Quinyon Mitchell Is Already 1 Of The Best Corners In The NFL

We knew the Eagles struck gold when Quinyon Mitchell fell to them on draft night. It did not seem likely the Senior Bowl standout would be there for them, but the board that night could not have broken better for the Eagles. Offensive players kept getting picked, and the top defenders kept falling. By the time the Eagles were up at pick 22, they had their choice of corner, and they wisely took Mitchell.

Everyone thought it was an HR pick. But what we did not know, is how good it would be year 1. It is reasonable to give an adjustment period to any rookie, especially a rookie corner. Few come into the NFL and immediately live up to being a 1st round draft pick. But Mitchell is not only doing that, he is already establishing himself as 1 of the best corners in the league.

Look no further than the Thursday Night game vs the Commanders if you need proof of that. Terry McLaurin looked like a top 5 WR. His 711 yards put him 3rd in the league, and his 6 TDs put him 4th. Well on Thursday night he had just 1 catch for 10 yards, and it did not come against Mitchell.

Mitchell held him to 0 targets in his 20 snaps lined up against McLaurin. Not 0 catches, 0 targets. Daniels couldn't even try to get the ball to McLaurin. He obviously wanted to. McLaurin is the rookie's number 1 option. But Mitchell's coverage was just too sticky, and he hung around right in the hip of McLaurin all night long.

Dave Zangaro from NBC Sports Philly joined The Best Show Ever the next day and talked to Ricky and Tyrone about 1 particular play where Mitchell's coverage on McLaurin stuck out.

"The one play that really stood out to me was to go and find the Brandon Graham stack because Jayden Daniels wanted so badly to throw that football to Terry McLaurin and he just couldn't. Quinyon Mitchell just stayed in his hip the entire way through a double move. He's unbelievable right now. He's is putting these good receivers in torture chambers for entire football games."

But this was nothing new for Mitchell. He has been battling elite WRs all year long, and doing the same thing. He has not allowed more than 25 yards in a game since the week 5 bye. He gave up just 1 catch for 5 yards to Cee Dee Lamb, 2 catches for 16 yards to Ja'Marr Chase, 1 catch for 10 yards to Amari Cooper, 2 catches for 19 yards to Mike Evans, and 1 catch for 5 yards to Drake London.

Per Next Gen Stats, he is allowing .5 yards per coverage snap, the 2nd best number among qualified corners in the league.

So you would think he would be in the DROY conversation. Thursday night did help his case. He went from +1600 to win it, to +300, the 2nd best odds as of writing this piece. But Jared Verse of the Rams is still the favorite at -250.

Mitchell's problem is going to be that all of these awards are stat-based, and he just doesn't have the stats. 0 interceptions in 10 games. But that is not because Mitchell is lacking in some skill, teams are just paying him the ultimate respect you can pay to a corner, they aren't targeting him.

He has been targeted a grand total of 18 times since the bye week. Again, that is while often being lined up against very good WRs. He drew McLaurin for most of the night, and they just didn't look his way.

It is impossible to get an interception if they don't throw it your way. That is why Darrelle Revis, despite being one of the best Corners of his generation, does not have big interception numbers. There comes a point where you are so good, that you don't get interceptions.

Mitchell is at that point as a rookie. He is too good for his own good. It might keep him from earning the hardware, while Verse is able to rack up sacks, 4.5 so far.

That is nothing against Verse. He is having a great rookie season. There are things he does that do not show up in the stat sheet either. But he plays a position where if you play great, the stats come. Mitchell is playing one where the better you are, the fewer stats you have.

DROY or not, he is a star. Even in year 1, he is looking like 1 of the best corners in the league. Eagles fans have waited decades to have another young elite corner. Now they have 2.

We didn't even talk about Cooper DeJean, who has arguably made his own case to be in the DROY conversation. Dejean has been starting in the slot the last 6 games, and gave up only 161 yards in that time. His highlight came when he tracked down Ja'Marr Chase behind the LOS to get a stop on 4th down. But even with as great as DeJean has been, Mitchell stands out.

Where once there was Revis Island, there is now Quinyonomo Bay. Put whoever you want on his side of the field, they are not even seeing the ball. He has some of the best WRs in the league out there doing cardio. Now the rest of the league finally got to take notice of him playing on the National Stage.

Last week, after the Eagles crushed the Cowboys, we talked about how it was time to buy into the Eagles as the real deal. If you didn't buy it then, you will certainly have to now. While the Cowboys were a weak opponent, the Commanders are not. And they fairly easily beat who going into the week everyone claimed was the Eagles toughest test yet.

Related: It's Officially Time to Stop Doubting The Philadelphia Eagles

The game looked ugly for 3 quarters. The Eagles offense had a hard time getting going. Jake Elliott seems to have developed the yips. The refs missed multiple face masks and extended a Commanders drive with a phantom Pass Interference Call on Cooper DeJean.

But in the end, they pulled it together. They beat the Commanders, took a multi-game lead in the division, and improved to 8-2. The defense shut down what had been one of the most dominant offenses in the league. The offense scored 26 points despite the Elliott misses and the slow start. And they have now won 6 straight games, and have yet to lose a game where AJ Brown plays.

It is time to admit it. This team is very good. Not just in the mix good, but a true contender, up there with any other team in the league. You can no longer hide behind the argument that they haven't played anyone. They faced the test the Commanders offered and passed it with flying colors.

Still don't believe? Well this article is for you. Because these numbers will change your mind. Well 6 of them will. 1 of the 6 numbers is a real concern for them. But outside that one thing, there is a lot to love about this Eagles team.

