PHLY Philadelphia Eagles Podcast - Eagles practice recap: Jakorian Bennett debuts with all eyes on CB2 battle

Episode Date: August 9, 2025

Fran Duffy and Bo Wulf were on the scene for the Eagles' Saturday practice, as Jakorian Bennett made his debut on the outside working primarily with the third team in his quest to unseat Kelee Ringo and Adoree' Jackson opposite Quinyon Mitchell. Come gets your notes on Terrace Marshall, Darius Cooper, Jihaad Campbell, Drew Mukuba and more. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hello, everybody, and welcome to the P. H.O.I. Eagles podcast. A quick hitting recap of Saturday's Eagles practice for you, Bo Wolf and Fran Duffy. And the big news today, Fran, as the Eagles got back on the practice field after Thursday night's preseason debut, we got to see Jacori and Bennett in an Eagles uniform for the first time. Yeah, the newest Eagle worked primarily, you all exclusively with the threes, which is understandable in his first practice. Vic Fangio talked about it beforehand. Yeah, he's going to be in the mix, but here worked with the threes. I la Grex's getting the reps with the second team unit. And I thought we saw some flashes, certainly. You're not expecting him to set the world on fire with his first time on the practice field here at the Novocare complex.

But I thought he saw some straight line juice. He is a little bit stiff, which we talked about when he was when they made the trade. But high hip, which typically when you've got those high waist that can affect your change of direction. But I do think when you're looking at it, I think he looked apart. Yeah, we got to talk to him after practice. You know, it has been obviously a whirlwind for him. He finds out. he's getting traded at like 5 o'clock. He's on a red eye at 11 o'clock that night. He's at, you know, practice watching the next day.

Not a lot of guys he knows here, but that's fine. He gets into the mix. All on the outside today, as we would expect. Gave up a couple catches. Last play of practice was a two-point conversion where Taylor Moran, the undrafted rookie from Wake Forest, beats him on a slant for a two-point conversion to complete an octopus after Moran

and had a touchdown pass reception of the back in the end zone against Drew McCuba. So go deeks. They're taking down all the high. hitting invested Eagles guys in the secondary. But nevertheless, Chaconian Bennett seems like a nice guy. It's going to be an uphill battle, I think, for him to really get into the mix. But Vic Fangio said, you know, it's too early to say, but he's not going to say that the guy can compete.

Everybody has a chance to compete. Yeah, it was an interesting kind of juxtapose it as well because Chaucorian Bennett spoke towards the end of the media availability. And a couple minutes before he came to the podium, we heard from Jahan Dotson. And so sitting in on Johan Dotson, he talked about the big transition for him from from last year to this year. Now, he arrived late in the preseason right before final roster cut down last year. That's not the case here with Bennett. But you talk about, yeah, like, essentially starting from Ground Zero, everybody else had all this buildup time. Bennett's going to be going through the same thing. So I would say, like, it's probably fair to temper expectations.

Is it completely out of the question that he's going to start? No. But I do think that he's very much on the outside looking in when it comes to those meaningful snaps. And obviously the reason that this is of such interest is because of the way that the outside corners looked on Thursday night against the Bengals. Now, yes, they were going up against Joe Burrow and Jamar Chase and T. Higgins, but it was not a great night for Keely Ringo and Adori Jackson. And Vic Finjo said, you know what? He's kind of glad that that happened. Not that he wants them to be given up touchdowns, but at that position, you're going to deal with failure. How do you respond? He wants to see how Keely Ringo responds. And I did, my ears

perked up a little bit that it was specifically Keely that he was talking about. I think you read the tea leaves. I think everybody wants Keely Ringo to win this job. We'll see if it but how did he look to you today in terms of how he bounced back? Yeah, I mean, he still got the lion's share of the snaps with the first team. Dori Jackson continued to mix in, but it was mostly Keely Ringo working with the first team defense. I thought he did. He looked fine. I think at the end of the day, I do agree with him that it feels like either Vic knows it's going to be Keeley or wants it to be Keeley.

That's going to be that starting corner opposite of Quinnian Mitchell. But look, at the end of the day, he was going up against Jamar Chase on Thursday night. You got to go and make the tackle. Vick said that said as much afterwards. Like, yeah, like, you give up the catch. I can forgive giving up the catch. You're going up against Jamar Chase. But in that situation, you have to have that awareness to go and make that play along the sideline.

