Motivated Devin White is Exactly What the Eagles Need
PHILADELPHIA – This is it for Devin White, a chance to redeem himself.
Second chances aren’t easy to come by, but as a fifth overall selection in 2019, it is easier to get another chance or two to prove you still have game.
White will get his second chance this season with the Philadelphia Eagles.
It could be just the motivator he needs to regain the form he flashed in 2020 when he was an AP second-team All-Pro and in 2021 when he made the Pro Bowl. He was a double-digit tackler for three straight seasons, making 140 tackles four years ago, followed by seasons of 128 and 124.
The cynic will say that shows a decline in production. Tackles are a subjective statistic, to be sure, but there could be something to the decline discussion coming off a year in which he made just 84 tackles while battling injury. He was eventually replaced in the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ starting lineup.
Devin White Ed Kracz/SI Eagles Today
It is just those two things that could serve as motivation for White, and a motivated White could be a very good thing for an Eagles linebacker group that, once again, is being pieced together.
Another motivator is his contract. Still just 26, he is on a one-year prove-it deal with a guaranteed salary of $2.5 million. If he wants to keep playing in this league and make the kind of money befitting of a top-five draft pick, this is the time to do.
Great things can often be born out of desperation, and desperation is how White has to view this season.
He gave his take on a one-year deal when he talked to reporters nearly two months ago.
“It’s an opportunity to go show why I was drafted top five,” he said, “why I helped a team win a Super Bowl, and obviously just prove I do what I do. I don’t lack any confidence as far as being on a one-year deal. I didn’t shy away from it. I think it was the best thing that happened.
“Like, ‘Hey, last year wasn’t who you were,’ that’s never been Devin White on tape just dealing with everything I dealt with. Now you get an opportunity on an even bigger stage. It’s a bigger platform here. I think it’s a better all-around team built right here, right now to go do great things and I want to be a part of that.”
The Eagles think White is a better option at this point than, say, Zach Cunningham, who played well for them a season ago and remains a free agent, and they may very well be right if White uses his one-year deal as motivation.