Jon Dorenbos, Eagles Agree to 3-Year Extension

Doug Pederson entered his Friday press conference with a little bit of news. 

A day after announcing a three-year extension for special teams ace Chris Maragos, the team also agreed to a three-year extension with Pro Bowl long snapper Jon Dorenbos. 

Both contracts are now extended through the 2019 season for guys who were set to become free agents after this season. Dorenbos has a base salary of $985,000 and a cap hit of $1.085 million in 2016. 

“We’re just so excited to have these two guys locked up for the next few years,” Pederson said. “Obviously special teams players. Chris being a big part of what we do on special teams and his value there. It makes me sleep at night having a long-snapper with Jon’s experience. That operation will be around for the next few years. Congratulations to those two guys.”

Dorenbos, 36, arrived to Philadelphia in 2006, which makes him the longest tenured Eagles player already. Before joining the Eagles, he had stints with the Titans and Bills. He is third on the Eagles’ all-time list for consecutive games played with 158. Barring injury, he’ll be first on the list by the end of the 2016 season. 

“Jon Dorenbos has been a pillar for the Philadelphia Eagles for the last 11 years on and off the field,” Eagles vice president of football operations Howie Roseman said in a statement. “He bleeds Eagles green. His commitment and love to our organization, to the City of Philadelphia and to our fans are second to none. He embraces every opportunity to represent this team and does so with class and a high-level of positive energy.”

Away from football, Dorenbos advanced to the finals of NBC’s America’s Got Talent this year and has been performing magic for decades. He immersed himself in magic and football at a young age, following a tragic incident as a child, when his father murdered his mother. 

Magic helped him through the tough times. While Dorenbos seems to have a post-football career lined up as a magician, that part of his life won’t start for a while. 

Did the Eagles have to outbid Vegas to keep their long snapper? 

“He was excited to stay here,” Pederson said with a chuckle. “We didn’t have to outbid Vegas.”

Extending Maragos and Dorenbos (a two-time Pro Bowler) shows the Eagles’ devotion to keeping their special teams as a top unit. Pederson praised special teams coordinator Dave Fipp, is in his fourth year, on Friday. Pederson said Fipp is a great teacher and does more drill work and fundamentals teaching rather than just running kick returns and punt returns over and over. 

Whatever Fipp is doing, it’s working. And the Eagles want to keep it going. 

“I think it’s very important,” Pederson said. “Part of the messaging to the team, from my standpoint, is we have three aspects of our team. You have offense, defense and special teams. And it’s so important to the success of your team. And we’ve seen it already this year, the importance of that. Hopefully, we can continue to build on that and good things will happen.”

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