Quinyon Mitchell is the real deal. He went up against Ja'Marr Chase and shut him down. He went up against Malik Nabers and shut him down. He went up against Cee Dee Lamb and shut him down. After all that, he got another tough matchup on a short week, drawing Terry McLaurin.

McLaurin came into the game as one of the most productive WRs in the game. 71.1 yards per game, 6 TDS, and 47 catches. He was a no-show against the Eagles. Mitchell put the clamp on him and held him to just 10 yards and 1 catch. But that catch did not come against Mitchell. On the night, Mitchell allowed a grand total of 0 catches.

How many elite WRs does Mitchell need to shut down before he is talked about as the Rookie of The Year? It may be a stat award, and he doesn't have the picks. but the only reason he doesn't have picks is he covers his WR so well opposing QBs don't even bother to throw his way. Mitchell is a true Super Star and proved it once again vs the Commanders.

But it was not just Quinyon who impressed. The whole defense deserves its kudos. They held the Commanders to just 264 yards. They came into the game averaging 377 yards per game, the 4th most in the league. That is 113 fewer yards than they averaged against the rest of the league. 

This Commanders' offense has been great. They were 4th in the league with 29 points per game. And the Eagles defense smothered them. It took a garbage time TD for the Commanders to make it a 1 score game. But for the vast majority of the game, they shut Jayden Daniels and the Commanders down. They have worked their way into being a top 5 defense in both yards allowed per game and points allowed per game. They shut down the run, they shut down the pass. Now, you can't even say it was a weak opponent because now they have done this to both the Bengals and the Commanders.

They have become elite on 3rd down. Last year they allowed the offense to convert 46.2% of 3rd downs. Nearly half. This year it was down to 35% coming into the game, and then they stopped them on 9 of the 12 3rd downs. A conversion rate of just 25% for the Commanders.

At one point the Commanders had the ball near the Red Zone, with it being 2nd and 1. The Eagles defense stuffed them twice to force 4th down, and then for good measure stuffed them on 4th down to preserve the lead. That is the type of stop we have not seen this Eagles defense make in a long time. But they make it regularly this year. Remember the 4th and 1 stop against the Bengals where Cooper DeJean stopped Ja'Marr Chase behind the line. This defense suddenly has a knack for this, when they were absolutely terrible at it all of last year. This is what championship defenses do. Right now, it is hard to argue that the Eagles don't have one of the best defenses in the league. It is young too. Be very excited Eagles fans.

Saquon Barkley was having trouble on the ground for most of the game. In his first 21 carries, he had just 73 yards. About 3.5 per carry. It was looking like a 2nd straight down game for the Eagles' star back. Keeping in mind that is a down game by his standards, which is still pretty good for most RBs.

But the magic of Barkley is how quickly a bad game can turn into a great 1. Because he finished with 146 yards on 26 carries. Meaning he had 73 yards on 5 carries to close out the game, with 2 of those carries finishing with a TD. That is 14.6 yards per carry on those final 5 touches. 5 important touches that helped turn a close game into a blowout.

Barkley is a true game-changer, in the sense he can change the entire game at any moment. He was struggling, but all it took was 2 explosive runs to completely change the course of not just his night, but the entire game itself.

There will be one negative stat because the Eagles have a Jake Elliott problem. He went 2-4 tonight, along with a missed Extra Point. It makes him 14 for 19 on the season (76.7%). He is now 0 for 3 on the season from 50+. They left 7 points on the board because he couldn't make what should be easy kicks.

What makes that so concerning is how automatic he has from 50+ in the last few seasons. 7 of 8 last year. 5 for 6 in 2022. 3 for 3 in 2021. In fact he missed just 2 all of last year from any distance and matched that number tonight. Maybe now we know why Sirianni didn't want to kick FGs against the Saints or Jags because based on what we have seen from Elliot so far, he is hard to trust.

Jalen Carter is a bonafide star. He did not get a sack last night, but honestly, who cares? What Carter is doing this year, and did last night, goes way beyond the box score. Just watch him for a drive, you will see him disrupting the offense nearly every down.

What makes that even more impressive? He played every snap. The Eagles defense was on the field for 66 snaps, and he played all 66. He had played 90% of the snaps in most of the games over this winning streak, but vs the Commanders he just stayed out there all game. Yet he didn't wane and was still making plays at the end of the game including blowing up multiple run plays. He is a huge reason why the Eagles got that stand from 2nd and 1 to a turnover on downs.

It is something to monitor. We saw him lose steam at the end of last season. It was at around this same time. Not saying he will lose steam again, so far he has passed every test with flying colors. But he is playing a lot of snaps, and that many snaps could wear down any player. We have not seen it take a toll on him yet though, and conditioning was something he focused on after his rookie season. if he can keep this up while playing this many snaps, we will be talking about him as 1 of the best players in the league.

Zack Baun might be the MVP of the team. What he has done for this defense can't be undervalued, and kudos to Vic Fangio for seeing this in a guy who until now had been a rotational pass rusher/ special teamer. He came into the game with 40 Stops. He added 6 more. Including that huge stop on 4th down that you could argue was the play of the game.

He also had a big pass breakup early, and 15 total tackles. Baun could genuinely be an All-Pro Linebacker this year. That is the level he is playing at. They went from having the worst LBs in 2023 to having one of the best ones this year. By the way, Nakobe Dean has been pretty great too. He added 10 tackles, and 5 stops of his own, plus a pass deflection. It sure is nice having LB be a strength of the team.