NFC Notes: Jayden Daniels, Ezekiel Elliott, Commanders, Cowboys, Eagles

Commanders

Mike Sando of The Athletic cites an anonymous NFL executive who believes what the Commanders do in next year’s offseason will be the determining factor in Jayden Daniels‘ success. 

“When you take a quarterback, you can draft a bunch of players to support him, but sometimes it is hard when you are forcing it,” an executive said. “What they do next offseason to really make this quarterback successful will be interesting.”

Another executive thinks OC Kliff Kingsbury‘s offense will benefit Daniels. 

“The way the offensive coordinator (Kliff Kingsbury) will use the skill players is going to help the quarterback and prevent him from having to put it all on his shoulders,” an executive said. “From the quick-game stuff to the RPO stuff and things you saw in Arizona with Kyler Murray, you will see some of those things bleed into what Jayden Daniels is going to do.”

Cowboys

Cowboys QB Dak Prescott is “super excited” to have Ezekiel Elliott back on the team given he brings leadership to their locker room. 

“Super excited. Just obviously knowing our history, my experience with him as a brother, but, in this case, as a teammate, understanding what he brings to the team,” Prescott said, via Lawrence Dowe of the Star-Telegram. “Just the locker room alone, the culture he sets, a guy that does everything the right way from, from the locker room to the field.”

Prescott said Elliott is a fun person to be around, but he also turns up the focus and intensity when needed. 

“He’s honest, what you see is what you get as I said, he can have fun when it’s time, but when it’s time to be serious and lock in, there’s nobody better than him,” said Prescott, “Just to be able to bring the fun to the locker room, but in the same sense you see that and be able to separate that moment you walk on the field to see his focus, to see his intensity, to see the way that he practiced as I said every young guy should follow, the way that he goes about his business on the field.”

Prescott is confident Elliott will be beneficial for their younger running backs on the roster. 

“You add a guy like Zeke, to a room that has a lot of depth in that sense, obviously, it’s a young group,” said Prescott. “But I think that’s the benefit of adding a guy like Zeke and what he can bring to that, what he can just give those guys for their career, the way that they can approach it, that’s going to speed that process up for them.”

Eagles

When appearing on the Rich Eisen Show, Eagles GM Howie Roseman was asked about taking CBs Quinyon Mitchell and Cooper DeJean with back-to-back picks. He said he didn’t target cornerbacks specifically and felt they were the best players available. 

“We don’t change our evaluations based on need, and I think with the way the board fell, with the offensive players going, with the quarterbacks going, it fell nicely for us,” Roseman said. “We felt like we were going to sit and get a pretty good player.”

As for whether they considered moving up, Roseman said it didn’t make sense for them to give away draft capital. 

“It didn’t make a lot of sense for us to move up and use draft capital to do it,” Roseman said.