Eagles Clips
The Eagles brought in receiver Makai Lemon with the No. 20 overall pick in this year’s draft, ostensibly setting him up to be one of the club’s top wideouts alongside DeVonta Smith in the coming season once A.J. Brown is traded.
Lemon and Smith have already started getting to know each other, attending Game 3 of the first round NBA playoff matchup between the Philadelphia 76ers and Boston Celtics.
Lemon told reporters on Thursday that the two got to talk and Smith said that he’ll love it.
“Yeah, super humble guy, super chill, super calm, kind of my type of vibe,” Lemon said, via Reuben Frank of NBCSportsPhiladelphia.com. “So I feel like me and him clicked on those things. When you step on the field, he’s already got that dog mentality. So I think me and him are going to click well, definitely.”
Smith and Lemon are each what one could consider undersized receivers, but both have shown an ability to still be productive — particularly Smith at the highest level.
“Yeah, he’s definitely not the biggest guy, not the tallest guy on the field. But having that heart makes him such an impact player. And that’s what sticks out to me,” Lemon said. “Once you have a guy like that on your team, lined up next to you, I feel like that’s only going to make you better. And I feel like we can help each other in any way.”
Lemon won the 2025 Biletnikoff award as the nation’s best receiver in 2025. He caught 79 passes for 1,156 yards with 11 touchdowns in his final season with USC.
Super Bowl LII MVP Nick Foles is a legend in Philadelphia for helping the Eagles win their first Lombardi Trophy.
He’s so legendary, in fact, that no player since Foles has worn No. 9 for the club.
That will change in 2026.
Eagles first-round pick Makai Lemon told reporters on Thursday that he will sport No. 9 for the team this season. Lemon said he spoke to Foles on the phone and received the former quarterback’s blessing.
“I’ll represent the nine well,” Lemon said, via Olivia Reiner of the Philadelphia Inquirer.
The No. 20 overall pick of the 2026 draft, Lemon won the 2025 Biletnikoff award as the nation’s best receiver in 2025. He caught 79 passes for 1,156 yards with 11 touchdowns in his final season with USC.
The Eagles have signed three more of their 2026 draft picks.
Adam Schefter of ESPN reports that they have signed fifth-round quarterback Cole Payton, seventh-round safety Cole Wisniewski, and seventh-round linebacker Keyshawn James-Newby to their four-year rookie deals. First-round wideout Makai Lemon also signed with the team on Thursday.
Payton completed nearly 72 percent of his passes and ran for 13 touchdowns at North Dakota State last season. He will try to earn a spot in a quarterback group that also has Tanner McKee and Andy Dalton behind Jalen Hurts.
Wisniewski was Payton’s teammate at North Dakota State before transferring to Texas Tech for the 2025 season. James-Newby finished up his college time at New Mexico after spending time at Idaho and Montana Tech.
Wide receiver Makai Lemon is the first member of the 2026 draft class to sign with his NFL team.
Ian Rapoport of NFL Media reports that Lemon has signed his four-year rookie deal with the Eagles. The 20th overall pick’s deal is worth just over $20.8 million in fully guaranteed money and includes an $11.5 million-plus signing bonus.
Lemon’s selection was the cause of some intrigue last Thursday as he was on the phone with the Steelers when the Eagles traded up with the Cowboys to snag him. The Steelers had the 21st overall selection.
Lemon had 79 catches for 1,156 yards and 11 touchdowns at USC last season.
The Eagles drafted Lemon, signed Hollywood Brown and traded for Dontayvion Wicks this offseason. They also have DeVonta Smith and the new receiver additions come ahead of an expected trade of A.J. Brown after June 1.
The Eagles waived tight end Jaheim Bell, the team announced.
The Patriots selected Bell in the seventh round in 2024 out of Florida State. He appeared in 15 games for New England as a rookie, catching two passes for 20 yards.
New England cut him out of the 2025 preseason, and he signed with the Eagles’ practice squad in October. The Eagles waived him a week later, and he spent a few weeks on the Steelers’ practice squad before signing a futures contract with Philadelphia after the season.
Bell, 24, did play a game in 2025.
The Eagles’ tight ends room now has Dallas Goedert, second-round pick Eli Stowers, Grant Calcaterra, Johnny Mundt, E.J. Jenkins, Cameron Latu and Stone Smartt.
The Eagles are parting ways with a longtime member of their personnel department.
The Eagles assistant General Manager Alec Halaby is stepping down. Halaby began his time with the Eagles as an intern in 2007 and held several titles in the organization before taking the assistant GM role in 2022.
“I am deeply grateful to the Eagles organization, especially [Eagles owner Jeffrey Lurie] and [GM Howie Roseman], for giving me a chance to work in the game I love,” Halaby said in a statement. “Jeffrey’s stewardship has created a first-class organization. Howie has been a mentor to me from Day One, for which I am greatly appreciative. It has been a rare privilege to contribute to building championship teams for the city of Philadelphia. The experience has been enriched by a set of special relationships with front office colleagues, coaches, and players. Football has been a core part of my life for as long as I can remember; that won’t change. Nevertheless, after 17 years in Philadelphia, I’ve decided to step away to start a new professional chapter. It has been a wonderful journey. Go Birds.”
