Opening remarks: "Alright, I am not going to go through all the picks here. However, we ended up with eight picks on the last couple of days here, draft picks. Obviously, we made a trade for (CB) Ellis Hobbs which gives us some depth at the cornerback position. Ellis led the National Football league in kickoff returns and also has been a starting corner for the New England Patriots for the last three years so we got a good, quality player there. You can't have enough corners in this league. So we wanted to make sure we addressed that and brought in a veteran player. This does not have anything to do with (CB) Sheldon's (Brown) situation or anything else. We don't even need to go there with that. This a quality player that we had an opportunity to get so we chose to do so. With that, I will turn it over to you."
On how the Eagles were able to acquire Hobbs: "Well I was in communication with (New England Patriots head coach) Bill (Belichick) during the draft as we were with everybody. I end up calling around to talk to everybody and I needed another corner and the board did not fall to where I was satisfied with what was there, so I went in this direction with Ellis. Again, he is a really good player."
On who the starting corner backs are now:"Well, we'll see when everything works out but I feel like I've got three solid starters and I know (CB) Joselio (Hanson) can step in there and also start. He hasn't had to do that but I know that he can. So I think we have four solid corners and some young guys that will work for positions after that."
On whether acquiring Hobbs makes a trade more likely with Sheldon Brown: "I'm not even going to go into all that. I am not entertaining that right now. Sheldon's on this football team."
On how CB Jack Ikegwuonu fits into the depth at the cornerback position: "Jack is coming off the major knee (surgery). He has been doing the offseason program and it looks like he has a chance. He is a little bit rusty right now but he is working his tail off so we will add him into the mix."
On whether Ikegwuonu will be at this weekend's mini camp: "Yes he will."
On whether he will contact Sheldon Brown, explaining the acquisition of Hobbs:"Well I am not going to go through and call every player here. I can't do that. He knows he is on the team so I don't feel it is necessary to do that."
On whether there is a chance Brown will play safety: "No, that's not the direction that I am going in."
On where fifth round draft pick CB Victor Harris will play:"Well you know what, he is unique because he is a football player. This kid, I don't know if you guys have had a chance to talk to him, he loves to play the game and he plays it very well. Now, his 40 (yard dash) time and all that didn't work out all-that well. I just took him because you can put him at safety or corner and he makes plays. He plays so smart, so instinctive, and with so much energy. He is kind of fun to watch."
On whether they felt the 5th round of the draft was the strongest part since they had as many as six 5th round picks at one point today: "It sure looked that way didn't it? You can move around and do some things. We ended up starting the day with five picks in next year so I wanted to make sure we worked ourselves into something worth you guys showing up next year to do this press conference. So we ended up trading back and ended up with eight picks next year."
On how they evaluated fifth round pick TE Cornelius Ingram's blocking ability:"What we actually looked at was his spring practice and we looked at him in the time that he played last year, not this past season but the year before. He looked like he could handle it. It didn't look awkward. I'm not going to tell you that he is heavy in the tail there where he is going to be knocking guys five yards off the ball but he looked like he was adequate at it. I think what you get with him is a very athletic receiving tight end who can pull the zone on the line of scrimmage."
On whether he has thought of using Ingram in the Wildcat formation since he used to play QB: "I really hadn't thought of that. That's not where I was going with him but if we do that I'll give you the credit."
On whether he is satisfied with where his tight ends are right now:"I am. I think (TE) (Brent) Celek is a very good player. I think we saw that last year, especially the last half of last year. I have no problem with him being a starter and other guys competing with him to win that position."
On whether the new options at returner allow WR DeSean Jackson to focus on playing WR: "Well, we'll see. We will see how good they are. I don't want to exclude him from that. He will continue to work there. I do think it gives us the flexibility to move him as we go. We'll just see how the other guys do."
On who the starting kick/punt returners will be: "Well, we will go in with the guys who started last year and really we don't have a game for a couple of months so we will see how they do. I want to see what they do here. I haven't seen that far."
On whether S Quintin Demp's role in the secondary would keep him from kick returns:"With both of them. If the other guys aren't starting and they have made the team and they are good enough then I would let the other guys do it. I wouldn't have any problem with that."
