Eagles general Howie Roseman appeared on Pro Football Talk's afternoon show "PFT Live" on Wednesday to discuss the results of the Eagles draft and the rest of a productive offseason for the team. Roseman was also asked about the status of Pro Bowl running back LeSean McCoy, who is set to enter to final year of his rookie contract this offseason. While not disclosing the particulars of any ongoing conversations between the team and McCoy's agent, Roseman made it clear that the Eagles expect "Shady" to be in the spotlight for the Eagles for a long time to come.
"We try to keep all our negotiations and our communications with our players between us and them. That fosters great relationships," said Roseman. "He's is a heck of a player. We want him in Philadelphia for a long time. We haven't been shy about that and we'll see if the guys who are doing the deal are any good right? Put a little pressure on me and (Eagles president Joe Banner)."
Roseman also addressed the notion put forth by head coach Andy Reid of late that the team will look to limit McCoy's touches a bit in an effort to keep him fresh throughout the season. McCoy had a career-high 321 offensive touches in 2011, the fourth-high total in the league and an increase from the 285 touches he had in 2010 (which were 13th in the league).
"I think there's always an effort to try to do that and get other people some touches so LeSean can play at the highest level this year and going forward," said Roseman. "But you're talking about a great player and you always want to get the ball in his hands. So once you're in a game and close games, you have to see what goes on there and coach does a great job with his backs and the rest of our skill guys in terms of spelling them, but obviously LeSean's a great player and he's going to get a fair amount of touches this year. I don't think he's going to have to worry about wondering if he's going to get the ball enough."
Roseman also hit on a number of topics, here's a rundown of his thoughts:
On how long Michael Vick will be the quarterback for the Eagles: "I'll tell you what. He's in phenomenal shape. This is his first offseason as a starter in Philadelphia. We're really excited about where he's at and the talent that he brings. You see quarterbacks are playing for a long time in this league, so I would not want to put any time table on his ability to contribute and play for a long time at a high level."
On factoring the DeMeco Ryans addition into the team's draft haul: "When we woke up Saturday morning and people came in the draft room, they saw that there was a player at the top of our fourth-round draft board, and that was DeMeco Ryans. The minute the commissioner put a team on the clock in the fourth round of the draft and we got to where our pick would have been, where the Texans were picking, we took DeMeco off our board and put him with our draft class and that was fun to do."
On the criticism of the Eagles only receiving a seventh-round pick in exchange for Asante Samuel: "I think that's an accurate criticism, but we wanted to have the player on our team last year. That's why we didn't make the move. So we just have to look at where we are with our team this season and this year and what we wanted to do. That was really the best opportunity for all involved, that trade that we made with the Atlanta Falcons.
"We spent some time exploring those options and had things that were close to coming to fruition. But at the end of the day, we went in with (Samuel, Nnamdi Asomugha and Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie) and we felt like they were three very talented players and they would help our effort to win a lot of games last year and it just didn't work out. We had to look at that and we got a lot of young guys on our team that we want to keep here and the cap, the way it is structured the next few years, we want to be in a position to keep our team together. So because of that, we felt it was in everyone's best interests to move forward and the Atlanta Falcons got a heck of a player in Asante Samuel and we'll miss him in Philadelphia but we thought this was in the best long-term interests of our football team."
You can watch Roseman's full segment on PFT Live here.
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