Eagles rookie Jalen Carter might already be one of NFL's best defensive players

Anyone who lined up to try to block Jalen Carter this summer seemed to rave about him afterward. They were in awe of his strength, his moves and his speed. They often said he looked unstoppable.

It turns out, his Philadelphia Eagles teammates might have been right.

"No, I wouldn't say unstoppable," Carter told reporters in Los Angeles on Sunday after the Eagles' 23-14 win over the Rams. "I've still got a lot to improve."

Maybe he does, but that's the frightening part because he's already off to a remarkable start. With his two sacks on Sunday, — something no Eagles rookie defensive tackle had done in a game since Corey Simon in 2000 — Carter now has 3 ½ sacks through his first five NFL games. That puts him just behind Reggie White (4 ½ in 1985) and Simon (4 in 2000) for the best start ever for an Eagles rookie pass rusher. In fact, his 3 ½ sacks are equal to what every other rookie defensive tackle in the NFL has — combined.

On Sunday, playing against a team that boasts Aaron Donald, it wasn't hard to argue that the 22-year-old Carter was the best defensive player on the field. And if that sounds crazy, consider that Carter has 23 quarterback pressures through five games, according to Pro Football Focus. That ties him with Donald, a seven-time first-team All-Pro, for most among defensive tackles in the NFL.

"He's had a great first five weeks," Eagles coach Nick Sirianni said. "We have high hopes for him. He has to keep proving it over and over and over again because if you want to be considered in the top part of this league as a football player, it's about consistency and it's about doing it year-in and year-out. 

"So, he's had a good start."

That is obviously an understatement, because through the first five games of this season, Carter hasn't just been one of the NFL's best rookies, he's been one of the best defensive tackles — and defensive players — in the entire league. He is already the odds-on favorite to be the NFL's Defensive Rookie of the Year. If he keeps this up, he'll be in the conversation for the overall Defensive Player of the Year, too.

That, of course, is what the rest of the NFL feared back in April as Carter slipped down the top of the draft before the Eagles traded up to take him at No. 9. He was universally hailed as the best defensive player in the draft, with the potential to be a Donald-like interior pass rusher. The Eagles saw him as the perfect replacement for Javon Hargrave, the Pro Bowl defensive tackle who left in free agency for the San Francisco 49ers.

And that's exactly what he's been.

"He's just been playing phenomenal," said Eagles edge rusher Haason Reddick. "He's a young guy with a lot of energy, a lot of juice. He didn't get picked No. 9 overall for no reason. Everybody knew that he had this type of ability."

Yes, they did. The only reason he slipped as far in the draft as he did was because of his involvement in a fatal car crash in Georgia that resulted in two misdemeanor charges for reckless driving and racing. The Eagles were convinced they had a strong enough locker room — particularly along the defensive line — to allay any fears about Carter's character.

Now they are reaping the rewards.

"I know coming in, his draft stock dropped a little bit, but shoot, we took a chance and I love it that it's paying off," said Eagles defensive end Brandon Graham. "At the end of the day, people make mistakes and people got stuff that happens in their life. I'm just happy that (Eagles GM) Howie (Roseman) did his due diligence and got him in and knew that we would be taking care of him here."

Roseman was right so far, but did he or anyone in the Eagles organization even imagine a start this good? Probably not, considering Carter was part of a heavy defensive line rotation playing behind starters Fletcher Cox and Jordan Davis. He didn't play in more than 50 percent of the Eagles' defensive snaps in any of the first four games. But with Cox out on Sunday, Carter ended up taking 70 percent of the snaps — and he made them count.

He's been so good that he's been drawing constant double-teams — remarkable considering he's on a line with Graham and Josh Sweat, with Reddick coming off the edge. Despite that, according to PFF, he leads all defensive tackles with a pass-rush win rate of 20.9 percent, which would even put him in the top 10 on the edge-rusher list.

His PFF overall grade of 91.8 is the best grade they've ever given an interior lineman through the first five games of his career, and this is the 18th season they've been doing player grades. Carter is their top-graded interior defensive tackle this season, even ahead of Donald. In fact, among all defensive players, only Cleveland's Myles Garrett and San Francisco's Nick Bosa have been given a higher overall score.

"We obviously see the kind of player he is and that he can be," said Eagles defensive coordinator Sean Desai said. "He continues to grow in that role and continues to keep doing better and better every week."

"Phenomenal player who works really hard to continue to get better," Sirianni added. "(He's) been a phenomenal player through the first five weeks, right? So he's just got to keep doing it."

If he does, he could end up making history. Only one player has ever been both the NFL's Defensive Rookie of the Year and the NFL's Defensive Player of the Year in the same season — Lawrence Taylor back in 1981. Micah Parsons made a run at that impressive double two years ago, though he finished a distant second in the overall Defensive Player of the Year voting to Pittsburgh's T.J. Watt.

Could Carter actually pull it off? There's a long way to go before that becomes a serious possibility, but it's still remarkable that it's even a thought nearly one-third of the way through the season. The Eagles knew he was a "phenomenal talent," as Sirianni said, when they watched him at Georgia. They saw it again at practice all summer long.

What he's done in the first five games, though, has exceeded everyone's expectations and quickly turned Carter to one of the best and most dominant defensive tackles — and defenders — in the league.

"We won't put him in Canton yet," Sirianni said. "He's got to just keep going each and every day and getting better. It's about consistency. He's got the ability to do it. He's just got to be consistent with it, and that's by working hard and growing each day."

Ralph Vacchiano is the NFC East reporter for FOX Sports, covering the Washington Commanders, Philadelphia Eagles and New York Giants. He spent the previous six years covering the Giants and Jets for SNY TV in New York, and before that, 16 years covering the Giants and the NFL for the New York Daily News. Follow him Twitter at @RalphVacchiano.