Eagles

At this time last year, Fletcher Cox and Mychal Kendricks were promising rookies brought in to upgrade an underachieving Eagles defense. Second-round pick Kendricks was a starter at outside linebacker from his first practice. First-rounder Cox found a spot in the crowded defensive line rotation. Their coordinator was dismissed during their rookie season and coach Andy Reid was gone at the end. A whole new system is in place for their second season, but what remains are the team's plans for Cox and Kendricks, two cornerstones for the defense going forward.

THE PICTURES of Monday's tornado aftermath on Lane Johnson's phone didn't come from CNN or a newspaper. They were taken, Johnson said, by ex-Oklahoma Sooners teammates who made the short drive from Norman to Moore, Okla., to try to help first responders. Offensive tackle Johnson and his fellow ex-Sooner, defensive end David King, were stunned and horrified to see the devastation in Moore; both recalled frequently going to see movies at the ravaged theater that has been so prominent in news coverage of the disaster.

The Eagles received NFL backing on Tuesday to proceed with plans to renovate Lincoln Financial Field, team president Don Smolenski said. "We are excited to have received league support today for our stadium revitalization project at Lincoln Financial Field," Smolenski said in a statement. "We will share the details of this project with our fans in the coming weeks. " The project was approved on Monday during the spring owners' meetings in Boston. While a formal announcement is forthcoming, the Eagles have spoken freely about some of the modernizations they had planned for their stadium, including bringing the jumbo video screens up to high definition standards.

After closing time at Club Chipper, the hot new dance spot in South Philadelphia, the patrons clear out pretty fast. They have to exit via a hallway lined with blowups of newspaper pages celebrating great moments in Eagles history - if you define Eagles history as things that happened since the NovaCare Complex opened in 2001. What is striking is how ancient that history is beginning to feel. To many of the players leaving Chip Kelly's aerobics/football class Monday, the names and faces on the walls are those of strangers.

A week after Chip Kelly lifted the curtain on his practices and Michael Vick had the slight edge on Nick Foles in first-team repetitions, the roles were reversed and the second-year quarterback was first up with the "ones. " Foles took 21 snaps to Vick's 15 in seven-on-seven and team drills on Monday, and if it weren't for the great interest in the Eagles' quarterback competition, it might have felt a little silly logging repetitions in May with players running around in shorts. But what the snap count did reveal, if we're to trust that Kelly's closed practices weren't significantly different, is that the Eagles coach wasn't lying.

THE WONDERFUL World of Chipper isn't just going to arrive full-blown in a stream of seamlessly choreographed, no-huddle artistry, everybody prancing in time to the thumping dance-mix beat. The Eagles have a lot of learning to do, along with a lot of winnowing of players, in the early days of the Chip Kelly era. This was apparent yesterday as the team allowed reporters their second look at an Organized Team Activity. (Back in the day, you might have called it "practice. ") Michael Vick didn't have a particularly sharp day throwing the ball, and seemed to get fewer reps with the first-team offense than Nick Foles.

THE EAGLES and the Giants exchanged players this offseason. Not formally, of course, but New York signed Eagles free-agent defensive linemen Mike Patterson and Cullen Jenkins, and the Eagles signed former Giants first-round safety Kenny Phillips. It will be interesting to see which organization had a better read on the other squad's talents. Patterson, a smallish defensive tackle, didn't fit the Birds' new defensive scheme. Jenkins just seemed to be wearing down at 32, and seemed expendable to a rebuilding team.

The NFL's collective bargaining agreement apportions the offseason into controlled, digestible bites for the players. Until the full training camps of August, there is no actual contact and the practice days are limited and counted closely. This is done for the health and welfare of the players, of course, at least in their view, and if it sometimes provides less preparation than a coaching staff might prefer, the league calls that an acceptable swap for getting to keep all the money.

Eagles running back LeSean McCoy left Monday's practice early with an apparent knee injury. McCoy stretched on the sideline at one point before leaving the practice field. McCoy was spotted after practice walking through a NovaCare Complex hallway with a plate of food. He said the issue was with his knee. He did not appear to be limping or in pain. The Eagles did not have an official report on McCoy's condition. Bryce Brown took first-team snaps at running back in McCoy's absence.

EVERYBODY loves an underdog, and every year there is a rookie of humble pedigree who catches the imagination of Eagles fans. Sometimes he's a seventh-round draft choice (Nate Ilaoa, a stubby fullback from Hawaii in 2007), sometimes he's an undrafted free agent (Chad Hall, a height-challenged ex-Air Force officer in 2010, or Damaris Johnson, the wideout/returner who supplanted Hall last year). Quite often, this object of fan affection doesn't even make the team. When he does make it, his impact tends to lag way behind the amount of attention he gets on message boards.