Eagles General Manager Has A Process For Evaluating 'Red Flag' Players In Draft

Walter Nolen makes a lot of sense for the Eagles and could be a target for general manager Howie Roseman when the NFL Draft begins next week. That might require a move up the draft board to land the defensive tackle from Mississippi.

There’s no denying Nolen’s talent, but he has been labeled a boom-or-bust prospect by NFL Media. Some teams have taken him off their boards for character issues, though most of those issues stem from his alleged lack of maturity, but, hey, he’s just 21.

Of course, Cooper DeJean was just 21 all last season and was an ace. No problem at all. Jalen Carter had some maturity issues, too, but hasn’t been any trouble for two seasons and is off and running toward what could be a Hall of Fame career.

Nolen could be the same, and it’s tantalizing to think about the prospect of him and Carter lined up, side-by-side, for the next five years or more. The thing is, it’s a high-wire walk that Roseman must make every draft. He attempted to explain it during his pre-draft media availability on Tuesday.

The GM said there is a set of criteria a player must meet if he is to remain on their board. If not, he’s removed from it early.

“It's very easy for us to get into individual arguments or make excuses for guys based on subjective factors, and I think that's really hard to do,” he said. “So, for us, we start with these basic principles of, we will not draft because of this. And when we get past those guys, then we obviously have a process that we go through.”

This is where Dom DiSandro comes. Big Dom for short. Or, if you prefer the more fancy title – Dom DiSandro, senior advisor to the general manager/chief security officer/gameday coaching operations.

“I don't think there's any doubt that he's the best in the National Football League, and in my opinion, really all of sports, in what he does,” said Roseman. “His ability to not only gather information, but to have a feel for people.

“And then we just have to make judgements. And in those situations, those are a little bit more subjective, and that's based on all the information that we get. We'll have a bunch of those in this draft, just like there are in every draft, and we're just trying to do whatever we can to increase the odds that we hit on a player. And talent's a big part of this. The person's a big part of this.”

Nolen has not been reported as a top-30 visit to the NovaCare Complex, but there are only 25 players who have been reported. Maybe he is one of the five nobody knows about, because one would think that if you are talking about a player with so-called maturity issues, you would want a closer, more intimate look.

As for other prospects in the draft who have had assault charges against them filed, such as Marshall’s Mike Green, Roseman addressed remarks he made on a recent podcast about saying he doesn’t even look at them in his evaluation process. He tries to, again, have a uniform set of standards to eliminate any gray area.

“We try not to make it subjective, is basically what I would say, (so we don’t) get in a situation where we really like a player (and) make excuses for that player,” he said. “So, we try to have objective criteria when it comes to the issues that you're asking me about, but it is important to us, the people that we bring in this building and that we know we can win with really good people. We also know that young people make mistakes in other areas.”