Eages Vic Fangio Explains Why Pass Rusher Bryce Huff Didn't Fit

Bryce Huff is gone now. Some may say he was never really here in the first place, after struggling from the start of the season to the very end when the young pass rusher was inactive for Super Bowl LIX.

Vic Fangio isn’t one of those people who would say that.

The Eagles' defensive coordinator was asked on Tuesday before the Eagles' OTA practice why Huff didn’t fit here. Fangio didn’t mention scheme or the changing nature of the league, but said it had to do with the wrist/hand injury that required surgery and cost him four games late in the season.

Huff tried to play through the injury before opting for surgery, so that limited him as well. Then, when he returned from surgery, he had a big cast on his hand.

“I think the one thing is he was getting better, and when he hurt his hand, he tried to play with it a couple of weeks,” said Fangio. “It wasn’t going good because he was reluctant to use his hand. Then, when they operated on it, he had to play with a big cast on his hand, which basically rendered his hand useless, and then rendered your arm useless because you can’t use your hand.

“That really had an effect on him. And we just came out of the draft season and the first thing you see when they put a name up on the board is his hand size, arm length. Well, he lost all that.”

While Huff was finding his way before and after surgery, Nolan Smith and Jalyx Hunt’s snaps increased, and they took off running with them.

“Things evolved, but I think he’ll do fine in San Francisco,” said Fangio.

The Eagles traded Huff to the 49ers for a conditional fourth-round pick that could become a fourth-rounder if he reaches various incentives.

While Huff never got to the point where the Eales felt confident using him this year, he was at least a depth piece. Fangio said he thinks the edge position will be fine.

“I feel good about Nolan,” he said. “I think we’ll feel good about Jalyx now that he’s gonna get a lot of reps and develop. He played good for us down the stretch last year and played a lot, as you saw. So, I feel good about those two guys and I think they’ll continue to improve. We’ve got (Josh) Uche, we’ve got Azeez (Ojulari), and we got three other guys there. I think we’ll be fine.”