Can a 33-year-old former Pro Bowler help Eagles replace Nolan Smith?

Can a 33-year-old former Pro Bowler help Eagles replace Nolan Smith? originally appeared on NBC Sports Philadelphia

Za'Darius Smith arrived in Philly just a couple weeks ago, and he's been doing his homework every night, figuring out a little bit more each day about Vic Fangio's defense.

Those homework assignments just got a lot harder.

I'm just now getting here and these guys have been here all training camp," he said. So they've been sprinkling it in a little bit every day. They'll give me one package to learn throughout the week, boom, the next package the next week, boom, the next package.

But now that we had a guy go down, it's like now I got a double up on my homework."

Nolan Smith is out for at least four weeks and most likely through the bye week in five weeks, which means Za'Darius Smith is about to see his playing time increase. Possibly dramatically.

It's just the next man up," he said. That's an injury that we didn't want to happen. But it's football. It's a part of the game. Hopefully, we all can just get in and rotate and help this boy that we're gonna miss."

Za'Darius Smith has a terrific resume: Three Pro Bowls, three double-digit sack seasons, more than 70 career sacks.

But he's also 33, still learning a new scheme and coming off a summer where he wasn't even in a training camp.

Can he play more than the 22 snaps per game he's averaged the last two weeks? How much more can he handle?

Yeah, I mean, I can," he said. But it's just still me learning the defense. You know, I just got here, what, two weeks now? I got all the nickel stuff down, but base calls are something that I'm working on now."

Smith, who aggravated the triceps injury he originally hurt in the Super Bowl, is averaging 47 snaps per game, so that's 47 snaps the Eagles have to make up.

It won't be just Za'Darius Smith getting increased reps. Jalyx Hunt might play a little more than the 39 snaps per game he's playing, but Josh Uche could increase his 18 snaps per game, and Azeez Ojulari, Ogbo Okoronkwo and Patrick Johnson could also be in the mix.

But Smith is the only one in the room who had nine sacks last year, he's the only who's been to a Pro Bowl, and he's actually the Eagles' only edge rusher who's broken into positive territory in sacks this year. He had a half against the Chiefs.

I'm still young in this, man," he said. You know, my first couple of years in Baltimore, I didn't play as much, so I still got a lot left in the tank. Obviously, I'm not going to turn (more snaps) down, but you look at guys like Ogbo, Azeez, now they can get an opportunity.

It's next man up, man, but that's our brother, I look at (Nolan) like a Smith bro, you know?"

Za'Darius Smith averaged 36 snaps per game last year, splitting time between the Browns and Lions.

He's already made a difference in the Eagles' wins over the Chiefs and Rams. But although the Eagles are 3-0 and they've been exceptional after halftime, allowing only one scoring drive more than 10 yards, they have just three sacks, which ranks 29thin the NFL and is the 2nd-fewest they've had through three games since sacks became an official stat in 1982. They're also 27thin run defense.

So there's room for improvement, and that improvement will have to come over the next month or more without one of their best defensive linemen.

Great defense," Za'Darius Smith said. It showed up last week. We all saw it. Obviously, we haven't got the sacks that we wanted and the pressure. We're working on it. We're working throughout the scheme.

So we're just going to keep doing what we're supposed to do as a football team and play as one."