Also very interesting for fans you have to say that in the preseason, you know, you are calling the game with player evaluation in mind. It's not like you're calling. Now, we know that they're not calling the game like you're trying to win the game necessarily. But, you know, he makes a joke about them. And they played the Bengals last year. They didn't call cover zero a single time. You're like this time that happens and they give a touchdown and that's what happens. Yeah, you're going up against that quarterback and those receivers,

you're not going to put your corners in that kind of a situation. But, yeah, I'm going to be interested to see like, all right, what does Keely look like this week? Look, they're going up against Jamar Chase T. Higgins. Cleveland does not have those guys, but they've got professional receivers. I mean, you've got Jerry Judy. You've got Cedric Tillman who came on last year. You've got Deonté Johnson, who's been a productive receiver in football. So I think when you're looking at this group, it should be a good test for Keely Ringo,

Dori Jackson, the rest of that secondary. All right, let's talk wide receivers. Two players in particular of interest today. The first, Darius Cooper, who had that great debut on Thursday night, got to spend a little time with the ones today. Yes, so seven on seven caught a nice in-cut from Jalen Hertz, the middle of the field. Jalen made sure to go up and dab him up afterwards.

And I think when you're looking at Cooper, this is a situation where, okay, the rookie goes out, undrafted, make some plays in the preseason game. Let's mix him in a little bit. Continue to try and give him some competitive reps, to try and see if you can earn a roster spot. I'm not going like overboard with that performance, but I think overall it's a good story for a guy that's, again, trying to fight

for the 52nd or 53rd job on this roster. Did have a tough drop, not a bad drop, but a tough play. A nice throw from Tanner McKee when he had a step on the Dory Jackson down the field. But yeah, I mean, listen, the reason that I have been so impressed with Darius Cooper and I would have him on my 53

is because I think there was a difference between a rookie doing it and a guy who's been in the league before. So the good context for the summer that Elijah Cooks has had today was the return of Terrace Marshall to practice. It has been out for a while, former second red pick, and Terrace Marshall was all over the place today. I think you had like 10 catches over the course of practice. Looked pretty good, looked pretty smooth, catches the ball well. And it's a good reminder that like, okay, if you are, you have been in the league on the roster periphery,

you should be able to do well in these practices. This goes back to like DeMires Johnson. Your original camp crush was a similar kind of, you know, DeAndre Carter, how dare you. Yeah, right. You're thinking you'd be a different on drafted Brooklyn. Yes, exactly right. I went to DeMaris Johnson's high school once for a story.

I do remember that. That's right. Great move by me meant that I got to fly down to New Orleans a day earlier. Yes, a pro move. But that said, when you're looking at, at Cooper, that's one of the things you do like about it. This is a guy that was extremely productive at the college level, at a lower level of competition at Tarleton State. Give him an opportunity here to continue to shine. You mentioned Terrace Marshall.

Yeah, back on the practice field here on Saturday. It was extremely active with the second team and the third team. Catches the ball extremely well. The route running continues to be a little bit of an issue. There was one of the biggest defensive highlights of the day. Came in a backed up period. It was a special situation, situation where it's the twos versus the twos. Terrace Marshall against Eli Ricks on the left sideline,

it was a quick game route. Ricks read it from the jump. Pick six going the other way. He gets into the end zone and punt. the ball towards the parking lot, which could have been precarious, but the field goal net, thankfully saves the day there for many insurance claims being filed. That was a disastrous series of plays for the offense. All three units got one play from the one yard line backed up, and all three were very bad.

The first one would have got Sequin killed. Yeah, that was, and Seguan goes to the ground. I was like, all right, get back up. He gets back up. You get the pick six, and then with the threes. What was it? It was just not a good play. It was.

I've got it here. Hold on. It was a, yeah, I think at the end of it was, Tariq Castro Fields broke it up and it was like, could have also been a fit. Yeah, sir, it was a nice play by. Castro Fields continues to, he flies a little bit. Yeah, I like Castro Fields. Then they brought the ones out again for a fourth play of the period.

He had a false start, and then it was a checkdown against the Blitz, Sikon-Barkley, a positive game there. But, yeah, to me, like, going back to Terrace Marshall, the route running continues to be a little bit of a concern. This was generally a relatively light practice. You know, they're not... They're coming off the game. They're in shells.

