The Eagles began preparing Saturday for life without Lane Johnson, and that meant two guys in new positions on the offensive line.
Offensive line coach Jeff Stoutland, a holdover from Chip Kelly's coaching staff, moved left guard Allen Barbre out to Johnson’s right tackle spot at practice Saturday and replaced him at left guard with rookie third-round pick Isaac Seumalo.
Johnson faces a 10-game suspension for a second positive test for a banned substance.
Johnson, the fourth pick in the 2013 draft, spoke with reporters after practice Saturday and seemed resigned to the suspension, although he said he was the victim of an improperly labeled supplement (see story).
Johnson, who was suspended for the first four games of the 2014 season, worked at right tackle with the second offense on Saturday.
Head coach Doug Pederson has a lot of options to replace Johnson. There's Dennis Kelly, Matt Tobin or Andrew Gardner, all of whom play tackle. Or, if he moves Barbre over, he could replace him at left guard with veteran Stefan Wisniewski.
Instead he went with Barbre at right tackle and the 22-year-old Seumalo at left guard.
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The current line certainly isn’t etched in stone. But it appears this is the unit that will start the second preseason game, which takes place Thursday night in Pittsburgh vs. the Steelers.
“I'm looking for five tough, dirty, nasty guys that want to go out and just play football,” Pederson said. “I don't care which five it is, but we're going to find the best five and the right five, and I feel like we've got them here on the team.”
Barbre has played some tackle before. He played well at left tackle in a win over the Packers at Lambeau Field in 2013 when Jason Peters had to leave the game with a quad injury.
The 32-year-old Barbre, originally a fourth-round pick of the Packers back in 2007, has eight career starts at tackle but just one since 2010. He started all 16 games at left guard last year.
“He's played there, No. 1 – more left tackle than right, but he's been there in the past,” Pederson said. “I love his athleticism. He's a smart guy out there. Some of these next couple of days we've just got to keep getting him some reps and getting him caught up.”
Barbre initially replaced Johnson at right tackle in 2014, when Johnson was suspended for the first four games of the season. But he suffered a season-ending ankle injury in the opener against the Jaguars, and Andrew Gardner and Todd Herremans wound up filling in until Johnson returned.
“In 2014, I knew it was four games,” Barbre said. “This could be 10 games. I’m definitely going to approach it the same. My approach is going out working hard every day, putting my best foot forward. … I’m still going to go out and give it my best regardless if it’s four games, one game, or 16 games.”
But Barbre has been playing guard throughout the preseason and all of last year. So this is a pretty big adjustment.
“Kind of flipping things in my head, doing different stuff,” he said. “Total different positions. … It takes a little bit of time.”
These moves give the Eagles a projected offensive line with Jason Peters at left tackle, Seumalo at left guard, Jason Kelce at center, Brandon Brooks at right guard and Barbre at right tackle.
But Peters struggled with injury problems last year, Seumalo is an untested rookie, Kelce had an off year last year, Brooks is a free agent who’s never played a snap as an Eagle, and Barbre is a journeyman who’s been released four times, suspended once for PEDs himself and spent time with four different teams.
If quarterback Sam Bradford is concerned, he’s not letting on.
“Obviously, it affects me but I try not to pay attention to it,” he said. “I believe in all the guys we have in that room, and the coaches are going to find the five best guys to put out there, regardless of who that is, so I try not to put a lot of my attention there right now. …
“Last year I felt like we did a great job of putting guys in. It seems like for a while there we had a different lineup every week or every couple weeks. I thought we did a good job of battling that last year. I think everybody knows you’re always one play away from stepping in there and playing, and someone’s just going to have to step up.”
Part of the issue with offensive line depth is that the Eagles have drafted only three o-linemen in the first three rounds since 2007 – Danny Watkins, Johnson and Seumalo.
Despite what appears to be a shaky line with a lot of question marks, Pederson said he’s confident in this group and isn’t worried the Eagles don’t have enough talent up front.
“You know what, I'm really not (concerned),” he said. “I'm really not. I look back to our days in Kansas City. We had a lot of injuries there and we were moving guys around, and we had a young left tackle early on (Eric Fisher). We made it work.”
