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It may have taken until the seventh round and the 251st pick, but we finally saw the coolest entrance in this year’s NFL Draft when the Eagles announced they were selecting defensive tackle Uar Bernard.
The cape, that’s what got me.
Bernard did not play at an American college. In fact, he didn’t play anywhere last year, or the season before, or the season before that. Bernard has never played American football before in his life. But he burst onto the scene over the last few weeks after testing off the charts and cementing himself on perhaps the biggest freakish athlete in the Draft.
As The Athletic’s Bruce Feldman wrote earlier this month, Bernard’s trainer, Jordan Luallen, has been raving about his raw natural athletic ability.
Uar Bernard (pronounced “ooh-are”) measured in earlier this week at the NFL’s HBCU showcase at 6-4 1/2, 306 pounds with 11-inch hands and almost 36-inch arms. Other people who have spent their lifetimes in football say Bernard looks like a Marvel creation. Bernard’s body fat: 6 percent. He vertical-jumped 39 inches and broad-jumped 10-10, which was 14 inches more than any other defensive tackle did at this year’s combine. His 40-yard dash: 4.63.
“Hands down, he is the most explosive athlete I’ve ever seen in my life,” Luallen told The Athletic. “He broad jumped 10-10, and it was effortless. At 306 pounds. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
There’s no way of knowing if this is going to amount to anything more than a curiosity, but Howie Roseman and the Eagles are banking on their coaching staff being able to unearth an NFL-caliber defensive tackle out of this raw athleticism.
Bernard got on the radar of teams like the Eagles through the NFL’s International Player Pathway program, the same program that brought Jordan Mailata to the United States. Ultimately, Roseman and the front office took a chance on the former Australian rugby player in the 7th round of the 2018 Draft and turned him into a perennial Pro Bowl left tackle.
But the Eagles didn’t stop there. Following the Draft, they also signed IPP defensive lineman Joshua Weru of Kenya to a free agent contract.
Roseman has had a knack for unearthing jewels in places very few others do. Moro Ojomo was not a part of the IPP, but was taken in the 7th round of the 2023 Draft and, over the last two years, has turned into one of the team’s most valuable defensive linemen, piling up six sacks and 12 QB hits in 17 games last year.
With the Bernard pick and Weru signing, the Eagles did exactly what you’re supposed to do in the 7th round. They’re taking a chance on their coaching staff being able to teach totally raw but tremendous athletes how to play American football.
Recent history says they can.
