Clay Harbor

TIGHT END Clay Harbor has been placed on injured reserve with a lower-back contusion, the Eagles announced Tuesday. Harbor, 25, has 25 catches for 188 yards and two touchdowns this season, all of which are career highs. With Harbor out, Brent Celek and Emil Igwenagu are the tight ends on the active roster. Celek is due to return after missing last week's game with a concussion. Igwenagu, who also plays fullback, made his NFL debut last week.  

Two years removed from college, Clay Harbor is back in class. The tight end is participating in his first full professional offseason this spring - he was drafted in 2010 and waited through the NFL lockout last year. The extra time with the coaches, he said, means a higher football education, and better results in the fall. In particular, Harbor wants to be a smarter blocker and a more fluid route runner. A couple of tweaks, along with extra two-tight-end packages, might pull him off the sidelines more often this season.

After Brent Celek sustained a concussion on the first play from scrimmage of Sunday's win over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Clay Harbor took his place at tight end. The Eagles didn't call his number right away. They eased him into the offense with a few protection assignments. After a few snaps, tight ends coach Tom Melvin called down from the press box to speak with Harbor. "I'm fine now. I'm in the game. The jitters are gone. I'm going to have a good game," Harbor told Melvin. After the game, Melvin reminded Harbor of that conversation.

The news of Mike Kafka's signing a futures contract with the New England Patriots on Thursday makes this a good time to revisit the Eagles' 2010 draft class - and specifically the fourth round. That's when Kafka went. He was one of four fourth-round picks for the Eagles. A fourth-round pick in the NFL has value - but not significant value. There's rougly a 10 percent chance of finding a starter in that round. Of course, based on those odds, the Eagles had a realistic statistical chance of finding a starter in that round.

TED WILLIAMS is the calm hand in the middle of the revolution. The longest-tenured assistant coach in the history of the Eagles franchise, Williams arrived here as the tight ends coach in 1995 and 1996 under Ray Rhodes. Now, a lifetime later - and after 16 years coaching running backs named Ricky Watters, Duce Staley, Brian Westbrook and LeSean McCoy - Williams is coaching tight ends again in 2013 under Chip Kelly. To say that a few things are different would be an embarrassing understatement.

IN HIS HUGE OFFICE, early in these spring mornings, ol' Chippah must be chuckling. He has the whole region chasing its tail, like some strung-out Pac-12 defense without the sense to just play soft until the red zone. Who will be the quarterback? Will the rookie right tackle start over that huge Hanson brother lookalike? Can Trent Cole play without his hand in the ground after eight seasons? Can Brandon Graham get a break? Who's going to return punts? Jason Avant's going to be a safety?

Part Three of a Series The Eagles are amid their first organized team activities this week, and they will practice throughout the next four weeks. After those practices, coach Chip Kelly will have a better idea of the Eagles roster. But there's a lot that will happen between now and then. Here is a look at the tight ends: Projected current first team TE1: Brent Celek (6-foot-4, 255 pounds), age 28, 7th season TE2: James Casey (6-3, 240), 28, 5th Of all the positions on the Eagles offense, the one that has seen the most change this offseason is tight end. Kelly brought in three new quarterbacks, but the current top two remain the same.

The Eagles signed defensive end Phillip Hunt on Friday to a three-year contract, adding a pass rusher who led the Canadian Football League in sacks last season. Hunt, 25, had 16 sacks for the Winnipeg Blue Bombers last season and had three in 2009. The CFL plays an 18-game season. He played at the University of Houston but was undrafted. Hunt worked out for the Eagles, Cleveland Browns, and New England Patriots in December. At 6 feet and 248 pounds, he fits the physical mold the Eagles look for in pass rushers.

SOME INTREPID folks were trying to work the gee-despite-the-win-you-were-eliminated-from-playoff-contention angle in the locker room Monday. Of the handful of Eagles available after a brief practice, nobody seemed shocked they weren't going to the postseason. "It felt great to win, especially under the circumstances, with a lot of young guys in, a lot of key players out in key positions," tight end Clay Harbor said. Despite how the question was phrased, Harbor didn't even mention the playoffs.

THE MUSIC Howie Roseman was happiest to hear from the Eagles' practice field this spring wasn't Nicki Minaj, Lupe Fiasco or even the Lumineers. It was the sound of Eagles players trumpeting their excitement over new coach Chip Kelly's changes. Roseman, who spoke to reporters yesterday at Lincoln Financial Field after participating in a Rothman Institute panel discussion of "The Impact of Sports," was asked if Kelly's loud, frenetic practices were as big an adjustment for him as they were for reporters, accustomed to the more staid style of 14-year coach Andy Reid.

