Eagles roster: Reed Blankenship, Azeez Olujari, Ty Robinson underrated on Philadelphia

Dynasties in sports are funny things.

Back at the turn of the millennium, it looked for all the world that the “Greatest Show on Turf” St. Louis Rams would be the NFL’s next big thing with their win over the Tennessee Titans in Super Bowl XXXIV on January 30, 2000, and their return to the big game two seasons later. Unfortunately for them, the Rams ran into an unexpected two-touchdown underdog in the New England Patriots, and that Tom Brady guy.

With that, the NFL’s future turned on its head for the next two decades.

We all know that on February 9, 2025, the Kansas City Chiefs were on the precipice of becoming the first team to win three straight NFL championships since the 1965-1967 Green Bay Packers. Then, they got themselves bombed by the Eagles, especially Vic Fangio’s defense — a unit that pressured Patrick Mahomes ceaselessly without blitzing once.

The 40-22 final score was not at all indicative of how the Eagles beat up on the Chiefs in Super Bowl LIX — Kansas City scored two touchdowns a 1:06 late fourth-quarter stretch, and you could take the 40-6 score before them as the true measure of Philly’s dominance.

So, maybe these Eagles are the NFL’s next dynasty? On paper, the prospects look good.

In Howie Roseman, the franchise has a general manager so adept, other GMs get nervous when his name pops up on the Caller ID. In Nick Sirianni, there’s a head coach who has learned to balance his prickliness with the need to relate to people in meaningful ways. And in defensive coordinator Vic Fangio, there’s the best and most important assistant coach in the league.

Quarterback Jalen Hurts has transcended many of the early bumps that defined his career for a while. And while regression to the mean tells us that we probably can’t expect another historic season like the Eagles got out of Saquon Barkley in 2024, it certainly helps that Barkley will be running once again behind the NFL’s best offensive line.

The defense is getting younger… and quite possibly better. Last season, it was linebacker Zach Baun who was the primary beneficiary of Fangio’s genius. Now, Fangio has two prominent and fascinating tools to play with in first-round linebacker Jihaad Campbell…

…and second-round safety Andrew Mukuba.

If these Eagles are to become the gold standard for the NFL in the 2025 season and beyond, here are three guys who will help them do it. In the continuation of our “Hidden Gems” series, we take a deep dive on one underrated veteran, one underrated free-agent signing, and one underrated draft pick.

Fly, Eagles, Fly? It certainly looks that way.

Underrated Eagles veteran: Safety Reed Blankenship

Middle Tennessee State has been a bit of an unheralded Defensive Back University in recent years, considering that both Kevin Byard and Charvarius Ward went there. The latest in this line of Blue Raiders DBs who have gone on to NFL success is Reed Blankenship, the 2022 undrafted free agent who spent his first NFL season as a role player fighting for time on the field, his second as a somewhat overwhelmed starter in coverage, and his third as one of the glue guys in an Eagles defense that did the most to present Philadelphia with its second Super Bowl championship.

In 2024, Blankenship thrived under Vic Fangio as so many of Fangio’s players did. He allowed 39 catches on 48 targets for 423 yards, 144 yards after the catch, one touchdown, four interceptions, two pass breakups, and an opponent passer rating of 75.6. Blankenship also had 77 solo tackles and 20 stops, but it was his coverage that really stood out for the first time. Over and over last season, Blenkenship’s ability to read quarterback intentions had him in the right place to come diving in for interceptions that those quarterbacks did not expect.

“It’s amazing how all three of his picks have looked the same,” Fangio said of Blankenship last November, back when Blankenship had just three interceptions. “He’s done a good job. He quarterbacks the secondary, leads the communication between them and the linebackers. So, he’s very, very valuable.”

Valuable on the field, and a bargain as well. Blankenship signed a one-year, $3.575 million contract extension before the 2024 season which keeps him on the roster through 2025. With C.J. Gardner-Johnson off to Houston in the Kenyon Green deal, and second-round pick Andrew Mukuba learning Fangio’s defense, it’ll be up to Blankenship more than ever to hold things together in the deep third.

Which he has learned to do with authority.

