In the weeks leading up to Plaxico Burress' release from prison, speculation started to grow about the possibility of him ending up with Eagles. We heard a lot of speculation about why the Eagles might be interested and of course we heard that Plaxico is interested in coming here... But we never really heard a solid report coming from the Eagles about any interest.
Until now? The Inquirer's Jeff McLane tweeted this morning that after speaking to some team sources, there is "certainly interest."
Re: Plaxico Burress and the #Eagles. Spoke to several team sources and there's certainly interest there. But no decision will be made until they can meet face to face with him.
I would imagine that this is the sentiment a lot of teams share on Burress. He's not going to be one of these free agents snapped up on day one of free agency. Teams are going to have to have a serious discussion with him, they're going to have to work him out.... So there's really going to be no rush. His agent, Drew Rosenhaus will do his due diligence. So anyone that wants a chance at Burress will certainly have the opportunity.
Eagles owner Jeff Lurie said this week that they evaluate all players on the market and that if they considered signing Burress, the process would be similar to the one they went through with Michael Vick.
"It would be similar," Lurie said. "Any player, if there's issues off the field, we have to ascertain . . . are they going to represent the Eagles and the community that we serve? Are they going to be part of events like this? Michael has shown this. If a player is not willing to be part of the culture we have, then I don't think it's a good fit."
"You can evaluate his talent. You can evaluate his age. But you can't evaluate where his heart and his head are at the moment," Lurie said. "Until you can do that . . . it's far from enough information."
Lurie continued, "We've shown we'll take chances if it's warranted."
While it is important to decide whether he'll be productive and whether he'll fit on the team, the Eagles won't have to deal with the level of criticism in signing Burress as they did with Vick. There's no doubt that Burress accidentally shooting himself in the leg was an irresponsible and stupid act, but people will likely find that much easier to forgive than all the heinous things that Michael Vick did.