Adrian Fedkiw
Jalen Mills played in just 23 percent of the snaps during Sunday’s win against the Cleveland Browns, but made the most of his limited opportunities.
With fellow Philadelphia Eagles cornerback Leodis McKelvin week-to-week with a hamstring strain, it’ll give Mills more of a chance to show what he can do.
The seventh-round rookie lit it up during Training Camp and spring practices before struggling a bit during the preseason. What we saw Sunday, however, was a glimpse into what the coaching staff was seeing during the spring.
Let’s take a look at some clips.
Mills was thrust into the action after McKelvin left with his injury. If Mills has a knock, he’s not known for being physical. He wasn’t always consistent with his tackling and taking the proper angles at LSU and some of that showed in August as well. Mills, though, wrapped up nicely on these two plays.
The Browns had a 3rd-and-13 and Mills was in off-coverage against Corey Coleman, who ran a comeback route. Mills recognizes where the sticks are, sees the comeback at the top of the route, puts his foot into the ground and closes on Coleman quickly to prevent the first down.
Another third down here and this is where Robert Griffin III suffered his shoulder injury. Mills leaves his receiver, gets off the block of Gary Barnridge and lays the wood on Griffin.
Here’s one play of Mills in coverage. Again, his snaps were limited so there wasn’t much to evaluate. This is Terrelle Pryor running a simple hitch route, Mills recognizes it immediately and closes quickly for the pass breakup.
This was solid coverage against Pryor as well.
Slot cornerback Ron Brooks was OK Sunday. He played the deep ball well on this occasion against Coleman, riding the hip of the rookie wideout along the right sideline.
Brooks got beaten from the slot earlier in the game. Andrew Hawkins was lined up in the slot on the left side, ran a stop route before hesitating, pivoting, spinning and turning upfield toward the back left corner of the end zone. He had a step or two on Brooks, but Griffin wasn’t able to connect with him for the score.
Carroll had an up-and-down day. There was a missed tackle here as Carroll was in zone and was unable to make the play in space along the left flat against second-year running back Duke Johnson Jr.
Carroll is known for his deep ball prowess, but got beat by Coleman on this underthrown heave into triple coverage along the left sideline. Carroll step for step with Coleman the first 20 yards until the first-round Baylor product put it into a second gear and blew by him. Coleman came back and adjusted, while Carroll couldn’t locate the ball.
He played deep ball well in this instance against Pryor along the left sideline, but the converted quarterback made a great play on the ball to come down with the tough reception.
This was some good coverage as well on Pryor’s fade route into the back left corner of the end zone?
McKelvin had a solid Eagles debut and thought fared better than Carroll. Here’s a clip of him staying stride for stride with Pryor on a deep crossing route.
It’ll be interesting to see how the Eagles coaching staff handles the cornerbacks if McKelvin misses Monday night’s game against the Chicago Bears. Does Brooks stay on the outside and come inside in nickel and dime situations or does Mills stay strictly on the outside and Brooks inside?
Mills showed enough encouraging signs to warrant a huge chunk of the playing time.