Jim Schwartz often talks about his guys finding “repeatable motion” like baseball pitchers. And the Philadephia Eagles defensive coordinator values preaches the importance of practice reps, something that helps them for when the “real bullets start flying.”
Well, it’s finally all coming together for Javon Hargrave. The 6-foot-2, 305-pound defensive tackle missed all of training camp with a pectoral strain, including the season opener. It was hard to replicate those snaps and get him up to speed during this pandemic-impacted year.
Remember, Hargrave was learning a new scheme after coming over from the Pittsburgh Steelers where they run a 3-4 base defense. Twelve games into his Eagles career, the light has switched on. Hargrave has three sacks over the past two weeks. He suddenly looks like the player the organization surprisingly shelled out $39 million for this past offseason.
“You can’t always judge a guy, and we’ve said this a long time, you can’t always judge a guy just on sack numbers,” Schwartz told reporters on Tuesday. “There’s a lot of other things that go into it, freeing up other people, sometimes you have a great rush, and somebody else will make a sack and sometimes you make a great rush and the ball comes out so fast that you really can’t affect it but you have to keep making steady progress.”
Hargrave was arguably the best defender on the field on Sunday against the New Orleans Saints. He registered two sacks, four tackles (two for loss), three quarterback hits, and that timely fumble recovery on Josh Sweat’s strip-sack. Steady as she goes while fighting through double teams.
“And I think Javon has done a good job of making steady progress,” Schwartz said. “He’s getting more and more comfortable in the scheme.”
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Hargrave Relishing Aggressive, Attacking Scheme
There has been a learning curve for Hargrave. While the Eagles don’t blitz a ton, Schwartz does employ an attacking defense that relies on the entire defensive line getting home. He likes his tackles to pressure the quarterback instead of sitting on the run. Sacks aren’t reserved for edge rushers. That’s a departure from Pittsburgh head coach Mike Tomlin who prefers his players to “read and react” on defense.
“I done came a long way, breaking a lot of habits that was in me from playing that read defense,” Hargrave told reporters last week. “I feel like I’m definitely getting more comfortable in the system. Just playing more comfortable and just playing faster and just evolving every week.”
The adjustment peiod was something the Egales had anticipated when they made the 27-year-old the highest-paid nose tackle in football.
“We knew it was going to be a little bit of an adjustment period,” Schwartz said. “It took a minute or so for him to get with all the intricacies and techniques that we play. But he does make an impact on the game and I think we’re seeing the reason we liked him so much and the reason we added him to our team.”
Credit Shaun Bradley for Sweat’s Strip-Sack
Schwartz credited a rookie linebacker for Sweat’s game-changing strip-sack last week on Taysom Hill. According to the Eagles defensive coordinator, Hill was focused on getting the ball out to tight end Adam Trautman but Shaun Bradley had him covered.
“Josh making that sack probably had a lot to do with Shaun Bradley and his role in that coverage,” Schwartz said. “Just bought time, the quarterback was looking for him, didn’t expect Shaun to be on him. He was trying to sort it out, trying to find somebody and Josh was able to make that play.”
In fact, Schwartz went on to say the whole play was a blown coverage. It was a miscommunication on defense that Bradley essentially saved the day on by being in the right place at the perfect time.
“Our worst execution of a defensive call was Josh Sweat’s forced fumble. They came out, we had miscommunication there,” Schwartz said. “But Shaun Bradley, who was out there pretty much for his first extended playing time, did a good job getting a receiver covered down the middle even though we didn’t have the overlap that we needed, we were able to buy a little bit of time for Josh to come back.”
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