EAGLEMANIACAL.com

HO HO HO!  I bring you the gift of Knowledge! 

Mostly because the Win/Loss record doesn’t count; and in part because players are shuttled in and out, lots of fans are under the impression that the preseason doesn’t mean anything. You get people coughing up hairball wisdom with statements like:

 THEY RUN VANILLA SCHEMES SO THEY DON’T GIVE ANYTHING AWAY.

Yeah. BOTH teams do that. Actually, all teams do that. You know if these people listened to what they had just said, they’d be MORE concerned instead of less. If both teams are playing vanilla (basic) football, then what you’re seeing is player vs the player. It’s skill for skill. You vs me, without all the trickery. If your guys are getting beat at basic football, your team has a problem.

THE STARTERS ONLY PLAYED A SERIES OR TWO.

For players part of the point of preseason is to shake off rust. The other part is to get comfortable with any improvements or changes over what they did last year. In football more reps is better. Fewer reps only mean more miscommunications and bad reads when the games count.

WE ONLY LOOKED BAD BECAUSE THIS GUY OR THAT GUY DIDN’T PLAY.

Holding out players for precautionary reasons is part of preseason games. If that exposes a lack of depth, teams know to make moves to shore it up. If they see they have a glut of players at one position they have trade bait. You can’t find that out without playing these games.

IT’S NOT LIKE THESE GAMES COUNT.

Ask Curtis Marsh if these games don’t count. Ask former EAGLE Kurt Coleman if these games don’t count. Coaches across the NFL use these games as an evaluation tool to determine whether or not a man can make his living playing NFL football. If your job hinged on your boss evaluating less than 4 hours of your performance, would you say those 4 hours were meaningless? I highly doubt it. Every time you watch one of these “meaningless” games that’s exactly what’s going on.

Any fan who thinks of the preseason as a preview of the regular season is likely one of these:

1. Under 13
2. New to the sport
3. An absolute idiot

 DO NOT assume that a good preseason means a good regular season. Quite often it means the exact opposite. Step back and just do what the coaches are doing: Look at the players.

By the way, did you see my letter to MY HATERS? That shit is delicious!