T.J. WANTS TO BE AN EAGLE

Bengals receiver T.J. Houshmandzadeh is due to become a free agent in little more than three weeks. And, if T.J. has his way, the equipment manager in Philly will be muttering “Newman!” when he realizes that he’ll have to come up with a way to fit all those letters on the back of a green jersey. On Wednesday, Houshmandzadeh told Mike Missanelli of ESPN Radio 950 in Philadelphia that the veteran wideout would like to play for the Eagles. “If they’ll be interested in me, I’ll be interested in them,” Houshmandzadeh said, via our own Sheil Kapadia of philly.com. “I think [Donovan] McNabb is a fine quarterback,” Houshmandzadeh said. “He’s one of the best quarterbacks in the league, probably, I can’t even think of another quarterback that has performed throughout his career the way he has and would be put in a situation like he was put in in Baltimore, but he bounced back very well.” Yeah, so well that McNabb might not even be the quarterback of the Eagles come September 2009, if as a growing number of league insiders suspect McNabb tries to force his way out of town. Whether Houshmandzadeh gets a chance to test the market remains to be seen; the Bengals could use the franchise tag to keep him in place. (As Kapadia points out, Adam Schefter of NFLN reported in December that the Bengals won’t do it.) The bigger question, in our view, is whether Houshmandzadeh needs a Chad Johnson across from him in order to be effective. If so, T.J. could be the next Alvin Harper and/or Peerless Price.