Subscribe
Follow Us
The Philadelphia Eagles are still flying high after winning Super Bowl 59. Philadelphia went from fraudulent Wild Card participant in 2023 to Super Bowl champions in 2024 thanks in large part to RB Saquon Barkley. The Eagles fell just short of winning an award related to Barkley this weekend.
The Los Angeles Lakers won an Alpha Award for Transaction of the Year across all sports at the Sloan Analytics Conference for their trade for Luka Doncic, per ESPN's Dave McMenamin.
The Eagles were nominated for the award because of their free agent signing of Saquon Barkley.
It is hard to argue with the Doncic trade, but that does not take away how impactful Barkley was for the Eagles in 2024. If there were an award for NFL transactions only, the Eagles would have won that award easily.
Barkley had a career year during the 2024 NFL season. Barkley rushed 345 times for 2,005 yards and 13 rushing touchdowns during the 2024 season. If Barkley had played in Week 18, he may have broken the single-season NFL rushing record.
Other award nominees from the NFL included the Ravens for signing Derrick Henry and the Vikings for signing Sam Darnold.
Nominees from other sports included the Knicks trading for Karl-Anthony Towns, the Dodgers signing Roki Sasai, the Mets signing Juan Soto, and Real Madrid signing Kylian Mbappe.
How Saquon Barkley's historic Eagles contract will impact running backs in the future
Did Eagles running back Saquon Barkley accomplish something positive for free agent running backs with his 2024 season?
The running back position has been devalued in the NFL for several years now. Many teams and analysts view the position as easily replaceable because of the wealth of cheap backs available in the NFL.
This is why it was so important that both Barkley and Derrick Henry got paid in free agency and then had excellent 2024 seasons.
Regardless, it seems that Barkley's season will not have a lasting impact on how running backs are viewed in free agency.
“The 2025 free agents aren't projected to continue the trajectory of the record-setting 2024 class,” ESPN's Brooke Pryor wrote on Friday. “Instead, last year's financial and on-field success were the product of a ‘confluence of events,’ according to one league source.”
It is important to note that both Barkley and Henry are not your ordinary running backs. Derrick Henry is an all-time great who has enjoyed a Hall of Fame career. Meanwhile, Barkley was the second overall pick in the 2018 NFL Draft. He was trapped on the Giants for several seasons, but even there it was clear that he was a special talent.
At the very least, it is good to see that special running backs can still earn a big pay day in the NFL.
