury that we’ve known about and he’s literally battled through it. He’s done everything he can for this football team. He wanted to be out there with his teammates for the remainder of the season but it’s just to the point now where the injury is too bad for him to continue.”
Peters entered training camp as the starting right guard before switching over to left tackle when Andre Dillard went down. The 38-year-old future Hall of Famer demanded a pay raise at the time. Then, Peters was placed on injured reserve on Oct. 3 with that toe injury and Jordan Mailata moved to left tackle.
With the news that Jason Peters is out for the year, the Eagles will have their 12th different OL in 13 games on Sunday:
LT: Jordan Mailata
LG: Isaac Seumalo
C: Jason Kelce
RG: Nate Herbig
RT: Jack Driscoll
The former Australian rugby player has locked down the position — Mailata hasn’t allowed a single sack in two weeks while giving up just five all year — and eventually forced Peters back to right guard.
“You know I’ve always had that saying since rookie year, and I’ve stuck by it: I’m just trying to get 1-percent better every day,” Mailata told reporters on Thursday. “I don’t feel like I’ve settled down yet, still got a lot to prove. I feel like I’ve come a long way so I have that in the back of my mind, just take it game by game, play by play.”
Peters’ future in midnight green — and possibly an extension of his 17-year NFL career — appears to be very much in jeopardy. It was a dominating run for one of the best to ever do it.
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Eagles Coach Opens Up About Malcolm Jenkins
Everyone has an opinion on Malcolm Jenkins and what he meant to the Eagles organization. Defensive coordinator Jim Schwartz started the week by hyping the safety up as the smartest player he’s ever coached, a fact echoed by several teammates throughout the week.
Avonte Maddox credits Malcolm Jenkins for teaching him the “little details” on how to play safety during his first year. “He had a big role here, very vocal and passionate, one of the leaders in our backend.” #Eagles #FlyEaglesFly
Avonte Maddox credited Jenkins with teaching him the safety position during his rookie year. And Rodney McLeod waxed poetic about his leadership and mentorship in the secondary. On Friday, Pederson shared his own thoughts on the former Eagles team captain.
“To me, he meant the world because he was a staple on defense,” Pederson said. “Number one, he was a leader on my player committee and he did a lot of things in our community here not only for the Eagles organization but for himself personally and marketing his brand. All the things off the field, that we’ve seen him do, just a tremendous leader and people gravitate to him and just a really good person.”
“The hardest part of this job is the fact you have to make tough decisions… It’s the nature of where we’re at as a sport… We’re in a postition know where we’re going to have to lose some guys.”
#Eagles VP Howie Roseman on parting ways with Malcolm Jenkins.
Jenkins himself told the New Orleans media that he felt a little disrespected on the way out. He had asked GM Howie Roseman for a minimal pay raise and they refused to work with him on a new contract. The three-time Pro Bowler didn’t feel “valued” or “appreciated.”
“Listen, we all have a lot of respect for Malcolm and we all know there are a lot of tough decisions that have to be made every year,” Pederson said. “Great players are going to come and great players are going to go. Again, it just goes back to I have a lot of respect for Malcolm and what he did for this organization, obviously helped us win a championship, and yet we do realize that sometimes the business side is the ugly side of what we do.”
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Eagles Pro Bowl Starter to Undergo Season-Ending Surgery