Getty The Philadelphia Eagles are mourning the loss of one of their own this week.
The Philadelphia Eagles are relying on a bunch of red-shirted rookies to come in and make an immediate impact in 2023. The one position battle everyone is fixated on is at the linebacker spot, with second-year man Nakobe Dean at the eye of the storm.
Dean, a third-round pick in 2022, was stashed last season as the team played the long game. They were grooming him to take over for starter T.J. Edwards, letting him sit in the meeting room and absorb from the sideline. Dean made 13 total tackles in 2022 on only 34 defensive snaps while serving as a key contributor on special teams (340 snaps). He wore the green dot at spring OTAs and tops the depth chart at middle linebacker heading into training camp. All indications point to a starting role.
Heavy’s Matt Lombardo included Dean in a list of “Sophomore Standouts” where he reeled off some second-year players “ready to take the NFL by storm.” In it, Lombardo predicts big things for Dean who might have the highest ceiling of any defensive player on the Eagles’ roster.
Lombardo wrote: “After all, Dean was widely regarded as one of the top prospects at his position, before meniscus and pectoral injuries pushed him down boards and into the third round. Dean, 5-foot-11 and 231 pounds, is an athletic freak with a nose for the football, who should be one of the centerpieces of Philly’s front seven in 2023.”
Playing with Big ‘Chip on His Shoulder’
Dean felt slighted in a number of ways during his rookie year. First, the 2021 Butkus Award winner dropped in the draft due to medical red flags, including concerns over knee and pectoral injuries. He showed up to minicamp last year physically unbothered. Mentally, the 5-foot-11, 231-pounder wanted to play every snap as the Eagles chose to keep him on the bench.
“Even if I went first round, first pick, this whole process gave me a chip on my shoulder. For me to slip the third round, the chip has down nothing but grow.”
Nakobe Dean is ready to be a full-time starter.
Dean never complained about his role or the draft-day snub, although he clearly banked it in his brain. Jordan Davis — his teammate at Georgia and on the Eagles — knows the chip on Dean’s shoulder keeps getting bigger and bigger.
“He has this thing, the chip on his shoulder, he talks about it,” Davis told reporters. “That’s what drives him. And just seeing him get his opportunity — and for us to have an opportunity to play together, to be on the field at the same time — that’s amazing. If we got a play at Georgia where he’s blitzing and I gotta make sure I get out of his way and he’s going to communicate that. He’s a world-class communicator when it comes to D-line and stuff like that, so just having Nakobe, having him get his shot, it’s great.”
Jordan Davis on Nakobe Dean
“He’s a world-class communicator”
@Eagles
If You’re Not Getting Better, You’re Getting Worse
Brad Boyette coached Dean at Lake Horn High School before leaving the school after the 2020 season. His words are still guiding the standout linebacker to this day, particularly when it comes to how hard he works on honing his craft. Dean adheres to a simple mantra he learned in high school.
“One thing a high school coach told me, if you’re not getting better, you’re getting worse. There’s no staying the same,” Dean told reporters. “So ever since the Super Bowl I ain’t done nothing but working to get better so I do feel like I’m a better player in all aspects of my game.”
Nakobe Dean: “A coach told me in high school ‘You are only ever getting better, or you’re getting worse, it’s no staying the same.’ And ever since the Super Bowl I ain’t been doing nothing but working and getting better. I feel like I’m a better player in every aspect of my game”
