Eagles-Commanders snap counts: Good things happen when Tank Bigsby touches the ball

The official snap counts from the Philadelphia Eagles’ Week 16 win over the Washington Commanders are in! Let’s take a look and run through some analysis.

OFFENSE

• Jordan Mailata continues to lead all Eagles players in offensive snaps played this season.
• The Eagles were able to pull most of their offensive starters late in the game.
• A.J. Brown and Dallas Goedert led all pass-catchers in snaps played. Brown saw 12 targets. Goedert only saw three, the same amount as Jahan Dotson. Kinda weird Goedert wasn’t targeted a bit more against a defense that’s allowed the eighth-most yards to tight ends this season. Goedert’s three targets resulted in three catches for 32 yards and a touchdown.
• Saquon Barkley played his fifth-lowest snap count percentage of the season but logged his second-most yards from scrimmage (132) in a game this season.
• Darius Cooper continues to have a small role as WR4.
• With Cameron Latu out, Kylen Granson saw some more playing time than he usually gets.
• Will Shipley and Tank Bigsby saw identical snap counts as the running backs behind Barkley. Shipley did not log a carry and saw one target for a three-yard reception. Bigsby’s four carries resulted in 37 yards and a touchdown. Bigsby is up to averaging 6.6 yards per carry this season. Good things happen when Tank touches the ball! Less so for Shipley, who fumbled the opening kickoff and then made a bad decision to run another return out of the end zone.
• E.J. Jenkins saw some offensive snaps after being temporarily elevated from the practice squad.

DEFENSE

• Zack Baun has now overtaken Cooper DeJean for most snaps played by an Eagles defender this season … by the difference of one snap.
• I don’t know if the extended playing time for Moro Ojomo during Jalen Carter’s absence has served Ojomo well. He only has one sack, one TFL, and two quarterback hits in the Eagles’ last three games. Not terrible but I think he’ll benefit from going back down to DT2 playing time once Carter is back.
• Nolan Smith overtook Jaelan Phillips as the Eagles’ top edge rusher by snaps played. Smith did not exactly stuff the stat sheet but he did have a quarterback hit and he looked more active than the box score would indicate.
• Jihaad Campbell saw his most playing time in some time since Nakobe Dean suffered a hamstring injury early in this game.
• Jordan Davis logged his eight-lowest snap count percentage of the season but he was very impactful when he was on the field with a team-high six stops in this game. (Stops are tackles that constitute a “failure” for the offense.) Davis is looking like a beast.
• Brandon Graham has there sacks and two TFLs over his last two games. This despite only playing 16 total snaps! The two-time Super Bowl champion is a really nice role player to have right now. The Eagles should continue to give him snaps on the interior defensive line.
• Sydney Brown and Kelee Ringo saw some defensive snaps with the Eagles pulling their starters late in the game. Ringo got called for pass interference to set up a Washington touchdown.
• Undrafted rookie free agent cornerback Brandon Johnson made his NFL regular season debut in this game.

SPECIAL TEAMS

• Jake Elliott missed three field goal attempts, two of which were officially recorded due to a penalty wiping out one miss.
• Braden Mann has only had to punt three times in the Eagles’ last two games. He was averaging 4.5 punts per game prior to this stretch.

DID NOT PLAY

INACTIVE: Lane Johnson, Jalen Carter, Cameron Latu, Joshua Uche, A.J. Dillon, Mac McWilliams, Sam Howell

• The Eagles are reportedly getting Johnson and Carter back in Week 17.
• Latu might be able to return after missing just one game.
• Weekly question: why is Dillon on the roster?
• Brandon Johnson being active over McWilliams doesn’t seem like a great sign for the latter’s development.

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