PHILADELPHIA — Browns pass rusher Myles Garrett took a quick break before a team period on Thursday, standing under the goalposts and chatting someone up. His teammates, getting ready to line up, started calling his name.
Garrett politely finished his conversation, slid on his helmet while he hustled to his spot on the right side of the Browns defensive line and resumed terrorizing the Eagles, like he did for much of the two joint practices here.
The Browns’ $40 million per year man looked worth every penny during these practices and it led to a simple question after the second session ended: How do you stop him?
“I can’t answer that,” Eagles left tackle Jordan Mailata said. “Not because I don’t want to. I just don’t really know the answer.”
Surely going against Garrett for two days must teach you something, right?
“There’s no one like Myles,” Mailata said. “You can’t apply what Myles does to anyone else. He’s just a freak.”
Garrett signed a four-year, $160 million contract extension in March after requesting a trade following the Browns’ 3-14 season. It was the richest contract ever for a non-quarterback at the time and the type of market-setting contract a player like Garrett can command.
Browns defensive coordinator Jim Schwartz challenged Garrett to take his already dominant game to another level during the spring.
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“I really think Myles is going to have the best season of his career and has to, right?” Schwartz said during OTAs. “I’ve told him before … what’s that Spider-Man quote? ‘With great power comes great responsibility,’ right? That’s with the big contract, with the notoriety that came along with that, with the process that took to get him to that point. There’s always pressure in this league, but probably a little bit more so. That brings out the best in players, and I know that’ll be the case with Myles.”
Garrett has responded by having a dominant camp, making life miserable for new Browns left tackle Dawand Jones and then anyone he faced from Philadelphia this week.
Mailata, a second-team All-Pro in 2024, was dumbfounded on what to do against Garrett, particularly with his ability to stay low and bend the edge like no one else in the game.
“I’m just standing, like, ‘What the (expletive),’” he said. “I did my job. And yet, I still got beat. How is that even possible? How is he still down around one of my knees and he’s still bending the corner? He starts the rush in a four-point stance, and by the time he’s four yards up-field, he’s still at that same height. It’s kind like, ‘What am I supposed to do there? Just jump on him?”
Even jumping on him probably wouldn’t work.
“He’ll just carry me to the QB,” the 6-foot-8, 365-pounder said. “Myles is a freak.”
This wasn’t the first time Mailata has seen Garrett’s work up close. He had three pressures in the Week 6 matchup between the two teams and jumped over the long snapper on a field goal attempt near the end of the first half to block a kick, resulting in a game-tying touchdown return by safety Rodney McLeod.
This week, Mailata got to work against Garrett in a setting with much smaller consequences, something he values, even if it’s hard to take what you do against Garrett and transfer it to other players.
“Any time you get an opportunity to go up against the best, he truly is the best at that position, you’ve got to take advantage of those opportunities, especially if it’s a training rep,” he said. “I think it’s gotten me better. I’ve got a lot of film to go off now and watch and see how I can refine and sharpen and learn from yesterday and today. Good for me.”
There is a relentlessness to facing Garrett in practice, and it’s not for the mentally weak.
“It’s kind of just like this lose-win-lose-lose-lose-win-lose-lose. That’s how it felt like,” Mailata said. “I just kept on saying I have to keep pushing for the next play. Keep trying to just do your job and we’ll fix it up later.”
Garrett had 14 sacks last season, his seventh in a row with double digit sacks and he is the only player in NFL history to record at least 14 sacks in four consecutive seasons. The 2023 Defensive Player of the Year is the Browns’ all-time sacks leader with 102.5. He joined Lawrence Taylor as the only other player to record 12 or more sacks in five consecutive seasons and was the fourth-fastest player in NFL history to reach 100 career sacks.
For Mailata, the real benefit isn’t as much about going against Garrett but picking his brain and sharing what he knows. It’s good for the young Eagles pass rushers, too.
“Probably the cues that he looks at in tackles,” Mailata said. “Even just in between different plays we would exchange like, ‘Why’d you do that?’ I’d be like, ‘Why’d you do that?’ And we just go back and forth and give each other a little of amount of, ‘OK, this is why I did that.’ You talk after practice and we trade information about what we’re looking at.”
Actually going against a freak like Garrett might not offer much when it comes to other edge rushers, but at least Mailata can laugh about it.
“I’ll get a giggle,” he said about going back and watching. “I’ll get a giggle out of it. I’ll be honest.”
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