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Upside Wins The Day For Cameron Williams

Originally posted on Philadelphia Eagles on SI
By John McMullen | Last updated Aug 27, 2025 7:20 PM ET

Eagles GM Howie Roseman went in-depth on his roster-building strategy Tuesday, particularly when it comes to the back end of the 53-man roster and the idea of a developmental player.

“I think that when you look at what we're trying to do here, we look at it and say, ‘If we let this guy go, are we going to have to go into the draft next year and draft someone in the third round, the fourth round, and the fifth round to replace them?’” Roseman mused. “ Sometimes that doesn't work out perfectly.”

Roseman took several shots at the back end of the draft this year, preaching to his personnel department to focus on upside.

“When you look at the quarterback position, we were not able to do that here, but when we look at those offensive linemen, they're really hard to find,” Roseman said.

The Eagles went outside the organization to get a more game-ready player in Sam Howell at quarterback, rather than wait on the development of sixth-rounder Kyle McCord. The good news is that after waiving McCord on Tuesday, the Eagles were able to get the South Jersey native back on the practice squad Wednesday.

On the offensive line, Roseman was hesitant to expose either fifth-round selection Myles Hinton or sixth-rounder Cameron Williams to waivers, even though neither player will be able to help early in their NFL careers.

Hinton will start the season on injured reserve with a destination to return, while Williams will be on the back end of the roster and a likely game-day inactive for the foreseeable future.

Williams is particularly interesting as a potential heir to All-Pro right tackle and future Hall of Famer Lane Johnson, who has started to broach the idea of retirement after his 13th season more frequently.

“I think that you talk about a guy like Cam and you’ve got to look at it like, ‘If this guy went back into school, where would he be a year from now? Where can we get this guy two years from now? What would that look like?’” Roseman said rhetorically.

The Eagles look at their roster as 1 through 70, which includes the 16-man practice squad and an international exemption. However, the idea is to make sure 1 through 48 on a given week is ready for the game on the docket.

“When you look at the roster like coach allows us to do, we're saying, ‘Alright, it's 1 through 70 and we’ve got to really make sure 1 through 48 are ready for the games,” said Roseman. “But we have a couple spots where we can make sure we're developing guys and we're not losing them.

“It's really a part of the strategy that we're trying to do here.”

It remains a tough tightrope to walk and could change in the moment depending on injuries or what’s needed on a particular week.

“[We are] not trying to hurt the team in the short term but also understand if these guys [like Williams] can help us down the road and save us a high draft pick, that’s incredible value,” Roseman said .” He’s got a long way to go to do that.

“We just talked about Coop [undrafted free agent WR Darius Cooper] and any of these rookies, they’ve got to earn it every day, but [Williams] did a great job of showing us the ability that he can have.”

This article first appeared on Philadelphia Eagles on SI and was syndicated with permission.

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