Saquon Barkley is a student of the game. And this offseason, his studies led him to Todd Gurley.<\/p>\n
When Barkley found out the Eagles hired offensive coordinator Sean Mannion to bring a Shanahan-style offense to Philadelphia, he wanted to watch running backs who have had success in that scheme. There aren\u2019t many better examples than Gurley.<\/p>\n
So Barkley sent Gurley a clip on Instagram and the two were able to connect.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s a lot of guys that do it in the system right now but one guy that I\u2019ve been focused on and talked to him a little bit over Instagram, Todd Gurley,\u201d Barkley said at OTAs on Wednesday. \u201cWatching his film. Obviously, it\u2019s a little bit different but the big years he had when he was playing, when he was healthy, the way that he attacked it.\u201d<\/p>\n
While Gurley\u2019s career was far too short, he was incredible at his peak. And his best seasons came under Sean McVay with the Los Angeles Rams in 2017 and 2018, when McVay took over as head coach and Mannion was still a backup quarterback.<\/p>\n
Gurley was an All Pro in 2017 and 2018 and put up gaudy numbers. In 29 games over those two seasons, Gurley rushed for 2,556 yards with 30 touchdowns and had another 123 catches for 1,368 yards and 10 more receiving touchdowns. He had nearly 4,000 scrimmage yards and 40 touchdowns in those two seasons before his knees began to fail him.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was a big fan of Todd when I was coming up,\u201d said Barkley, who was drafted in 2018. Barkley clearly regrets that he never got to play against Gurley.<\/p>\n
While the Eagles would probably prefer to be coy about the changes coming to their offense in 2026, it\u2019s going to be awfully hard to conceal their plans because there are obvious staples in this brand of offense.<\/p>\n
Even though there\u2019s going to be some sort of \u201cblend\u201d of old and new, we\u2019re expecting to see the elements of this style of offense that has taken the NFL by storm. One of those key elements is under-center usage, which is expected to see a big uptick in Philly this season.<\/p>\n
What are the advantages for a running back when the QB is under center?<\/p>\n
\u201cUnder center you can see a little clearer. You\u2019re not blinded,\u201d Barkley said. \u201cWhen you\u2019re in gun, you\u2019re really kind of focused on this side. You\u2019re able to get your shoulders square easier. I don\u2019t know if y\u2019all know what that means. Like if you have an inside run, from guy you gotta really work on getting your shoulder square so you can see the whole field. From under center, it\u2019s easier. You can get downhill a little quicker.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cYou can threaten them with stretches and outside zone a lot more. There\u2019s a lot of unique things you can do. It\u2019s not no secret what this system is about. Look forward to doing that. It\u2019s probably the most I have ever done it, under center too, outside zone and all that stuff. It\u2019s a challenge I\u2019m looking forward to working on and getting better at and trying to be the best at it.\u201d<\/p>\n
After one of the best rushing seasons in NFL history in 2024, Barkley\u2019s 2025 was not nearly as good. He still rushed for over 1,100 yards and was productive, but it wasn\u2019t the same.<\/p>\n
While a lot of that drop-off seemed to stem from the health and play of the offensive line in front of him, Barkley has consistently taken ownership. He did it again on Wednesday as he looked back at last season.<\/p>\n
\u201cObviously, we don\u2019t like the way the season ended,\u201d Barkley said. \u201cI personally don\u2019t like how my year went. I don\u2019t like how I performed for the team. I don\u2019t feel like I performed at a high enough level. And that\u2019s the beauty of it. It\u2019s easy when you rush for all these yards and you win a Super Bowl, it\u2019s easy to watch film and move on to the next chapter. But when it doesn\u2019t go the way you want it to be, you gotta lock in even more, be more detailed in yourself, be more critical of yourself.\u201d<\/p>\n
The one silver lining of an early playoff exit is that the Eagles\u2019 season ended on Jan. 11. That gave Barkley an extra month to recover and he\u2019s feeling fresh this spring.<\/p>\n
When asked what specific element he really wanted to improve from last season, Barkley pointed at his playmaking ability. He just wants to be a bigger playmaker for the Eagles in 2026.<\/p>\n
Maybe the new scheme will help him get there with a little assist from Gurley.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Saquon Barkley is a student of the game. And this offseason, his studies led him to Todd Gurley.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":206716,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[6107,69,71,70],"class_list":["post-206715","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-philadelphia","tag-eagles-blog","tag-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia-headlines","tag-philadelphia-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206715","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=206715"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206715\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/206716"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=206715"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=206715"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=206715"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}