On whether he is content with the defense: "I think we have competition there and I think that's important as long as there is good competition. As long as the players are good, I want to create some competition and I think we have done that. I thought we needed to bring in some offensive players so that was the direction we went. I'm not going to say I am content with anything until the season is over and then I will be able to answer that. Right now I just want to put as much competition with as many good players as we can. I think that strengthens you as a football team."
On whether he has talked to QB Donovan McNabb about the draft:"Yeah, we did. He is excited about it."
On why he felt they had to address the offense: "We lost some people. We had some people that were a little bit older and then we lost some people in free agency. I just thought we needed to fill in those spots without forcing something; try to fill in those spots. I told you before (WR Jeremy) Maclin I had no idea he would be there. That wasn't something that we had targeted strategically or planned to get him. That's not what that was. He just happened to fall and we thought he was the best player on the board at that time and tried to stay as disciplined with that as we could."
On whether McNabb is happy with the way things have been going this offseason: "Yeah, I don't know I didn't ask him. He was very interested in the draft which he is every year. This is no different than it is any other year. We talked during the draft."
On whether he considers age when drafting players:"I look at it more if they're 25-plus as opposed to 20. You do want some form of maturity when you come in here especially as a number one pick. However, I can't say I look at how young they are as opposed to, you get some of these guys that are a little bit older. You try to figure that out; how that works in. If they're 25 years old, five years, that's what you have there. That's what you look at."
On whether he is happy with how the offseason has been going: "I think it's gone well. I want to see how these kids function in our system. I don't want to criticize these guys before we see how they perform. On paper, it looks good. It's important that we gel together as a football team. You have to go through that whole training camp experience and you have to keep the injuries out of the picture. See how these young guys grow in our system."
On whether there is anything that would lead him to believe that McNabb won't be at mini camp:"No."
On whether this draft was all about value: "Value, quality of the player and what kind of people they are; all those things go into the evaluation. I think it was a solid draft. The group of players presented you with a solid draft. Enough guys there to draft with. However, I don't think you had that number of great players, what people consider great players like you might have in past years. Although they might turn out that way. I think the players were a little more condensed and you had a bigger volume of them where you didn't have the separation. It allowed you to trade down and get all those nice fifth round picks."
On whether he cared what tight end they got or whether Ingram was the guy they wanted all along even though they got him after trading down: "We cared. I knew it was deep enough where we could do that (trade down)."
On what he knows about Ingram's knee and the kind of examination they gave him:"We think we did a fairly thorough job of examining him and it looks like he's healthy and ready to go. Our (doctors) felt real good about it, our trainers felt good about it. We watched him run around and do the cuts that we're going to ask him to do and he seemed to do that. We'll see how he's able to do with the pounding day after day. We'll monitor that. I think when you meet him you'll get the feeling that he'll take care of himself. He'll make sure that he's in there getting rehab on it; doing everything possible that he can do. He's a real responsible kid so I don't think it will be a problem. I think he should be okay there."
On WR Brandon Gibson and his last year at Washington State: "I don't want to say too much before they get here. I thought he was one of the better route runners in this draft. I don't worry about the numbers there, I just kind of look and make sure that he can catch and he can run a route and he's a decent kid. I think if you look at him in the bowl games, one-on-one competitions, you can see that. When he was against good competition you saw that. I thought he was a very good football player."
On whether WR DeSean Jackson's season last year raised the bar for what wideouts can do in his system:"I said this when we had (WR) Todd Pinkston. When you come in as a young guy, you have to be smart and sharp and obviously have the athletic ability to play the position. So much of it is being able to retain all those routes that we throw at you. (WR) Todd (Pinkston) was able to do it and then DeSean was able to do it. I think (WR) Jeremy (Maclin), he'll be able to do it too. He's a very intelligent guy."
On whether he thinks RB Brian Westbrook's offseason surgery will have any impact on his involvement in mini camp: "I don't. We'll see; we'll see how he does. Right now I don't see that. He's working his tail off; rehabbing and everything. It looks like he's in great shape."
On whether he expects Sheldon Brown to attend mini camp: "Yeah, I expect him. I expect (CB) Sheldon (Brown) to be here."