Underrated Eagles free-agent signing: EDGE Azeez Ojulari

The recent trade of edge-rusher Bryce Huff to the San Francisco 49ers reflects that even when the Eagles get a free-agent signing wrong, they’re generally smart enough to punt on the thing once the fit isn’t obvious, and move on to the next. That seems obvious, but more NFL teams than not will go with the sunk-cost fallacy and hold on to their mistakes when they really shouldn’t.

With that trade, Brandon Graham’s retirement, and Josh Sweat joining the Arizona Cardinals on a fairly massive contract, the idea is for that edge group to get younger and more athletic. There are already edge-rushers with a ton of potential — Nolan Smith and Jalyx Hunt are the names to know there — and the team added some real burst in the person of former New York Giants second-round pick Azeez Ojulari with a one-year, $3 million contract. Not a bad deal for a guy who had seven sacks and 22 total pressures last season on just 196 pass-rushing snaps.

Ojulari had his best season in 2021, his rookie campaign, when he totaled 10 sacks and 42 total pressures. Injuries affected his potential in 2022 and 2023, and by 2024, he was the odd man out behind Kayvon Thibodeaux and Brian Burns. But when Thibodeaux suffered a wrist injury in Week 5, Ojulari got his shot, and he made the most of it.

Ojulari made my Midseason All-Underrated Defense as a result. At 6’3” and 240 pounds, Ojulari wins more with speed and the ability to jump gaps than with pure power, but he can work his quickness into leverage when it’s needed.

Unfortunately, Ojulari suffered a toe injury in November that put him on injured reserve, and he didn’t play after Week 12. The injury history is why he was available on a lowball one-year deal, but if he can stay healthy, Ojulari has a lot to add to Philly’s pass rush. He’s proven that already.

“We obviously know him well with us playing the Giants twice each season,” Roseman said of Ojulari in late March. “He played at Georgia, and we’ve got a bunch of guys from there who have played well for us. Azeez fits in right away. He’s got the ability to rush the passer, he has a lot of the physical and intangible traits that we look for, and we’re excited to bring him here and hopefully help him play his best football.”

Underrated Eagles draft pick: DI Ty Robinson

If you evaluate draft prospects from year to year, there are always those guys whose draft positions drastically undersell their collegiate performance and NFL potential. One of those prospects in the 2025 class for me was unquestionably Nebraska’s Ty Robinson, who put up six sacks, 41 total pressures, 25 solo tackles, 28 stops, and seven tackles for loss in his sixth season with the Cornhuskers. Robinson then went to the scouting combine and put on an athletic show, which made me wonder all the more why and how he lasted all the way to the 111th overall pick in the fourth round, which is where the Eagles absolutely stole him.

Robinson measured 6’ 5⅛” and 288 pounds at the combine; he played with more of a 300-pound frame, and he did just about everything from just about every gap.

Two sacks and 13 total pressures came from Robinson’s 204 pass-rushing snaps at nose tackle.
Four sacks and 18 total pressures came from Robinson’s 240 pass-rushing snaps at three-tech defensive tackle.
No sacks and nine total pressures came from Robinson’s 154 snaps as an edge defender.

Maybe it was Robinson’s age (he turned 24 on May 3) that had him dropping in this draft; perhaps it was the all-time nature of the interior defensive lineman class. Or it could be that some NFL teams didn’t see the fit with Robinson’s particular size criteria. But the Eagles, who need to replace Milton Williams, probably saw Robinson as a like-as-like fit. When Williams came out of Louisiana Tech in the 2021 draft, he was 6’3” and 284 pounds — another hybrid defender who absolutely demolished the combine. If the Eagles saw the similarities… well, I would not disagree. The Eagles put Williams more at three-tech than anywhere else (90% of his snaps last season), and Robinson could find himself with similarly effective placement.

“I mean, it doesn’t take long to put on the tape to like Ty Robinson,” Roseman said of his newest defensive lineman. “He’s got quickness, he can work edges, he’s strong with his hands, he’s got great elite character. He’s a Philly kind of player, so again, he was a guy that we really were targeting yesterday at 96. We woke up and was really hoping that he was there at our pick, and that was one we weren’t considering trading back from.”

So, the Eagles got their guy in this case, and this could be yet another instance in which Howie got it right, and everyone else will be left to wonder how.