Nick Sirianni on Brandon Brooks’ injury and the Eagles’ plan at right guard

The Eagles suffered two big Brandon injuries during their Week 2 loss to the San Francisco 49ers with both Brandon Graham and Brandon Brooks leaving the game early.

Speaking to reporters on Monday afternoon, Nick Sirianni confirmed what we had already heard about Graham. The Eagles’ veteran defensive end is out for the season with an Achilles tear.

As for Brooks, though, he’s not done for 2021. Philly’s head coach gave the following update on the team’s starting right guard:

“He strained his [pectoral muscle]. We’re thinking he’s probably going to go to IR but it’s not a season-ending injury.”

Good to know that Brooks will return at some point, although it’s not currently clear when that will be. The Eagles placing him on IR makes him ineligible to be activated until some point after their next three games (at Cowboys, vs. Chiefs, at Panthers).

As for who starts in place of Brooks, it would seem like Landon Dickerson is the man for that job. The Eagles turned to the 2021 second-round pick when Brooks left Sunday’s game early.

But Dickerson struggled. He allowed five pressures in just 20 pass blocking snaps, according to Pro Football Focus. Sirianni admitted the rookie has room for improvement.

“He played a solid game. He definitely— we all know we all have to do things to improve based off of yesterday’s game. But I thought he played solid for his first outing. Again, there’s some things with his pass pro that we’ve got to clean up. Assignments, and stuff like that. But encouraged by his first time to play significant snaps.”

In fairness to Dickerson, Sunday was his first game action since tearing his ACL in December 2020. Dickerson didn’t participate in a single training camp session and wasn’t a full participant in an Eagles regular season practice until early last week.

Still, given the nature of the position, teams aren’t always comfortable letting young offensive linemen play through severe growing pains. It’s a risky decision when they’re tasked with protecting the most important player in the sport. If the Eagles feel like Dickerson isn’t ready, they might look to turn to Nate Herbig.

At least, Sirianni didn’t rule out that possibility on Monday afternoon.

“Obviously, everything’s a discussion. We watched the tape this morning and now we’re in the early game-plan part — before the players come in tomorrow — on Dallas. Nothing final there. I don’t want to say ‘Hey, it’s going to be Landon’ or ‘Hey, it’s going to be Nate’ one way or the other right now. Because we’re not there yet, to be perfectly honest with you.”

The guess here is that Dickerson will be the guy to replace Brooks since the Eagles believe in his long-term potential. But there’s a non-zero chance it could be Herbig instead.