One of the more impressive streaks in the NFL came to an end on Monday night when former Eagle Malcolm Jenkins was taken off the field in the third quarter against the Chargers.
On that play in the third quarter, the Chargers faced a 3rd-and-1 from the Saints’ 49-yard line so the Saints had just three defensive backs on the field. Jenkins wasn’t one of them.
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Why not?
“Ahh, you gotta ask (Saints defensive coordinator) Dennis Allen about that,” Jenkins said to the Associated Press. “It was a package that I just wasn’t in. I take a lot of pride in being available and being on the field as much as possible. But it made me feel a lot better that we won the game.”
Yeah, eventually the Saints beat the Chargers 30-27 in overtime and Jenkins played 70 of 71 defensive snaps.
Jenkins’ incredible streak began with the 2017 playoff run. Jenkins played just a handful of snaps in that 2017 regular season finale against the Cowboys but then played every defensive snap in that Super Bowl run and didn’t miss one until Monday. That’s pretty incredible.
NFL
During his six years with the Eagles, including playoffs, Jenkins played a total of 6,818 defensive snaps out of 6,909, an incredible 98.7 percent.
2014: 1,153/1,158
2015: 1,214/1,216
2016: 1,019/1,020
2017: 948/1,031 — 206/206
2018: 1,039/1,039 — 141/141
2019: 1,034/1,034 — 64/64
"I'm blessed, to be honest," Jenkins said after the 2018 season. "There's not really much I can take credit for. This game has a 100 percent injury rate. Everyone that plays this game will be hurt at some point in time. And so for me to be as available as I've been since putting on this Eagle uniform, it's one of those things, I've been blessed to have that. Obviously, I take care of my body to make sure I'm available, but there's some things that are unavoidable. I consider myself to be blessed."