The Jacksonville Jaguars released Leonard Fournette on Monday, a guy coming off a season in which he ran for 1,152 yards and caught 76 passes for 522 yards. He was the fourth overall pick in the 2017 draft and entering the final year of his rookie deal after Duuuuval decided not to pick up his fifth-year option.

Why would they do this?

Combination of things.

Fournette has had some injuries, he’s been fined and criticized by the team, and suspended for fighting Buffalo’s Shaq Lawson. He had a 2019 arrest for driving with a suspended license and I guess the Jags were just sick of dealing with him, so they decided to move on. They traded Yannick Ngakoue to Minnesota over the weekend, so it would seem like they’re just cleaning out some of these guys with whom they have frayed relationships.

This would seem to sum it up:


Jacksonville said they tried to trade Fournette, which means they either asked too much or nobody was interested. That seems weird considering that he was only due $4 million in salary before becoming a free agent, so you’d think at least one team would give up a late-round pick for a one-year Fournette rental. He doesn’t technically hit the waiver wire until 4 p.m., so a last-minute trade is not out of the question.

Anyway, this is what the Eagles are looking at right now in the RB department:

  1. Miles Sanders (currently dealing with an injury)
  2. Boston Scott
  3. Corey Clement
  4. Elijah Holyfield/Michael Warren/Adrian Killins

Right now Holyfield seems like the fourth guy, while one of Killins or Warren could go on the practice squad.

But Fournette does fill a position of need. The Eagles still don’t have a downhill tackle breaker, nobody who can do what Jordan Howard was doing before he got injured last season. Miles Sanders can do a lot of things, but the consensus among fans seems to be “let’s not kill him by running him through the A Gap on 2nd and goal if we don’t have to.” (also consider the Birds are down two starting linemen)

The other thing is that Fournette isn’t going to get the same volume of touches here as he did in Jacksonville. He’s technically in a contract year, so maybe he’s looking to showcase himself in a new city to land that big-money deal in 2021. If he’s splitting reps with Sanders in Philadelphia, I don’t know if he achieves that goal, and the Eagles don’t pay running backs the way other teams do anyway. Historically they use their cap to maximize other positions of need.

It’s an interesting thought, Fournette in Philadelphia, and while he’d be a nice fit on this team, he’s traditionally not the type of player they would go for. Therefore, we set the odds of Leonard Fournette to the Philadelphia Eagles at +5000.

I think we all know who is keeping a close eye on Fournette right now: