Eagles
Eagles Sign Elliott, Lovato to One-Year Deals
Penn State Great Valley MBA, Penn State Berks Undergrad, Eagle Scout and Vigil Honor, IT Service Manager. I joined Sports Talk Philly in 2017 and root for all the Philly teams (as well as their minor league counter parts).
All posts by Paul BowmanPublished22 Feb 2019
By Paul Bowman, Sports Talk Philly Editor 
While the Eagles did not get the news they were hoping for in regards to the compensatory picks earlier Friday, they made sure to handle some in-house business.
The team signed both kicker Jake Elliot and long-snapper Rick Lovatto to one-year deals.
The signings are not major suprises as both players have fewer than three years of tenure in the league and were Exclusive Rights Free Agents (ERFAs). Essentially, that means that the Eagles can choose to sign them to deals. The ERFA system essentially makes it so that a team has three years of a player on a deal similar to a rookie deal that would be signed by later draft picks.
Roster Moves: #Eagles have signed K Jake Elliott and LS Rick Lovato to one-year contracts through 2019.#FlyEaglesFly pic.twitter.com/T7AzFmClBv
— Philadelphia Eagles (@Eagles) February 22, 2019
Elliott has made 52 of his 62 field goal attempts over the last two seasons as well as 72 of 77 extra points. Overall he has accounted for 228 points since taking over for Caleb Sturgis in 2017.
Elliott also holds NFL records for the longest field goal by a rookie (62), longest field goal in the playoffs by a rookie (53) and longest field goal in a Super Bowl by a rookie (46) as well as Eagles franchise records for the longest field goal (62) and most field goal kicks over 50 yards in a season (5).
Lovatto, meanwhile has been the long snapper every step of the way for the young kicker. He has done well since joining the Eagles and both he and Elliot have even gone so far as to make quite a few tackles on special teams.
It was certainly going to be a tall task to replace long-time long-snapper Jon Dorenbos who was a fan favorite at perhaps the least likely position. Lovatto doesn’t have the massive fan support yet, but he has been extremely productive on the field in his first two seasons.
The pair will be restricted free agents next offseason, so longer-term deals will become a more likely option at that point.
