Jalen Carter Wants a New Deal. Jeffery Simmons Just Made It Complicated.

The Philadelphia Eagles have a Jalen Carter problem. Not the bad kind, not yet. But the kind that gets expensive fast.

Carter showed up to minicamp clearly wanting an extension. He’s not alone in that, plenty of players do. But the timing here matters because Jeffery Simmons just reset the market for interior defensive linemen with a $105.8 million deal from the Titans. And Simmons and Carter play the same position at an elite level.

Simmons is probably the best in the league at what he does. That’s why he got the bag and pushed the ceiling higher for everyone else. Jimmy Kempski of the Philly Voice broke down what that means for Carter and it’s not as straightforward as you’d think.

“The overwhelming sentiment from an Eagles perspective was that Jalen Carter should be happy that the iDL market got pushed up a bit. I view that a little differently. In my opinion, it could have been worse,” Kempski wrote. “The top of the iDL market increased roughly 11 percent. However, the salary cap has increased roughly 18 percent since Jones signed his deal that set a new top of the market in 2024. Simmons is a significantly more productive player than Jones of late.

“Simmons will turn 29 on Sunday. Carter turned 25 in April. However, while Carter has shown flashes that he can be among the league’s best players, he had a disappointing 2025 season during which his production wasn’t close to Simmons.’”

That’s the rub. Carter had a down year. Not terrible, but not what you expect from a guy who looked like a generational disruptor coming out of Georgia. Meanwhile Simmons is still producing like a monster. The age gap helps Carter. The production gap does not.

Then there’s the other stuff. The off-field questions. The spitting incident with Dak Prescott last season. Teams notice that. Agents notice teams noticing that. It becomes a negotiating chip, even if it shouldn’t be the deciding factor.

Still, talent is talent. Carter can wreck a game plan by himself when he’s locked in. The Eagles know that. They’d be foolish to let him walk. But they also don’t want to overpay for potential when the production hasn’t fully matched it yet.

This feels like a standoff that gets resolved, but not without some tension first. Simmons’ contract set a number. Carter’s camp can point to it. The Eagles can point to the difference in results. Somewhere in the middle is the real deal.