Haason Reddick’s draft ascension to culminate in his backyard – Comcast SportsNet Philadelphia

Haason Reddick's draft ascension to culminate in his backyard

Live draft coverage begins Thursday at 5 p.m. with Philly Sports Talk and continues untilmidnight on CSN, CSNPhilly.com and the NBC Sports App.

DeShone Kizer, who played against Haason Reddick in 2015 at Lincoln Financial Field, needed just one word to describe the Temple product.

"Stud," Kizer said at the Shriners Hospital for Children on Wednesday at an NFL PLAY 60 event.

"Absolute stud. You've got to game-plan for him. He was playing at a higher level than you would expect a Temple football player to play at. We knew we were going to have to do whatever we could to stop him. He balled out against us. That took a whole team for us to go up against a guy like him, (Tyler) Matakevich in that fourth quarter to try and win it all."

Temple would have upset the Fighting Irish that nightif it wasn't for some late game heroics from Kizer.

Kizer connected with Philadelphia product-turned Houston Texan Will Fuller on a 17-yard touchdown pass with 2:09 left in the game as Notre Dame won, 24-20.

"They came out and they fought," Kizer said. "They were an undefeated team going into that game, it was Halloween night, Will Fuller's back home, and the way that game finished was obviously a good showing of what the season looked like all year."

Reddick racked up four tackles in that game, including 1for a loss. As Reddick reflected on his career at Temple, he said that game against Notre Dame, the Penn State game in 2015 and the 2016 game against Memphis were some of the games that put him in the national spotlight.

Reddick has taken that spotlight and continued to rise up NFL draft boards since the start of the draft process.

"I feel like I was under the radar," Reddick said. "They still truly don't understand the hard work that I put in to get here and really what type of player I am. But that will all change soon."

The former Temple walk-on has been projected as a mid-first-round pick.

The Eagles hold the No. 14 overall pick in the draft Thursday nightbut haven't been linked to Reddick as much as other prospects like Ohio State cornerback Gareon Conley and Alabama linebacker Reuben Foster.

But with Conley and Foster each reportedly slipping because of off-the-field issues, Reddick might be an option for the Eagles at 14.

Reddick said Eagles linebackers coach Ken Flajole has met with him a couple of times leading up to the draft.

If selected by the Eagles, Reddick would already be familiar with Lincoln Financial Field since Temple plays its home games there. It's where he led the Owls to the American Athletic Conference championship in 2016.

"The process has been a crazy ride," Reddick said. "To be able to hear my name called on Thursday, God willing if that happens, it would be beautiful, man. It would be a great way to end this first chapter and start getting ready for the next one."

The scene at the Art Museum was insane. The noise, the energy, the enthusiasm. Electrifying.

When the Cardinals picked Temple's Haason Reddick at No. 13, the reality hit everybody that the Eagles could snag an elite cornerback like Marlon Humphrey, Tre'Davious White or Gareon Conley. They could get a stud tight end like O.J. Howard. They could even grab a projected top-10 pick like linebacker Reuben Foster or defensive tackle Jonathan Allen, who both plummeted through the first round.

They were going to get a stud.

The minutes wound down, and then commissioner Roger Goodell walked to the podium and announced the name "Derek Barnett,"and ...it wasn't like people booed, but the reaction sure was muted.

It was just like ... "OK then."

I don't know why Eagles fans wouldn't be thrilled with this pick (see debate for/against Barnett at No. 14).

Barnett is not Jerome McDougle, Jon Harris or Marcus Smith. He's not another Eagles first-round defensive end bust.

He's a 20-year-old kid with boundless upside who played at a high level against the best competition in college football, andhis speed and relentless effort fits perfectly into defensive coordinator Jim Schwartz's scheme.

And he just happens to fill a crucial need on a defense that desperately needs pass rush help.

He's exactly what the Eagles needed.

I think pass rush was just as big a need for this team as cornerback,and this draft is so deep at corner that going defensive end in the first round and corner in the second or third round made perfect sense.

So let's look at what Schwartz has to work with as he enters Year 2.

Up front, he has Fletcher Cox, Tim Jernigan and Beau Allen inside and Barnett with Brandon Graham, Vinny Curry and Chris Long outside. The Eagles will miss Bennie Logan, but on paper, that's a very good defensive line.

At linebacker, budding star Jordan Hicks and Nigel Bradham will get the lion's share of the snaps. Mychal Kendricks is still a de facto starter, but I still don't think he'll be here by opening day. And even if he is, he'll play only 15 to 20 snaps per game.

You have two very good safeties in Malcolm Jenkins and Rodney McLeod, and that really leaves cornerback as the one big giant question mark on defense.

But whoever the Eagles run out there I would guess Jalen Mills and whoever they draft on Friday, with Ron Brooks back in the slot if he's healthy will be an upgrade over Nolan Carroll and Leodis McKelvin. Anything would be an upgrade over Nolan Carroll and Leodis McKelvin.

When I look at this group, I see a top-10 defense.

And if you think that's crazy, consider this: The Eagles were only three yards per game away from being a top-10 defense last year, in their first year in Schwartz's scheme, with Connor Barwin playing out of position, a terrible set of cornerbacks and huge issues getting to the quarterback.

