There's a pretty good reason you haven't noticed Quinyon Mitchell much lately

Think back. When was the last time you heard Quinyon Mitchell’s name mentioned during an Eagles game?

It’s been a while.

Mitchell is so good you don’t even notice him.

The Eagles’ 1^st-round pick from Toledo is having the best season by an Eagles rookie corner since Eric Allen in 1988, and he’s been shutting opposing receivers down so routinely that quarterbacks rarely even throw his way anymore.

Mitchell had 6.3 targets per game before the bye but just 3.6 per game since the bye, during the Eagles’ franchise-record 10-game winning streak.

Over the last three weeks, quarterbacks have thrown 92 passes against the Eagles, and only 10 have gone Mitchell’s way. Only five of those have been completed for a total of 40 yards.

And this is incredible, but since the bye week, Mitchell has allowed 25 or fewer yards in nine of 10 games. Even including the first four weeks of the season, he’s allowed 25 or fewer yards 10 times – two more than any other cornerback.

During those 10 games, he’s allowed 21 passes for 203 yards, according to Stathead analytics. 

That’s two completions for 20 yards per game.

Some 52 NFL cornerbacks have been targeted more than Mitchell during the winning streak, 62 have allowed more catches and 79 have allowed more yards.

Why challenge him? It’s not going to work.

Overall, Mitchell ranks 16^th in the NFL out of 57 corners who’ve been targeted at least 50 times with an 80.6 opposing passer rating. He’s 10^th in opposing completion percentage (55.7 percent) and 16^th in yards per target (6.4).

It’s not always easy staying focused when the ball rarely comes your way, but Mitchell clearly isn’t having an issue with it. 

“Yeah, just staying locked in, just staying prepared,” he said. “Always communicating, asking Slay what just happened on his side and coming back to the sidelines and just communicating with everybody with what they saw and just staying locked in. 

“I feel like if you don't get locked in, that's when it's going to come back to (hurt) you.”

It hasn’t all been perfect. Mitchell looked somewhat human against the Rams – Matt Stafford was 5-for-5 for 64 yards throwing at Mitchell, including a meaningless 27-yard touchdown to Cooper Kupp in the game’s final seconds – the only touchdown Mitchell has allowed this year.

But Stafford and Kupp do that to a lot of people. 

In 10 out of 14 games Mitchell has had a passer rating below 80. That’s the most in the NFL. 

Mitchell is a big part of the No. 1 pass defense in the NFL but certainly not the only part. 

Slay has been very good in his 12^th season, and he actually has a slightly lower opposing passer rating than Mitchell at 80.0. Cooper DeJean is at 84.0. The Eagles and the Steelers are the only teams with three corners below 85.0, and the Eagles just threw for nearly 300 yards against the Steelers.

“He’s just a mature player,” Reed Blankenship said. “You rarely see that in rookies now, and I don’t have to worry about him. I just look at him, we communicate, and he’s on board with anything that I have to say. 

“He handles himself so mature, like a seasoned vet. He’s doing a great job.”

Mitchell also adds a dimension of physicality you don’t see that often as an outside corner. He has 41 tackles and just three missed tackles.

But he’s mainly out there to cover wide receivers, and he’s done that as well as almost anybody in the league. He somehow doesn’t have an interception yet, but he does have 10 pass breakups – tied with Slay for most on the team – and just one outside the top 10 in the league.

“It really doesn’t matter (how many targets I get),” Mitchell said Wednesday. “I mean, I just come out prepared to compete. That's just how I look at it.”

Subscribe to Eagle Eye anywhere you get your podcasts: 
Apple Podcasts | YouTube Music | Spotify | Stitcher | Simplecast | RSS | Watch on YouTube