PHLY Philadelphia Eagles Podcast - Emergency Pod: Eagles bolster pass rush, sign veteran DE Za’Darius Smith

Episode Date: September 5, 2025

Did you really think Howie Roseman would waste a day without improving the Eagles after their Week 1 win over the Dallas Cowboys? Joining Nolan Smith, Jalyx Hunt and Josh Uche on the edge now is Za’Darius Smith, the longtime sack artist who had 9.0 sacks last season with the Browns and Lions. We react to the Eagles’ big addition. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

To the Xfinity Mobile Studios, we got an emergency pod presented by the good folks at Bet365. Bo Wolf, Fran Duffy, E.J. Smith, you knew that Howie Roseman wasn't done. He wasn't going to watch the Eagles get no sapsed against Dak Prescott and just continue living his life. Instead, he signs Adairius Smith. And you know that this one must have been in the works because Adairus was in Philadelphia to sign today. that means that this must have been cooking for at least a couple days, Fran. No question. I think when you're looking at a player like Zadaria Smith,

I get why there would be some trepidation. If you're an Eagles fan, it's like, oh, like a veteran, they were still in the market. I will say this, going through his film from last year, just from 2024, not like what I know from Green Bay and Minnesota. If he is even like two-thirds, the player that he was last year for Cleveland and for Detroit, this is a huge upgrade for the Eagles as the third defense event, third edge rusher in this group.

I'm really enthusiastic by what I've seen over these last like half hour as I've gone through the film through Zadaria Smith. He's an impressive player still. Now Zadariah Smith will be 33 next week. So he is out there and available for a reason. You know, he is a little bit older. But yes, I had nine sacks last season, which we should say is. the same amount of career sacks combined that Nolan Smith and Jalix Hunt have. And listen, you can have all the expectations you want for Nolan Smith and Jailix Hunt.

Josh Ushay had a couple nice pass rushes last night, but they signed a couple of veterans in Aziz Ojilari and Agba Okarankwo, who were both healthy scratches last night. So certainly there is room for somebody to add into this mix, EJ. Yeah, I think this really is reflective of the way that those two veteran signings went, especially Aziz O'Jolari, you would have thought that he would have been that third edge rusher going into the season. But I'm with Fran, you know, I'm going to, I'm going to, I'm going to borrow a phrase from Fran. I've been listening to him a lot the last couple of weeks. I kind of, I buzzed through, you know, as a Darius Smith's nine sacks last season.

And you see a guy, you know, I was doing some guys myself here. And you see an edge rusher who wins with power, can get to the quarterback. And also, at least in the, in the limited sample size I saw, I think this is a guy who can offer you some early down value, just being a little, just being strong at the point of attack. So yeah, I think that, again,

the third edge rusher spot, I feel like this will be an upgrade for them at that spot. And it's kind of, to me, a response to the way that the summer went for Aziz Ojalari, being able to shore up the back half of that eddresher rotation. And now listen, Zadarius Smith has been around.

He's, you know, at a position that is, can often be like for mercenaries. He is like a mercenaries, mercenary. But that means that he's experienced coming in with without a lot of a head start. What kind of player is he, friend? Violent is like the first word that stands out. You know, just watching him now, it's the

violent bull rushes, the violent hits on quarterbacks, whether it's a sack or if it's a pressure. When he arrives, he arrives with bad intentions. And he's still a sturdy, rugged, defensive end. What I find to be fascinating is that so much of his work, not just last year, but over the course of his career. A lot of his best stuff has come when he has kicked inside and stood up over guards and stood up over centers. The Eagles have not historically been like super duper like creative when it comes to like their front alignments. And you know, we've seen like, oh, yeah, they're going to bump Brandon Graham inside. I think you're going to do all of that with Sedaria Smith as he gets comfortable with the scheme. I just think it'll be interesting because a lot of his best stuff has come.

Like, oh, he's going to kick inside. He's standing up over the center. But he's actually going to loop around and come around. And he's a great pinner on those stunts. Like, He has done a lot of good work in that kind of role. I'll be interested to see if the Eagles try and incorporate more of that in when you put when you sign a guy like Sidariusman. Well, I mean, listen, if the defensive tackles keep spitting on guys, they're going to need that. They might. Yeah, I think they would.

Look, going back to it, I think at the end of the day, uh, Zizzo Zollari inactive week one, Agua O'Ranquo, inactive week one. Even Josh Uche, even though the fact that he had a couple nice rushes on Thursday night, this is the guy that was inactive. down the stretch for the Super Bowl last year for the Kansas City Chiefs. You know, I think when you're looking at the depth in that room, you want a presence likes it area, Smith. The guy who's extremely experienced, nearly 70 career sacks, has been doing it at a high

level for a long time. Fran, did you on purpose say nearly 70 instead of 69? I know who I'm all the podcasts, but yeah. Defd, deft move. Yeah, so listen, nine sacks last year. five and a half the year before that with Cleveland, and then 10 when he was a pro bowler with Minnesota in 2022. And, you know, I'm not going to,

I'm not going to tell you about pressure. I'm going to tell you about quarterback hits. There was a bit of a drop off last year, even though he had nine sacks. He only hit the quarterback on 4% of his pass rush opportunities, which is like, you know, it's sub, you know, Josh Schwett's at 4.5%. He was at 4.0%. So it's good.

