Is Saquon Barkley’s resurgence enough for the Eagles to exploit the Bills’ vulnerable defense?

It’s hard to watch Saquon Barkley’s 2025 season with the Philadelphia Eagles and consider it anything but a disappointment.

Sure, he wasn’t bad per se, he’ll still finish the 2025 NFL season with over 1,000 yards, maybe even in the mid-1,200s, but after going over 2,000 yards in one of one of the best rushing seasons in NFL historyranking in the lower end of the top 10 isn’t the result many expected when Howie Roseman gave the Penn State product a raise for his second season in midnight green.

Fortunately, after taking a backseat to the Eagles’ offense in November and seeing his stats drop off considerably during the Birds’ losing streak, Barkley found his sea legs in the month of December, rushing for at least 100 yards in two of the team’s three games while averaging a very impressive 5.3 yards per carry on the ground.

After recording just one game with a rushing attempt longer than 19 yards in the first 12 games of the season, Barkley has gone 40-plus twice in three weeks, scoring 52 against the Los Angeles Chargers in the MNF and 48 against the Washington Commanders in Week 16.

Is Barkley back? Has he unlocked that k-factor that has been missing from his game all season, or did he just get lucky on two great runs, dropping his average in three games under 4.0 yards per carry without those two runs removed? For the Eagles’ sake, let’s hope it’s the former, as it’s clear that Nick Sirianni still wants to be a run-first team, even if the team’s attempts aren’t directly related to production due to so many runs under 3.0 yards.

Fortunately, Barkley and the Eagles have a chance to really pick something up in the penultimate game of the regular season, with their opponent, the Buffalo Bills, having one of the worst rushing defenses in the NFL.

The Eagles need to take advantage of the Bills’ rushing defense

With 16 weeks of action in the books, the Bills rank 29th in offensive defenseallowing 5.4 yards per carry and 24 rushing touchdowns since September, not good for the 31st and 32nd best marks in the NFL. Through 15 games of action, Sean McDormitt’s unit has held just four of its opponents to less than 100 yards on the ground, with four, the Baltimore Ravens, Atlanta Falcons, Tampa Bay Buccaneers and New England Patriots, surpassing the 200-yard mark.

To make matters worse for Buffalo, they will be without two defensive tackles when they take on the Eagles, with both Daquon Jones and Jordan Phillips out, which, combined with their top defensive tackle, Ed Oliver, already landing on IR, leaves the team pretty light in the middle of their defense.

Sure, there were games where the Eagles faced below-average rushing defenses and didn’t really capitalize on them. Barkley was held under 100 yards in September against the Los Angeles Rams and Tampa Bay Buccaneers, both of whom he had success against in 2024, and picked up just 22 yards on the ground against the Dallas Cowboys in Week 12 despite the fact that 12 of their 15 opponents ran for 10 on the season.

Fortunately, since hitting 100-plus against the Chargers, Barkley has seemingly rejuvenated and has come to accept that the best way to hit home runs is to consistently put the bat on the ball and force opponents to play him fair, instead of rushing the sideline to turn a potential small gain into a negative play. As a result of Barkley’s new attitude, the Eagles get better field position on second and third down, which, in turn, makes life easier for Jalen Hurts and company, and the book opens up for Sirianni, Kevin Patul and company, with Dallas Goedert and DeVonta Smith reaping the benefits early.

Throw it all together, and Week 17 could be the final piece in getting Barkley back on track in time for the playoffs.

Could the Bills go all-in on bottling Barkley and reset his late 2025 progression to the beginning? Of course, the Denver Broncos went all-in to slow Barkley and held him to a season low as a result. But given the Bills’ tendencies, personnel and playoff position, Week 17 could serve as the perfect dress rehearsal for Barkley, where he can find success against another Super Bowl contender, make good film and allow Tank Bigsby to run out the clock in the frigid cold of upstate New York.