Things Are Going So Great In Philadelphia That Za'Darius Smith Has Decided To Retire In The Middle Of The Season Out Of Nowhere
Kevin Sabitus. Getty Images.Sometimes an important player on your roster gets injured. It seems bad at first, but it turns out to be a good thing because it caused everyone else on the team to elevate their game. Sometimes teams will have a players only meeting after a tough look. It seems bad at first, but it turns out to be a good thing because now everybody is on the same page.
And sometimes a veteran player decides to randomly retire in the middle of the season on a Monday. And I gotta be honest…that's never a good sign. That is something that strictly happens to bad teams. And that's what happened to the Philadelphia Eagles today when Za'Darius Smith decided to wrap up his career.
Za'Darius Smith has been in the league for 10 years. He's put in his time, and I'm sure he was interested in capping off his career with a Super Bowl when he signed with the Eagles in September. One last run to try to go out on top. I'm sure he dreamed of being a Super Bowl champ when he was a kid growing up in Greenville, Alabama, and he wanted to see if he could get himself a ring before hanging them up for good.
It seemed like a perfect fit. The Eagles were in need of some more depth edge rushers. They were coming off of a Super Bowl win, and bringing back a ton of the same guys on offense. They looked like a team who could be on track to be the next dynasty. But holy shit has that train gone so far off track over these last couple of weeks. Complete and total derailment. And if there was ever any indication of how things are going inside that locker room right now, Za'Darius Smith deciding to retire in the middle of the season should tell you everything you need to know.
If he thought there was any chance that this team could get themselves back on track to be legitimate Super Bowl contenders again, he'd stick around for the rest of the season. If he thought this Eagles team had any hope of patching up all the holes in this boat, he'd put up with whatever he had to put up with to at least see this one through. But if the writing is on the wall that this team is cooked? Well then Za'Darius Smith isn't going to keep putting his body through the weekly grind of the NFL season.
Again, guys just don't quit in the middle of the season on good teams. It literally does not happen. Everybody loves to be a part of a winning football team. Winning cures everything. It makes showing up to practice every day easier, it makes injuries hurt a little less, it just makes everything better. But the Eagles aren't winning. Not only are they not winning, but they have a pretty obvious public feud going on right now between the wide receiver, the quarterback, and the offensive coordinator. The offense is a mess. The defense is getting shredded apart by Bo Nix and Jaxson Dart. It just seems like the Eagles are making everything 10x more difficult on themselves than it needs to be.
So instead of going down the ship, Za'Darius Smith decided to bail early enough that he can plan some pretty sweet vacations around the holidays. As much as I hate the move, I can't say I blame him for it.
P.S. -- Howie Roseman has earned himself permanent hero status in Philadelphia by bringing us 2 Super Bowls. But holy hell, what a whiff he had on this season. Za'Darius Smith seemed like a good signing for a few weeks, but now he's retired. I would give anything in the world for Tank Bigsby to decide to retire right now, because he's awful. The only dude to ever be signed as a kick returner, who literally can't return kicks. AJ Dillon is a dud. Every move Howie made this season has been the wrong one. Still a hero, but heroes have awful years sometimes.