The Philadelphia Eagles could have their star running back Saquon Barkley return to the field come Monday Night when they host the Dallas Cowboys.
According to NFL Network’s Mike Garafolo, Barkley is expected to return to practice Thursday and is “in line” to play this week.
Barkley has missed essentially the last three games since suffering a hamstring injury on the second drive Week 4 against the Los Angeles Rams.
His return would be a major boost to the struggling offense which has dealt with a long list of injuries, including Barkley’s backups in Tank Bigsby and Will Shipley both on the IR and of course Jalen Hurts out for the season dealing with blood clots in his lungs.
Philadelphia has struggled to get any type of run game going this season, even when Barkley was healthy. Through four games this season, Barkley has rushed for 182 yards, averaging 5.1 yards per carry.
His best game this season was in the season-opener against Washington where he ran for 83 yards, but half of that came on a 42-yard run.
Since joining Philadelphia in 2024, the running back had not missed any games during the regular season outside of meaningless season finales where Nick Sirianni rested all of his key offensive starters.
This season, the Eagles own the fourth-worst rushing offense averaging 82.2 yards per game and 3.7 yards per carry. Last week against a Carolina Panthers’ defense that ranked near the bottom of the NFL in stopping the run, Dameon Pierce mustered just 35 yards in the loss.
Barkley won’t be the switch that can be flipped on and the running game will magically improve. The offensive line needs to get in sync and execute better than it has, but he certainly can provide the spark.
His return comes at a perfect time.
Dallas has allowed the most rushing yards per game this season, yielding a whopping 149.8 yards per game and allowing 4.7 yards per attempt to opposing running backs.
If Barkley can withstand a normal workload coming off his injury, that could allow Tanner McKee to have more success when he makes his second straight start as the new starting quarterback for Philadelphia. The backup quarterback threw the ball 45 times last week against the Panthers, a formula that is not beneficial for the Eagles.
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