Good thing, because the Birds have basically nothing in the secondary heading into Sunday’s game in New Orleans.

Doug Pederson told media today that the second-year corner is currently listed as “day to day” –

“Optimistic that he’ll play, so we’re going to see at the end of the day how he does and go from there.”

Jones’ presumed return, coupled with a somewhat healthy Corey Graham, would at least let the Eagles roll out something like this on Sunday:

  • outside corner: Sidney Jones
  • outside corner: Rasul Douglas
  • slot corner: Avonte Maddox
  • strong safety: Malcolm Jenkins
  • free safety: Corey Graham

You could play that as your nickel package and drop Maddox back to safety in the base defense if you really like him there, which they seem to.

Doug was also asked if he wants to see Jones working on the outside in practice this week:

“I think we’ll see him in both spots. Avonte has done a nice job in the nickel, and he’ll probably continue to work in there. We’ll just ease Sidney back in today and see what he can do.”

That probably makes the most sense, I guess. They didn’t draft Jones to be a slot corner, he just ended up there as a Patrick Robinson replacement this season because the Eagles liked what they had on the outside with Ronald Darby and Jalen Mills. Without either of those guys in the picture, this is an opportunity to play Jones where he played as a college standout.

Pederson also offered updates on the following players:

  • DT Tim Jernigan: day-to-day, “optimistic, but we’ll see.”
  • TE Richard Rodgers: optimistic that he will return this week, also day-to-day
  • TE Joshua Perkins: “has a knee injury and is going to miss substantial time.”
  • RB Darren Sproles: will “continue to rehab and train and get healthy”

There wasn’t much else to take home from the presser. Jeff McLane over at the Inquirer always seems to have a somewhat contentious and/or interesting exchange with Doug, at least one per week, and this probably qualifies:

Q. When you’re meeting (with Carson Wentz), what are some of those discussions about? What are you guys going over? 

DOUG PEDERSON: We talk a lot about hunting, fishing, dinner, and then a little football [joking]. I mean, come on. We talk about football. We talk about plays. We talk about personnel. We talk about situational ball. Just game situations. Just talk ball.

Q. Has he expressed any frustration in the fact that here he is progressing rapidly in year three and you guys haven’t been able to capitalize on that?

DOUG PEDERSON: No, no he’s not. In fact, he’s probably the first one to tell you that he’ll take ownership when there is a mistake made at his position obviously…”

You know, hunting, fishing, dinner, typical head coach and quarterback talk. It’s not an unfair question, the coach just isn’t gonna give you anything when you ask it.