PHILADELPHIA — Greeting entrants to the locker room at the Eagles’ training complex is a nearly 7-foot-tall orange tackling dummy. Its right arm, elevated at a 90-degree angle like a passer’s, and its left, lowered and tucked into the body like a runner’s, each has half of a football stitched into it.
Every time that defensive end Fletcher Cox walks by, he hits the passing arm’s elbow, just as he did in a recent drill in which rushers approached a dummy on the practice field and prioritized stripping the ball over sacking the quarterback. The extra dummies around the complex help reinforce that.