Former Eagles president calls Reddick deal a ‘steal'

The Eagles made their first big splash of free agency on Monday, agreeing to a contract with free agent Haason Reddick.

Reddick’s three-year deal with the Eagles is worth $45 million with $30 million guaranteed at signing and can be worth a maximum of $49.5 million, a league source confirmed to NBC Sports Philadelphia. NFL Network’s Mike Garafolo first reported the deal.

That’s a lot of money.

But in an NFL world where contracts continue to become more and more outlandish, former Eagles president Joe Banner took to Twitter on Monday afternoon and called the contract a “steal” for the Eagles.

Riddick is a steal at 15/. With the cap increase this yr & what’s coming, that is the best deal from the team side so far. So many teams needed a player like this, I assume he wanted Philly badly or a bunch of teams were sleeping. Quality guards and solid receivers getting more

— Joe Banner (@JoeBanner13) March 14, 2022

Yeah, Banner is right. This does look like a steal for the Eagles.

Part of what Banner said could be true. Reddick is a Camden, New Jersey, native and he played college ball at Temple. So this is a homecoming. Maybe he took a little less to make it happen.

But he brings up a very solid point about Reddick’s deal being a pretty decent one from the team perspective. In fact, according to OverTheCap, Reddick’s new contract at $15 million per season ranks him tied for 17th in the NFL among edge rushers.

That’s one heck of a discount for a player who has 23 1/2 sacks over the last two years, the fifth-most in the NFL in that span.

Here’s a look at the top five sack-getters in the NFL over the last two seasons with their sack totals and their AVY:

1. T.J. Watt - 37.5 sacks ($28M)

2. Myles Garrett - 28.0 ($25M)

3. Trey Hendrickson - 27.5 ($15M)

4. Aaron Donald - 26.0 ($22.5M)

5. Haason Reddick - 23.5 ($15M)

It’s important to note that Hendrickson signed his $15 AVY deal last March coming off one big season of production as a former third-round pick. Reddick is coming off two similar years for two different teams as a former first-rounder.

And during the season, the Eagles extended Josh Sweat with a three-year, $40 million deal, making Sweat’s AVY $13.3 million. And Sweat hasn’t had nearly the same NFL success. Sweat has had his best two NFL seasons in 2020 and 2021 and still has 10 fewer sacks than Reddick during that span. And even though other teams had the ability to bid on Reddick, he still ends up getting a contract worth just $5 million more than Sweat in the same time frame.

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OK, so maybe the Eagles will call Reddick (6-1, 235) a linebacker, which would make this look like a much better deal for him. If we’re calling Reddick a linebacker, then this makes him the fourth-highest paid linebacker in the NFL.

But even if Reddick gets the linebacker title and does some linebacker things, his primary objective with the Eagles is going to be to rush the passer. It’ll be interesting to see just how the Eagles use Reddick. He could be a fit to play the SAM position in Jonathan Gannon’s defense, which has some pass rush and linebacker duties. But he’ll also probably spend some time as a defensive end. It’s very likely that Reddick’s versatility is what drew the Eagles to him.

It’ll be up to Gannon to figure out how to utilize Reddick properly but the Eagles wouldn’t have made this move if they didn’t have some sort of plan. Whatever the plan is, the biggest part of it will be to let Reddick do what he does best: Get after quarterbacks. He’ll get paid well to do it but the Eagles will be thrilled if this ends up looking like a major steal.