For someone who “didn’t want to get into specifics” about his time with the Philadelphia Eagles, mega-bust free agent edge rusher Bryce Huff sure was specific about the problems he had in his one year with the reigning Super Bowl champions in 2024.
Huff decided it was a good time to go off on the Eagles during an interview with The SFNiners YouTube Channel — he was traded to the San Francisco 49ers for a 2026 fifth round pick on June 2.
In San Francisco, Huff is reunited with his head coach on the New York Jets with defensive coordinator Robert Saleh, who was fired just 5 games into the 2024 season.
“There’s a plethora of things that went down,” Huff said. “I don’t wanna get into specifics. Being in the league for five years, I kinda knew what it felt like for me to be in a good situation. I gotta look out for myself and do what I think is best. I kind of knew where it was headed fairly early on into the season, probably even training camp if I’m being honest. So when everything popped off, it was just like ‘Yeah, all right let’s get to work.’”
Huff also detailed how he felt uncomfortable in defensive coordinator Vic Fangio’s defensive scheme after he signed a 3-year, $51.1 million free agent contract with the Eagles in March 2024.
“Huff had 10.5 sacks playing for Saleh with the Jets in 2024 and turned that into a three-year contract with the Eagles, but he never found a groove during his lone season in Philadelphia,” Pro Football Talk’s Josh Alper wrote on July 7. “Moving from playing with his hand on the ground to standing up on the edge proved to be a bad fit and he wound up being on the inactive list for the team’s Super Bowl win over the Chiefs.”
Is there anything worse than someone complaining about a job they were terrible at and got paid tens of millions for? Also, if you know ball, there’s never been an elite edge rusher in the history of the NFL who let how they lined up stop them from getting to the quarterback.
It just seems like a lot of excuses, and Huff would have been much better off just keeping his mouth shut. Going off on your old team seems like sour grapes and is just unprofessional — especially in the face of Huff’s own abject failure.
There’s also the results. The Eagles had the NFL’s singularly dominant defense last season and rolled to a blowout win over the Kansas City Chiefs in Super Bowl LIX.
The Truth About Huff: Not Up To The Competition
The sad part about Huff’s massive contract, which included $34 million in guaranteed money, is that it probably came at the expense of keeping edge rusher Josh Sweat.
Sweat spent the 2024 season on a 1-year, $10 million contract, balled out of his mind, led the Eagles in sacks and then cashed in with a 4-year, $76.4 million free agent contract with the Arizona Cardinals.
The truth about Huff is that the Eagles got misled by a “good stats, bad team” guy who had 10.5 sacks with the Jets in 2023 but finished eighth on the Eagles with 2.5 sacks in 12 games.
Not only could Huff not beat out top edge rushers Nolan Smith Jr. and Sweat, he couldn’t even create separation between himself and rookie Jalyx Hunt, a third round pick in the 2024 NFL draft out of Houston Christian.
