Brett Toth

NFC East Notes: WFT, Quinn, Cooper

By Rory Parks | at January 30, 2022 11:29 am

The Washington Football Team moniker will soon be a thing of the past. As Nicki Jhabvala of the Washington Post tweeted earlier this month, WFT’s new name and “brand identity” will be revealed on The Today Show on February 2. During its two years as the Washington Football Team, the franchise put together a 14-19 regular season record, though it did capture the NFC East title in 2020 and came close to defeating the eventual-Super Bowl champion Buccaneers in last year’s wildcard round.

As we get set to usher in a new era of football in the nation’s capital — or at least a differently-named era — let’s take a look at some other NFC East items:

• Cowboys defensive coordinator Dan Quinn was the hottest name in this year’s head coaching cycle, but it appears the job he really wanted was the Giants‘ HC gig, per Ryan Dunleavy of the New York Post (via Twitter). When Quinn realized that Big Blue had narrowed its search to Brian Daboll and Brian Flores — the post ultimately went to Daboll — he withdrew his name from HC consideration and signed an extension with Dallas shortly thereafter.
• There has been a fair amount of speculation about WR Amari Cooper‘s future with the Cowboys, speculation that ramped up following some of owner Jerry Jones‘ recent comments on the matter. While the club could save $16MM in cap space by cutting the 27-year-old wideout before his $20MM base salary for 2022 becomes fully-guaranteed on the fifth day of the league year in March, Aaron Wilson of Pro Football Network says that most sources he has spoken with expect Dallas to retain Cooper.
• Eagles TE Tyree Jackson, a former collegiate QB who also spent some time in the XFL, saw action in nine games for Philadelphia in 2021, and in the club’s regular season finale, he secured three catches for 22 yards and his first NFL touchdown. Unfortunately, he also tore his ACL in that game, and as Tom Pelissero of the NFL Network tweets, Jackson recently underwent successful ACL reconstruction surgery. The Eagles have high hopes for the 24-year-old, who — depending on how his recovery goes — could operate as their TE2 in 2022.
• In addition to Jackson, Eagles OL Brett Toth, who signed with Philadelphia as a UDFA in 2020 after receiving late permission from the U.S. Army to join the NFL, has also gone under the knife. Toth announced on Instagram (via Jeff McLane of the Philadelphia Inquirer on Twitter) that he recently had knee surgery that would require nine months of recovery. That timeline obviously puts the start of the 2022 season in jeopardy, if Toth is even on the roster at that point.