Top Ten Best Eagles Draft Picks - #5 Sheldon Brown

The Eagles have had an interesting spread of success in the second round in the Reid era. We've seen some huge misses like Quinton Caver, Barry Gardner & Matt McCoy, but we've also seen some major hits like the next two guys on our list.

Sheldon Brown - 2002 - 2nd round

With their first three picks in 2002, the Eagles completely revamped their secondary drafting Lito Sheppard, Michael Lewis & Sheldon in that order. At the time it seemed like an odd move to some since they still had Bobby Taylor and Troy Vincent and weren't really in need of a corner, let alone two. However, in this first draft controlled by Andy Reid, we got a glimpse of what his draft philosophy was. He wanted to anticipate needs, rather react to them. From this point on, we could look at the roster come draft time, find he guys turning 30 and make a pretty good guess as to what positions the Eagles might be drafting.

Of those three secondary players they picked in 2002, the last ended up being the best. While he never made a pro bowl like Lito did, Sheldon spent eight solid years with the Eagles and was the most consistent corner on the team the entire time. He was a great tackler, an underrated cover guy and he made more big plays than a lot of people remember. In eight seasons here, Sheldon scored five defensive touchdowns.

The only thing that probably kept him from being a multiple time pro bowler was the fact that a) he usually played alongside a more famous or higher rated corner (even if he was better than them in the case of Lito) and b) he rarely put up gaudy INT numbers.

Sheldon was always one of my personal favorite Eagles. Not only was he a great player, but I always got a kick out of hearing him talk as well. For one, it was hilarious that often spoke in the third person, but in an organization of guys who say nothing and stay as generic as possible when talking to the press, Sheldon was very honest. Maybe more than anyone in the organization, I always felt that he was telling us exactly what he thought.

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