Consider this: The 2016 Eagles limited opposing QBs to the fifth-lowest completion percentage in the NFL, allowed the fifth-fewest first downs, allowed the eighth-fewest TDs and ranked third in the red zone.

This was a betterdefense a year ago than people realized.

What was its biggest issue? Allowing big pass plays.

The Eagles allowed a ridiculous 27 pass plays of 30 yards or more, second-worst in the NFL (one fewer than the Raiders).

Big plays killed this team a year ago, and that's a combination of a lack of pass pressure and terrible cornerback play.

Greatly reduce those big plays and this is a playoff defense.

The Eagles have already jettisoned their starting cornerbacks, and Mills and a rookie will be an upgrade. And now they've addressed their pass rush.

How much difference will Barnett make in Year 1? No way to tell yet. But I have to think a rotation of Graham, Barnett, Curry and Long will be more productive than Graham, Barwin, Curry and Marcus Smith.

The Eagles haven't had an elite defense since Jim Johnson's last season, when they ranked fourth in the NFL in points allowed and third in yards allowed.

That team won a couple playoff games, reached the NFC Championship Game, and was one fourth-quarter, fourth-down stop on Tim Hightower away from Super Bowl XLIII in Tampa.

That was 2008. That was nine years ago.

It's no coincidence that the last time the Eagles had an elite defense was the last time they won a playoff game.

It's been a long, sad eight years since. Years filled with coaching changes, a lack of stability at quarterback and defensive play that Eagles fans had to be largely embarrassed by.

How do you go from Brian Dawkins,Trent Cole, LitoSheppard and Sheldon Brown celebrating playoff wins to Nnamdi Asomugha waving his arms at Kurt Coleman after allowing yet another touchdown bomb just a few short years later?

Sad. This is a city that loves offense but loves defense even more.

I'm not sure this is ready to be an elite defense yet, but drafting Barnett is going to help the Eagles continue becoming a pretty darn good one.

The Joe Douglas Era is underway. Clearly.

If folks were wondering how big of an imprint the Eagles' new vice president of player personnel would have in the organization, it didn't take long to figure out.

Douglas' fingerprints are all over the selection of Derek Barnett at No. 14.

Aside from Douglas' raving about Barnett's "ankle flexion" and comparing the 20-year-old to Ravens great Terrell Suggs, Barnett also fits the mold of what a Joe Douglas player is supposed to be.

High motor, high character, high compete level.

"Since Joe has been here," Eagles VP of football operations Howie Roseman said, "the things that he stressed to [the scouting staff] when we met and talked about what we wanted this team to look like, is that it's the war-daddy mentality of having guys on the field who are going to do whatever it takes to get better.

"Guys who have an incredibly high motor and tremendous character. This is the first pick with Joe here, and to get a guy [in Barnett] who when we talk about those guys is our example when we talk to the scouts, and when Joe talks to the scouts and says, 'This is what I'm talking about here in Derek Barnett.' I think it's a great example for the room here as we go forward over the next couple of days. This is what fits. This is what we're looking for, and this is how we want to build."

For months, the Eagles have pushed the word "collaboration." In fact, it was a favorite buzzword of Jeff Lurie's when the Eagles' owner met with reporters at the owners meetings in late March. Roseman is no longer on his own as the overseer of everything Eagles football. Roseman has some help.

And apparently, he's listening, which might bode well for the future of the franchise.

In addition to throwing out the buzzword "collaboration," the Eagles have also made an obvious and concerted effort to put Douglas in front of cameras right next to Roseman. The optics are appealing for a fanbase that has long lost faith in Roseman as a talent evaluator.

Douglas learned from legendary GM Ozzie Newsome, but it's hard to pin down a resume for the Eagles' VP of player personnel. While he's been involved in multiple drafts with the Ravens and last year with the Bears, it's impossible to know how much credit and how much blame to assign to him specifically.

But at least one thing's clear a day into his first draft with the Eagles: He's having an impact.

The Eagles weren't wowed by combine statistics when they made their first-round pick this year. In fact, Barnett didn't perform very well at this year's combine. (Roseman pointed out Barnett had the flu.) Instead, Barnett was just a really solid player for three years in college. That outweighed his lackluster performance in the underwear Olympics, just like it did for Suggs long ago when the Ravens drafted him.

While some view Barnett as a safe pick, Douglas sees plenty of room for him to grow.

"I think there is a higher ceiling with Derek," Douglas said. "I think he is going to get better. I think [D-line coach Chris Wilson and defensive quality control/assistant D-line coach Phillip Daniels] are going to do a great job with him and improve some of his hand technique. He even said it in his interview after he was drafted, how he's just scratching the surface of his talent level. So I expect him to definitely reach his full potential because of his make-up."

Roseman mentioned those characteristics like high motor and character but is thatphilosophy a departure from before?

"I don't know necessarily that it's a departure, but it's more stressed," Roseman said. "And I think that that's some of the things. I mean, I think there are things that you're attracted to naturally, and I think we balance each other on that stuff. I understand the reason why it's so important to have guys like that on this football team. The more guys we can get like that who have incredible passion for the game, who have tremendous character, who will do whatever it takes to get better and who are team players, the more we're going to have success going forward."

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Haason Reddick's draft ascension to culminate in his backyard - Comcast SportsNet Philadelphia