I'll give you a couple notes from one-on-ones. The best rep from O'Lon-D-Lon-1-on-1-1s I saw, Josh Ushay had a really nice little hesitation. Hezzi on... Hesitation Hesit on Jordan Milada. Beat him clean to the inside. And then on the next one had another solid rep against Milana. So Ushay and Vic Fangio sort of hinted at this as well,

has been the guy of those depth edges who has had the best summer so far. see how much that matters. Ogo Ocaronko also had a very good series of reps against Kenda Lamb. Lam tried to quick-set him and Ocaronko spun right off of it on the inside. Lamb's like raising his hand and he's like, you know, my bad. But the next one, Okaranko, I think, beat him to the edge as well. So he's a guy who's coming on a little bit. What do you think of Ogbo's chances to make the 53? I would say less likely, more likely to not make the team than to make the team. But I don't think that it's done and dusted. I think he's got a shot.

Yeah, I think he and Ojalari fighting for a spot together, right? I think the key to delivering Hezzi is to not, you can't hesitate. You just got to hit it and go. There you go. I think that's probably right. You mentioned Ushay and what Vic Fangio said about him before practice. He continues to get mixed in with the ones. And I felt like today he actually got a decent amount of run with that first team opposite Nolan Smith.

So at the expense of Jaylux Hunt. So that could be something to monitor here. moving forward. It was the typical rotations with the first team, though. The linebackers, you continue to see it's Smile Mondin, Jeremiah Trotter Jr. and Jehad Campbell. I mentioned earlier that it was mostly Keely Ringo in Nickel.

It was mostly Sidney Brown. We did see Tristan McCollum work in with the ones, but it was typically midstream. Like, you know, Quignan Mitchell would come off the field for Dory Jackson. You'd see Reeb Blanketship go off and then McCollum would come on, but I thought it was notable that McCollum got some additional reps with the first team as well. Just to give it to you the full

injury report, no practice for AJ Brown, Elijah Cooks, Kenyon Green who got hurt the other night, Charlie Hewlett, the long snapper, Montrell Johnson, Cam Lottu, and Byron Young, limited Zach Bonn. So back from being totally out, did not really play in teams, but he was out there a little bit, which is good news. Lyndon Dickerson and Terrace Marshall, that also meant that Drew McCuba was a full participant in practice for the first time in a while. Did you see anything from him? Yeah, they were just trying to get him as many reps as possible. Did not get any reps that I saw with the first team, but worked a lot with the twos and with the threes.

You mentioned the touchdown allowed against Taylor Moran in that final period. That did come against McCuba in coverage. I wasn't sure of the coverage scheme, so I don't know how much I squarely put up. It was a really nice throw from DTR. DTR, continue to outplay Kyle McCord a little bit. So it's something I'm continuing to keep my eye.

I didn't think that McCord looked particularly strong today. But again, at the end of the day, McCuba, I think they just want to get him reps and get him up to speed as fast as possible. Listen, the balancing getting guys reps is a big part of the puzzle of the summer. And just to follow up on something from Thursday night, Vic Fangio explained that the reason that Smile Mondin got to start at linebacker over at Jahad Campbell is because there were a certain amount of reps that each of those guys were going to get between those three.

Trotter, Mondin, and Campbell. And the training staff wanted Campbell to get fewer of them. So it made more sense for Campbell to sort of play in the middle there to give guys a rest. And that might sound fishy, but I actually think that totally trash. not just because it's Vic saying it but you see this throughout practice like for instance today you've got the ones on one field and the three's on another field and Morrow Ojimo is practicing with the twos and the threes because they're not going to be in base it's just nickel work and morrow needs to get reps because he didn't play in the game the other night so Jordan Davis and

Jalen Carter are going to be here moro's going to be over here everybody needs to get what they need to get yeah and it's a matter of like you want guys to get enough but not too much and so everybody's kind it's the training staff and the coaching staff are going to work hand in hand. I thought it was cool that Vic Fangio pulled back the curtain a little bit on that. All right. That'll do it for this quick recap of Saturday's practice at the Novacare Complex. Eagles go to the link on Sunday night for the only open practice of the summer.

And then Monday, the debut on PHOI of EJ Smith. We're very much looking forward to it. A big week with joint practices with the Browns coming up as well. We'll have it covered on PHOI. Like the video, comment, all that good stuff. We'll see you later.