TED WILLIAMS is the calm hand in the middle of the revolution. The longest-tenured assistant coach in the history of the Eagles franchise, Williams arrived here as the tight ends coach in 1995 and 1996 under Ray Rhodes. Now, a lifetime later - and after 16 years coaching running backs named Ricky Watters, Duce Staley, Brian Westbrook and LeSean McCoy - Williams is coaching tight ends again in 2013 under Chip Kelly. To say that a few things are different would be an embarrassing understatement.

IN HIS HUGE OFFICE, early in these spring mornings, ol' Chippah must be chuckling. He has the whole region chasing its tail, like some strung-out Pac-12 defense without the sense to just play soft until the red zone. Who will be the quarterback? Will the rookie right tackle start over that huge Hanson brother lookalike? Can Trent Cole play without his hand in the ground after eight seasons? Can Brandon Graham get a break? Who's going to return punts? Jason Avant's going to be a safety?

FOR EAGLES tight end Clay Harbor, all this part-time linebacker stuff harkens to an uncharted and uneasy future. For Jason Avant, playing a little nickel corner takes him back to his past. "I got recruited out of high school by most of the big schools to play defense," he was saying after yesterday's OTA concluded at the NovaCare Complex. "I was a two-way player. And I was All-American as a receiver and really close to making it as a safety. And most of the big schools saw me playing there.

Chip Kelly has been open about his desire for versatile players, a trait sought by many coaches. But Kelly's search for versatility stretches beyond convention, as evidenced by at least two roster experiments during organized team activities last week. Tight end Clay Harbor spent one day of practice at outside linebacker. Wide receiver Jason Avant took practice repetitions with defensive backs. Neither player is changing positions. Rather, it seems to be an effort to explore different scenarios, if needed.

Part Three of a Series The Eagles are amid their first organized team activities this week, and they will practice throughout the next four weeks. After those practices, coach Chip Kelly will have a better idea of the Eagles roster. But there's a lot that will happen between now and then. Here is a look at the tight ends: Projected current first team TE1: Brent Celek (6-foot-4, 255 pounds), age 28, 7th season TE2: James Casey (6-3, 240), 28, 5th Of all the positions on the Eagles offense, the one that has seen the most change this offseason is tight end. Kelly brought in three new quarterbacks, but the current top two remain the same.

WHEN EAGLES general manager Howie Roseman and head coach Chip Kelly went to sleep early yesterday morning, a few hours after the first round of the draft ended, the name at the top of their draft board was Stanford tight end Zach Ertz. When they went on the clock with the third pick in the second round last night and Ertz still was unclaimed, they took him. While Kelly regularly uses two and often three tight ends in his offense, the position hardly was a crying need. They have Brent Celek, Clay Harbor and newcomer James Casey, whom they signed away from Houston last month.

YOU DON'T just wake up one morning and become a 4-12 football team. It takes work. Just as it takes a steady stream of smart personnel decisions to build a winning franchise, so does it take a substantial number of dumb ones to become the train wreck that was the 2012 Eagles. Yes, injuries certainly played a role in the decline and fall of the Reidian empire last season. But what did the Eagles in, what ultimately caused them to miss the playoffs the last two seasons, and prompted the NFL to assign them just one Sunday-Monday night television appearance this year, was their abysmal decision-making in the 2010 and 2011 drafts.

While the Miami Dolphins acted as if they were the 2011 "Dream Team" Eagles and other teams snatched up high-priced veterans, the Eagles signed five under-the-radar players on the first day of NFL free agency. The Eagles announced the moves in rapid-fire succession Tuesday evening, a little more than four hours after free agency kicked off. They signed defensive lineman Isaac Sopoaga, safety Patrick Chung, and tight end James Casey to three-year contracts and cornerback Bradley Fletcher and linebacker Jason Phillips to two-year deals.

Whether one subscribes to the argument that having two above-average, pass-catching tight ends greatly increases an NFL team's chances of success, the Eagles need to upgrade at the position. Like at safety - another spot where the Eagles need change - there are an abundance of tight ends in free agency and the draft from which the team can address its need. Free agency, of course, comes first - Tuesday, to be exact. There aren't any studs on the market, but there are a handful of tight ends - Jared Cook, Delanie Walker, and James Casey - whom the Eagles could get at good value.