It's not great. both of the previous two years, though, he was up around like five and a half. And so, you know, on a per rush basis, he took a little bit of a drop back. But, I mean, listen, there is no question that this is a no-brainer for the Eagles, given the state of the Edd Rush Group now. And as you said,

Fran, if you can get 80% of what he was last year, that's a nice addition. It's a huge upgrade. And a guy that can serve with a couple of different roles. Again, you were hoping that one of your bets that you made at this position in the offseason was going to really pay off and kind of serve that role as the second or third guy opposite Nolan Smith, behind Jalick's hunt.

I think you feel good about Zadaria Smith coming in and filling that role right now. He is better than, you know, the film that I'm watching from 2024 is better than Aziz Ojalari's film. It's better than O'Shea's film. So I'm excited based off of what I've seen so far. Yeah, and to your point, friend, Josh Usher played 19 snaps last night. Patrick Johnson played 12. So if you're telling me this guy is in that tour.

20 to 25 step range, maybe even a little bit higher than that. It just really raises the floor for that group. It's also a hedge against the thing that we have talked about, which is that Nolan Smith himself plays a very violent game. And with that frame, you do kind of worry that, you know, there's a chance he's not going to be able to make it through 17 games. And so it's a hedge against that as well. E.J.

Like, do you think that Howie was like, you know, he was worried he wasn't going to get enough attention after the game yesterday? everybody was going to be thinking about the Brazil game tonight. You needed to steal some shine? I think this is really reflective of the state of the Eddresher group going into the season. I mean, I guess, you know, it never, never hurts to add a little bit of pizzazz after a season opening win, I guess. But I really do. I think that this is probably something that they've wanted to address for the last couple of weeks as they saw, as they saw that Aziz O'Jolari was having a really quiet summer.

I know he had the one joint practice against the Browns. It was the one day I wasn't watching the defense. I was watching the offense that day. but really it was a quiet a quiet training camp and again i think the writing was on the wall with the inactive last night my big takeaway here fran um just all things considered is you got to give credit here to eric burkhart of rock nation for negotiating the terms on this deal i mean what what a great job by the agent i mean we we got to make sure that everybody knows that he nailed this one you know what i mean if my agent got me all of training camp off he got me week one off i

got to, you know, go on vacation, I got to relax. And then I get to cash them them checks anyway. You know, you got to give them a little credit for that, right? It's the man after my own heart. The Darius can give him credit. I don't know if the world needs to give him credit. The Bert man, EB getting it done on a big spot. Love that.

There's some scuttle butt in the chat. Like, does this have anything to do with Jalen Carr? No, I don't think you're not signing Zadari Smith because Jalen Carter, you know, could potentially worst case scenario get another one game suspension from the league, which I find to be highly unlikely anyway. As you noted at the top of the showbo, I think something like this, the fact that Zadari Smith was in town to be able to sign this contract and, you know, passive physical means that they reached out. They didn't reach out last night at 11 at 830 at night. I think that this is something that's probably been in the works for at least the last week.

And we should mention that Ben Van Sumeran was placed on injured reserve to clear the roster spot for Zadaria Smith. Sorry, EJ. I think we're all glad that you were the one who got to say that. Yeah, we can hear it in your voice. The pain. I mean, listen, I truly, I feel terrible for the guy. Yeah, no, yeah, absolutely. The look on his face, like, he knew immediately it was.

The incredulity, like the first play of the season this happens. Like, are you kidding me? awful. Yeah. Yep. I wonder what they would have done had he not got hurt who would have been opening up this spot.

You know, I was thinking about this last night. Uh-oh. I can see the smile. I mean, there's something's coming here. I was thinking about this. So the Eagles lost the toss last night. Or no, the Eagles win the toss last night. They'd defraud them.

What if they had lost the toss and they return? It's a great question. Spitgate doesn't happen. Yeah. The other, like just like that, a flip of a coin. the season changes for one player uh one game changes for jalen carter you're absolutely right you know it's a game it's a game of inches it's a it's a game of uh game of seconds here crazy and then kenyon green wouldn't be on the 53 what does that have to do with it because they would

have to clear a spot they wouldn't add bvus on you think that you know that was my was trying to be clever i was trying to try to be like smooth here about that too clever yeah too clever uh we should say if you know fran is going to be putting out some info here on Zadaria Smith is going to break it down. If you too would like to be able to do some guys, you can join the supporters club. Do it. Support us because that means that you can use the custom emojis.

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No big deal. and make sure that you become a diehard so you can read Franz breakdown of Zadarias Smith and EJ's early bird is breakdown of everything that happened last night with a few extra little nuggets in there, EJ. How did that go for it? It went well. You know, it was definitely, I think I posted it at 452 or something like that. I was going to schedule it for 5 a.m., but it felt like an exercise in futility to give it the extra eight minutes. So, but no, I was excited about it. I hope people enjoy it. And, you know, I would encourage people to give me feedback on it. You know, I said to Bo that this is kind of like when you run the mile to plug in the stats for your like 5K training program, like that's how I feel about it.

So yeah, if you have any thoughts or feedback, I'd love to hear it, guys. All right. Good stuff, everybody. Thank you to Ethan for hopping on this emergency podcast. Thanks everybody for watching. Zadaria Smith is an eagle. Let us know what you think in the comments. And unless the Eagles sign another guy this weekend, we will talk.

to on Monday at 2 o'clock on the p hl yagles podcast thanks for watching and as always we love you