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Both of them
Join Date: Sep 2006
Posts: 10,225
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Runyan ready to tackle another season
http://www.nj.com/columns/times/ecke...370.xml&coll=5
Quote:
Jon Runyan remembers one of the first things he learned from new Hall of Famer Bruce Mat thews when he broke into the league with what was then the Houston Oilers.
"Bruce never missed a game," Runyan said. "He always said there were young guys waiting behind you. If you give them an opportunity to take your job eventually they will."
Matthews, who was part of the six-man Hall of Fame class inducted last weekend in Canton, Ohio, never had his job taken. One of the amazing facts about the longtime Oilers and Titans offensive lineman was that he played every game of the 1990s, and also went to every Pro Bowl in the '90s.
Runyan, who got the weekend off from the Eagles training camp at Lehigh to attend Matthews' in duction ceremony, isn't giving up his job any time soon, either.
"I'm not planning on it," he said with a smile. "We'll see how it goes for how much longer I do this. But I'm not going to let anyone take it."
Without a doubt the best free agent addition the Eagles have made under Andy Reid's watch, Runyan is past his time as an Eagle. The thing is he might be just as good, if not better, today than he was when he signed with the team after the 1999 season.
"I feel I'm still doing the job," Runyan said modestly. "You tell for sure when they grade you at the end of the year."
Last year, his seventh with the Eagles and 11th in the league, was one of his finest. He handled his once arch-nemesis, Michael Stra han, "the player he least likes to face," in all three games against the Giants. And the Eagles potent run ning game, late in the season, which led to its playoff run, came behind the right side of the line that Runyan anchors.
"You look at that team and dissect it and the big guy at right tackle still jumps out at you," one NFC scout said. "When you just watch the game, you might not no tice him doing anything special. But then after the game, you realize the guy he was blocking didn't do anything. That's the sign of a good lineman."
The Eagles originally signed Ru nyan to what was then considered a mega-contract when he got just over $30 million on a six-year deal to play right tackle and provide the rest of the line with an attitude that Reid wanted in his linemen.
It took that kind of money to get him to leave a Super Bowl team in Tennessee for an Eagles team coming off consecutive seasons of 3-13 and 5-11.
You could call it a coincidence, but it's likely not, that the Eagles have gone to the playoffs every year but one of the seven years Runyan has been with the team.
"He's been everything we wanted him to be," Reid said, "and more.
"What Jon brought to the offensive line is that temperament of his. He is going to maul you and beat you up and feel pretty good about doing it."
One year before Runyan's deal was set to expire, the Eagles traded up in the first round to select Shawn Andrews, who was projected as a right tackle and was the heir apparent to Runyan's job.
It hasn't happened for two reasons, one is Andrews has developed into a Pro Bowl guard, and two, Runyan is still playing like a Pro Bowl tackle.
It's hard to believe the Eagles almost let him walk a year ago, when his contract did expire and he actually turned down more money from the Jets to stay and enjoy the 13,000-square-foot property he just had built in South Jersey.
Now, Runyan is in the second of his new modest three-year deal with the team. His current streak of 160 straight starts ranks fourth among active players. He's still years away from Matthews' NFL mark of 296 games played by a position player. But who knows.
Just as Runyan was finishing an interview, a reporter asked him about the team's center, Jamaal Jackson.
Runyan smiled.
"We had a good center in Hank Fraley, he got hurt, missed games and gave Jamaal the opportunity," Runyan said. "See what I mean."
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