Thurmond's a playmaker and a filmmaker

IN A SEASON of mostly unpleasant Eagles surprises thus far, Walter Thurmond has been just the opposite - a guy with a sketchy injury history, signed to provide depth at corner, who has been healthy and reliable as a starting safety, a position he had never played before coming here this past offseason.

Thurmond leads the team in interceptions, with three, headed into Monday night's visit from the Giants, the team Thurmond might have thought he'd be playing for at this point.

Fresh off a strong performance as a Super Bowl-winning nickel corner for the Seahawks in 2014, Thurmond signed in New York. It was a one-year deal for $3 million, but Thurmond had designs on establishing roots. Though the Eagles and Thurmond's former Oregon coach, Chip Kelly, were also interested that offseason, Thurmond wanted entrée to New York for an off-field interest - his cinema company, "Get More Films."

"I've executive produced a couple of films that are being submitted to the various film festivals, so I've been working on distribution and stuff," Thurmond said Friday. "I'm in the pre-production stages, working on a documentary on the recording artist Eddie Levert (lead vocalist of the O'Jays) that I'm scheduled to direct.

"I always had a passion for film," said Thurmond, whose degree from Oregon is in political science. "I probably watched more movies than I did sports games. As I got older and suffered a serious knee injury my senior year in college, it just put things in perspective as far as life after football and what I want to do. Film was the route that I wanted to go."

Thurmond is "self-taught," as he said: "Read various books on directing and producing. Started breaking down movies like I would game tape . . . I've met some great people, just working on various projects who've mentored me through this whole process."

Thurmond wanted to - and did - make NYC film world contacts after signing with the Giants. He furthered a previous professional relationship with Jamal Joseph, a Columbia film professor and writer, director and producer, who last year worked with Thurmond on a film entitled "Chapter and Verse," set in Harlem. What he didn't do was play much football. In the second game of the Giants' season, against Arizona, Thurmond tore a pectoral tendon and went on injured reserve.

"Just going in for a strip, the receiver kind of pulled away from me, and I pulled away as well. Just that inertia from the force between the two tore my pec tendon," Thurmond recalled.

Seeing his season and his chances for a big-money, long-term contract disappear in an instant was not a new sensation for Thurmond, who entered 2015 having played in just 36 of a possible 80 NFL games in five seasons. He has been on IR previously for a broken ankle/leg (2011) and a hamstring (2012). Kelly said this week he thinks Thurmond would have been a first-round pick in 2010, instead of a fourth-rounder, if he hadn't suffered that season-ending knee injury four games into his senior year.

Kelly was asked what he expected when he signed Thurmond to a one-year, $3.25-million deal in the spring.

"Honestly, what you guys see right now," Kelly said. "I thought Walter was an outstanding football player when I coached him at Oregon. If he didn't get hurt his senior year, I was convinced he was a first-round pick, but he had a really bad knee injury . . . He just has been kind of snakebit.

"The injury he had in college has never reoccurred. He had a pec, he had this, he had that, it was just different things, but that was the same player that I saw . . . My first year as head coach, he was a captain. He was all over the field, was our best defensive football player, was always around the ball."

Eagles running back and Oregon alum Kenjon Barner was a freshman Ducks defensive back when Thurmond was a senior.

"You gotta recognize - DB skills are real . . . Walt was a playmaker," Barner said. "An extreme playmaker. Very smart. Very high IQ when it comes to football. Can dissect a play within seconds."

Injuries have kept Thurmond well short of NFL stardom, at least until now.

"It's part of the game," he said. "If I suffer (another) serious injury, like the ones I've had to my leg or my knee, I would probably contemplate my future as far as the NFL's concerned, but that's one of the things where I don't think about it, and I just go out there and play every game like it's my last, because you just never know in this business."

Thurmond said he figures if he weren't really talented, he'd be out of the NFL by now - teams don't like paying players who can't stay healthy.

"Up until this year, I've played five seasons and I've been on IR three of them," he said. "Most guys don't get that opportunity, to (stay) in the league. I think it's one of those things where every time I've stepped on the field, I've made plays. I have a body of work where teams know I can play in this league, despite the injuries."

Thurmond's strong play for the Eagles has not gone unnoticed by the Giants, whose pass defense ranks last in the league.

"He comes down in the box, he tackles, he seems to do an outstanding job. You would expect him to have outstanding range (as a converted corner) and he does," Giants coach Tom Coughlin said this week.

"We were excited about him while he was here, and (as a questioner noted) he was injured and out," Coughlin said. "We've missed and lost a good football player that would have been beneficial for us to have in our secondary. What I see this year, the conversion to safety, he's all over the place - he's down low, he's up high, he's making interceptions in games. He's playing really well."

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