Eagles Acquire Running Back Jordan Howard From Bears in Exchange for 2020 Draft Pick

The Eagles on Thursday evening traded a conditional late-round draft pick to the Bears for former Pro Bowl running back Jordan Howard.

Remember earlier this week, when Howie Roseman basically told Eagles fans to relax about the running back position?

Well, now we know why.

The Eagles on Thursday evening traded a conditional late-round draft pick to the Bears for former Pro Bowl running back Jordan Howard.

According to ESPN, the deal is for a sixth-round pick that can turn into a fifth-rounder if Howard meets certain incentives. Not a bad price to get a running back who will step in and immediately help the Eagles’ already-dynamic offense. And it also won’t cost the Eagles a ton of money either. Howard is owed a base salary of $2.025 million in 2019; the Eagles came into the day with over $24 million in cap space.  

The connection to Howard has been pretty obvious for a while now for several reasons:

1. The Eagles obviously needed more help at the running back and Howard has rushed for over 3,300 yards in his first three NFL seasons.

2. Eagles VP of player personnel Joe Douglas was the Bears’ director of college scouting for one season in 2015, the same year the Bears scouted Howard out of Indiana before they drafted him.

3. By trading for Howard instead of signing a running back, he doesn’t count toward the Eagles’ compensatory pick formula. The Eagles are stockpiling draft picks to give their roster an infusion of young and cheap talent over the next few years and have been very strategic to not hurt themselves with that formula.

So what are the Eagles’ getting in Howard?

Well, he likely figures into the rotation as their primary runner on first and second downs. He hasn’t been a great receiver out of the backfield, but has put up really solid numbers as a rusher. He ran for 1,313 yards in his rookie season when he was named to the Pro Bowl. In 2017, he rushed for 1,122. And last year, he rushed for 935, but his yards-per-attempt average dropped to 3.7.

Howard is a clear improvement over what the Eagles had. He’ll join a running back group that still includes Corey Clement, Wendell Smallwood, Josh Adams and Boston Scott. And because they didn’t give up very much to get Howard and because he’s in the final year of his rookie contract, I still wouldn’t rule out the possibility of drafting one — perhaps even in the first few rounds — in about a month.

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