The Eagles‘ initial 53-man roster was made official Sunday evening.

It was an uncharacteristically quiet day for Eagles general manager Howie Roseman, who will speak with reporters on Monday, but he’s often quick to remind fans and reporters alike that roster building does not end on cut-down day.

With that in mind, here are five thoughts on the initial roster, what moves may still happen in the coming days, and which players overcame the most to make the cut:

1. Looking through the Eagles’ initial 53-man roster, the tight end position stands out as the one that still seems somewhat incomplete going into the start of the regular season.

The team carried four tight ends (Dallas Goedert, Johnny Mundt, Eli Stowers, and EJ Jenkins), but that room still lacks solid depth in the event that Goedert misses a meaningful chunk of time the way he has in four of the last five seasons. Stowers is currently sidelined with a hamstring injury, which may have necessitated Jenkins’ inclusion on the roster with the team needing the numbers to utilize heavy personnel packages. Still, Jenkins could very well prove to be a placeholder for a tight end to be named later between now and the season opener against the Commanders on Sept. 13.

Who might that player to be named later be? Zach Ertz has a chance to fill the Eagles’ void at tight end with a potential return on the table, according to league sources. Nothing is imminent as the 35-year-old is nearing the nine-month mark of recovery from a scary knee injury suffered on Dec. 7, but Ertz would welcome a return to the Eagles for his 14th season. He was cleared for football activities earlier this month, although the nine-month benchmark coming next week is often a timeline teams will abide by when assessing a player coming off an ACL tear.

The fit would make sense, too. Ertz, who had 50 catches for 504 yards in 13 games last year, would be able to play behind Goedert as another receiving option in the room or step into a more featured role if Goedert misses time. Adding Ertz would also buy time for second-round rookie Eli Stowers to develop behind the scenes with the added benefit of another mentorship figure in place for the. 23-year-old. Stowers struggled to break into the first-team offense before suffering a hamstring injury late in training camp and is still enough of a work in progress as a blocker to keep him from projecting into a meaningful game day role as a rookie.

Eagles general manager Howie Roseman hasn’t been opposed to reunions with franchise greats in the past. He traded for DeSean Jackson in 2019 and signed Nick Foles in free agency two years prior. There’s also the fact that Ertz is 10 catches away from tying Harold Carmichael for the franchise record in receptions, although that’s secondary to the actual need the Eagles have at the position.

2. The four quarterbacks making the roster were certainly a surprise given the lack of precedent for the team doing so, but aligns with something we saw from three other teams on Sunday evening. The Minnesota Vikings, Atlanta Falcons, and Pittsburgh Steelers also kept four signal callers on their initial active rosters. I’d argue that each of those teams, as well as the Eagles, did so in part because they do not have a surefire No. 2 in place going into the regular season.

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