In the first half of Thursday night's NFL season opener, running back Jay Ajayi only played nine snaps but Philadelphia Eagles coach Doug Pederson said going forward he will be more involved. In the second half, Ajayi took off scoring two touchdowns and helping lead the Eagles to a victory.
Pederson said the Eagles were trying to be careful with him as Ajayi was still working back from a lower-body injury and they wanted him to get into the flow of the game. In the second half, they stuck with Ajayi as the lead back, and it was the difference in this game.
“I wanted to make sure because Jay was nursing a little bit of a lower body injury for a couple weeks, and just wanted to make sure he was good and get him into the flow of the game,” Pederson said, via Pro Football Talk. “And then of course we were sort of struggling in the run game and just trying to get a rhythm and a feel and putting different guys in there in the second half. Just kind of stuck to our adjustments at halftime, and he was the back, the featured back in the second half. He did a nice job. Obviously the two touchdown rushes and then the two-point conversion. It was encouraging to see. I think not only going forward, but him, health-wise, coming out of the game was really good. Moving forward, we’ll see him more.”
Ajayi looked healthy coming out of the game, and the lower body injury didn't seem to be affecting him at all. Ajayi finished with 15 attempts for 62 yards and two touchdowns. Darren Sproles also did a nice job out of the backfield finishing the game with four receptions for 22 yards.
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