Halaby was a candidate for multiple GM openings around the league in recent years. It is unclear what direction his new professional chapter will take him.
It’s the second departure from the Eagles front office in recent days. Bryce Johnston left the team to join the Falcons as their senior vice president of football administration and senior personnel executive.
Longtime Eagles offensive line coach Jeff Stoutland retired from the team after 13 years this offseason, and he says bad play calling made for a frustrating final year in Philly.
Stoutland appeared on Jason Kelce and Travis Kelce’s podcast and said that what went wrong for the Eagles’ offense last year included not calling the right play against the right defense.
“I think any time things don’t go well, and I don’t want to sound like I’m on an interview, but it’s the truth — it’s execution, it’s calling the right play at the right time, and not running bad plays into bad defenses. I mean, it ain’t that hard — that’s pretty much it,” Stoutland said.
The Eagles fired offensive coordinator Kevin Patullo after the season, and while Stoutland didn’t mention Patullo by name, it’s impossible to hear those comments and not think Stoutland was frustrated with Patullo’s play calling. As was much of the city of Philadelphia.
The Eagles are exercising the fifth-year options on the contracts of defensive tackle Jalen Carter and edge rusher Nolan Smith, the team announced.
Carter’s will pay him around $27 million for 2027 and Smith’s is worth around $13.7 million for 2027.
Carter, 25, was the ninth overall pick in 2023, and he has made the Pro Bowl each of the past two seasons.
He has totaled 108 tackles, 13.5 sacks, 37 quarterback hits, 13 passes defensed and four forced fumbles.
Smith, 25, was the 30th overall pick in 2023.
He has totaled 91 tackles, 10.5 sacks, 25 quarterback hits, two passes defensed and two forced fumbles.
The Eagles surprised a lot of people when they took quarterback Cole Payton in the fifth round of the draft. With Jalen Hurts starting, Tanner McKee backing him up and Andy Dalton recently arriving in a trade, the Eagles’ quarterbacks room would seem to be set.
But the Eagles think Payton, who threw for 16 touchdowns and four interceptions last season at North Dakota State, is too good a prospect to pass up.
“Really, really athletic, really good with the ball in his hands in the quarterback run game, made great decisions with the football, accurate passer — 72 percent last year as a starter, and you can’t be that unless you’re making good, accurate throws and going the right place with the ball,” Eagles coach Nick Sirianni said. “There are some ‘Wow’ plays on his tape that are really impressive. I think I charted four times he jumped over somebody. I wrote down, ‘He’s the best athlete on the field.’”
Before he became North Dakota State’s starter in 2025, Payton was a backup quarterback used primarily as a runner in certain packages, and he made the most of those opportunities, running for 31 touchdowns in his college career. Sirianni said he’s open to Payton getting on the field in any role he can.
“We’ll see how that goes, get him here, get him acclimated here, have a chance next weekend at rookie minicamp learning the playbook, then we’ll see where it goes from here,” Sirianni said when asked if Payton has a chance to play in some capacity as a rookie.
Eagles General Manager Howie Roseman said you can’t have too many good quarterbacks.
“He was the highest guy on the board and obviously it’s an important position,” Roseman said. We feel really good about the three quarterbacks that are here, we plan to have them here, we’re excited about all three of those guys. It’s not about them, it’s about staying true to the process and taking the best player available. . . . We’re open to keeping four quarterbacks, for sure. It’s the most important position in sports. If you have four good ones, why wouldn’t you keep them?”
The Cowboys rained on Pittsburgh’s draft parade on Thursday night, by trading out of the No. 20 spot and allowing the Eagles to draft receiver Makai Lemon at a time when the Steelers had Lemon on the phone.
A report emerged that the Steelers weren’t happy with the Cowboys for giving the pick to the team that plucked Lemon. On Saturday, the powers-that-be in Dallas addressed that claim.
Via Jon Machota of The Athletic, Cowboys executive Stephen Jones said, “That’s not right.” Cowboys owner and G.M. Jerry Jones added, “Not at all.”
“I don’t want to get on their bad side,” Jerry Jones said. “I’m sorry if they’re mad. But, boy, I’ll tell you what, we’ve had it happen to us a bunch of times. It [was] traded right out from under us.”
Jerry Jones explained that the Cowboys traded up one spot in round one with the Dolphins to avoid being jumped by someone else for safety Caleb Downs. That’s how the draft works. All’s fair. There’s no reason for the Steelers to be upset. If they really wanted Lemon, they should have traded up to No. 19 or higher.
The draft is a free for all. A Battle Royale. Every team for itself. If you get jumped by a team that trades up, the last team to be pissed at is the team that traded down.
That’s how the draft goes. Anyone who thinks otherwise doesn’t understand how the draft works. And if Steelers owner Art Rooney II is upset with Jerry Jones, Rooney shouldn’t be.
Our guess, with all due respect to the report that the Steelers are upset, is that the Steelers are embarrassed by the fact that their effort to draft Lemon became a public spectacle. But they aren’t — and shouldn’t be — upset with the Cowboys for exercising their absolute right to trade down.
