On the Barkley/Tebow Report

There’s an NBC report from Diana Russini out suggesting that the Eagles are looking to trade Matt Barkley so that they can sign Tim Tebow:

Sources with the Eagles say they are trying to trade Matt Barkley. If he is traded, I’m told there’s an “80% chance” they’ll sign Tim Tebow

— Dianna Marie Russini (@NBCdianna) March 17, 2015

As we noted yesterday, it makes perfect sense that the Eagles are trying to trade Barkley, although it seems unlikely that they will find a suitor. The team has shown no confidence that it believes Barkley can be even a viable backup at this point. If they thought he could fill that role, the Eagles wouldn’t have rushed out to sign Mark Sanchez the past two offseasons.

But the more important thing to point out here is that there would seem to be no reason for a Tebow signing to be linked to Barkley. If Chip Kelly wanted Tebow, he could just sign him. Teams get 90 roster spots this time of year. And the Eagles carry four to five quarterbacks in the spring. The salary cap is not an issue, considering what Tebow would sign for.

Some on Twitter pointed out that maybe the Eagles don’t want to lose leverage in a potential Barkley trade, but that doesn’t make any sense either. Kelly could easily say Barkley and Tebow are competing for the No. 3 job. If he gets an offer for Barkley down the road, deal him. And there would be no guarantee that Tebow would make the roster anyway.

Long story short, it makes perfect sense that the Eagles are looking to unload Barkley. And it’s possible they want to sign Tebow after having worked him out. But unless we’re missing something, there’s no scenario where these two things would be linked.