Saquon Barkley struggles to duplicate his 2,000-yard rushing season for defending champion Eagles

Maybe Saquon Barkley should fire off a cryptic social media post in the next day or two if he wants to carry the ball more than six times.

What else would it take for the Philadelphia Eagles to remember they have a 2,000-yard rusher and the 2024 AP Offensive Player of the Year in the backfield?

Forget chasing history as the first running back to get consecutive 2,000-yard rushing seasons. Barkley might not even crack 1,000 yards at his paltry rate through five games for the Eagles (4-1). Barkley rushed for only 30 yards — he got 17 of them on one carry in his longest run of the season — in Sunday’s 21-17 loss to Denver and has only 267 yards total on the season.

For a quick refresher on just how dominant Barkley was last season, he ran for a franchise-record 255 yards and 205 yards in two games against the Rams.

Barkley returns to his first NFL home to play the New York Giants on Thursday night looking for any kind of spark to get his season going. Of course, he’s not the one calling the plays; that falls on first-year offensive coordinator Kevin Patullo (with game-planning input from coach Nick Sirianni) and he’s the one who decided to give Barkley a season-low six carries.

One possible reason for the decline in carries against Denver: The Eagles listed Barkley on their Monday injury report with a knee issue. The Eagles did not practice on Monday but estimated Barkley would have sat out.

The Eagles tried to placate their receivers after Brown caused a minor stir last week with a post that seemed to indicate he was unhappy with his role. Brown later clarified his post was much ado about nothing, though it’s clear the Eagles listened. DeVonta Smith had his first 100-yard receiving game of the season and Brown was targeted eight times (with five catches).

Barkley actually topped Brown in receiving yards 58-43 thanks to a 47-yard touchdown reception in the third quarter that stretched the Eagles’ lead to 17-3.

Denver scored a pair of fourth-quarter touchdowns as part of a comeback that saw the Eagles get shut out in the final frame.

“You always want to come out of that game with Saquon getting enough touches for the type of player he is,” Sirianni said. “We’ll look for solutions. We’re on a short week trying to get better to put ourselves in position to go play against another NFC opponent.”

Barkley — who in March signed a two-year contract extension with $36 million guaranteed — took the high road when pressed on his light workload.

“I’m not really going to get too caught up in that,” Barkley said. “At the end of the day, whether we ran the ball enough or not, we had an opportunity to win a football game. We didn’t.”

Barkley ran for 176 yards in his only game against the Giants last season and sat out the finale with nothing at stake for the Eagles except his shot at topping Eric Dickerson for the NFL season rushing record. Barkley’s postseason run did help him set the NFL total season rushing record with 2,504 yards. He ran for a modest 57 yards against Kansas City in the Super Bowl.

Who knew that number would be considered a breakout performance this season?

What’s working

Smith and Brown each flashed reminders of their value to the offense.

What needs help

Cleaning up penalties. The Broncos caught a huge break in their rally when the Eagles had a late fourth-down pass conversion called back on an illegal shift penalty whistled against Barkley. The Eagles were instead forced to punt.

“Saquon started the motion before we were set, so that’s on us,” Sirianni said. “We want to get up and get set as quick as we possibly can, so then you can go through all the different things that you need to go through at the line of scrimmage to help you execute the play. That’s something where we can’t make that mistake. That’s a mistake that’ll get you, and it obviously got us.”

Stock up

Smith didn’t raise the fuss that Brown did, but he also was unhappy with his lack of touches this season. He had a season-long 52-yard reception and a season-high 114 yards receiving.

Stock down

Jalen Hurts did throw for 280 yards and two touchdown passses. He also has seven passing TDs this season without an interception. But he took six sacks — and there were dropbacks where he could have thrown the ball away — and passed for only 68 yards on the Eagles’ final five possessions when the defending champions were in dire need of a comeback.

Injuries

The Eagles lost left guard Landon Dickerson to an ankle injury, and there was no immediate update on his availability for Thursday. The three-time Pro Bowl lineman appeared to get hurt when a teammate rolled over his leg on a block.

Dickerson needed meniscus surgery on his right knee during training camp but was still in the lineup on opening night only 22 days after the procedure. He later suffered a back injury.

Brett Toth filled in for Dickerson against the Broncos.

Key stat

Dallas Goedert has a touchdown catch in three straight games for the longest streak by an Eagles tight end since Zach Ertz had one in four straight games in 2017.

Next steps

The Eagles have a short week and a short road trip against the Giants to try to get things right and start playing like defending champions.