March 19, 2025
According to a report from ESPN, the Jacksonville Jaguars are signing former Philadelphia Eagles OT Fred Johnson.
Johnson has served as the team's swing tackle the last two seasons, and he started six games in 2024 — one game at RT in relief of Lane Johnson, 4 games at LT in relief of Jordan Mailata, and the meaningless Week 18 game against the Giants. PFF had Johnson down for eight sacks allowed, most on the team by a wide margin, on 482 snaps. He did have one very good game against Trey Hendrickson and the Cincinnati Bengals.
The Eagles very clearly have the best starting offensive tackle duo in the NFL in Jordan Mailata and Lane Johnson, but they are thin on depth at the bookend spots. Swing tackle is a sneaky important position, and one the Eagles feel likely to address in the draft. Fourth-year pro Darian Kinnard is probably the top in-house candidate to assume that role if not.
Financials for Johnson's deal are not yet known. On Monday, the Eagles signed edge defender Azeez Ojulari to a deal that should count toward the comp pick formula. If so, he would cancel out the sixth-round comp pick the Eagles were poised to gain for the loss of Isaiah Rodgers.
Johnson's deal would have to be somewhere in the ballpark of ohhhh, sayyyy, $3.5 million to count toward the comp pick formula at the seventh-round level, at which point he would cancel out Ojulari instead of Rodgers.
On the one hand, Johnson isn't worth $3.5 million, in my opinion, and when the financials aren't immediately disclosed it usually means it's a low-cost deal. On the other hand, the Jaguars are dumb and often hand out nonsensical contracts. So, we'll see.
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