IN tribute to the success enjoyed by our division rivals, I figured in the spirit of the Christmas season, I’d be classy and tip my hat to them.
So I did it in the form of a song, that I wrote JUST for them. Enjoy.
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EAGLES 14 – Bengals 32
WHILE watching this game, at times I felt like I had more at stake than some of our players. There were a few players out there clearly dogging it, but with a little luck we won’t be seeing some of those faces in 2017. Speaking of luck, we seemed to have had as much bad luck as we did poor execution. A couple of the turnovers we surrendered were more bad luck, than real skill by the Bengals. It was just not going to be our day. Sometimes that happens. Sometimes it’s Pittsburgh, sometimes it’s Cincinnati. Gotta take the good and the bad equally.
On a day when the Offensive Line couldn’t protect QB Carson Wentz (36/60 – 60.0% – 308 – 1 – 3), the play-calling dialed up 60 passes compared to a team-wide 19 rushes. In the second half, starting RB Wendell Smallwood (8 – 19 – 2.3 – 0 – 0) didn’t see the field as we instead opted to lean on an undersized, 33 year old, with a broken rib. Our leading WR was Paul Turner (6 – 80 – 13.3 – 0), proving once again that many fans here have a better feel for our receiver situation than the Head Coach. (Remember the days of fans holding up“I’m a moron, I want a WR!” signs? We went and got a real WR (Terrell Owens) and went immediately to the Super Bowl, didn’t we? Maybe us fans shouldn’t be ignored so much.) Turner was targeted 7 times and snagged 6 passes for real yardage. And he’ll probably be benched/inactive again next week.
Defensively, I couldn’t help but notice the utter lack of pride that some of our players have. Later in the game there was an incident that threw a spotlight on it. When the Bengals allowed the TD to our TE, a couple of their defensive players jawed at each other over the blown coverage. It’s been weeks since our Secondary has shown that much pride. Our CB’s (Carroll/McKelvin) seem resigned to being sub-par to average players, who are happy enough to draw a check. For that reason, I hope that neither returns next year. We don’t need that attitude to contaminate our young, in-coming players.
Due to large cushions, free releases, and (let’s be honest) just downright shitty fucking coverage, yet another opposing QB was able to constantly get rid of the ball quickly. Our Secondary has effectively neutered our pass rush. Defensive Co-ordinator Jim Schwartz has to be ultimately held responsible for the decline of this unit, due to him not having any answers for how to fix the Secondary.
Did you notice?
How you and I seem to care more than certain players at this point.
Cincinnati Bengals
Sunday 1:00 Paul Brown Stadium Cincinnati, OH
NEEDS TO STEP UP:
WR Nelson Agholor. Over the long run, poor WR play will only stunt the growth of QB Carson Wentz. So this game will be a direct indicator of whether or not Agholor has the resiliency to be relied upon in the future. With WR Jordan Matthews (if he plays), still at less than 100%, Agholor will not only be given the opportunity to step up, but he’ll be relied upon to do so. If he comes back playing the way he did before he was benched, it will almost certainly mean we are drafting a WR early in the next Draft. This game will either be the straw that break Agholor’s career, or the defibrillator that brings him back.
WE MUST CONTAIN:
DE Carlos Dunlap. If I were building a defense and I could pick any NFL players to be on it, the second DE I’d take would be Dunlap. (The first would of course be J.J. Watt.) While it doesn’t hurt to have DT Geno Atkins and LB Vontaze Burfict as teammates, Dunlap is still a complete DE who does everything well, plays under control and actually sees what’s happening around him. By no means will he be an easy assignment for RT Allen Barbre to draw.
EAGLES STORY LINE:
We’re in a rut. Plain and simple. No need to sugar-coat it, we’re in a rut. That’s not the worst place to be though. A rut by definition says that there is an upside ALL AROUND us. We have potential. We’ve seen it. There isn’t a lack of talent, merely a poor coordination of it. There isn’t a lack of ability, just a stretch of poor execution. The good news is, every issue we have is correctable if we apply ourselves to actually correcting what’s wrong.
The first thing that needs fixing is attitude. Speaking frankly, I get the feeling that there are some players on this team who are fine with how things are going right now. I also get the feeling that a lot of those players will be let go and allowed to not shine for another team next year.
Something special is being built here. It’s taking time and real growing pains. In the process of fixing what’s broken, we’re learning why things break, why they work, and how to improve them. In the midst of disappointment, we are only disappointed because we see the potential.
BOTTOM LINE:
Time to see if we can bounce back in 2016, or if we have to wait until September.
PREDICTION:
EAGLES 20 – Bengals 17
WE enter this week at 5-6, showing less and less competitive competence, in each of the last three successive weeks. However, if we have the capacity to max out at 10 wins in a season, we have to keep plugging away. Even if our division leader has already 11 wins, there still exists the chance for a wild card playoff spot. In fact, even we finish 9-7, we might still (with some help) make it in. Say we make the playoffs, and get hot (like the 9-7, 2011 giants)… Hey, you never know. So as long as there’s a real chance, we have to keep plugging.
Your team needs you, fellow Eagles fans. Don’t bail on them now.
We’re going somewhere that has not been kind to us this year. I don’t mean Paul Brown Stadium, (since we haven’t been there yet). What I mean is anywhere on the road. I mentioned the word “playoffs” and I was serious. If the Eagles win 4 of these last 5 games, or (clutch the pearls) run the table, the math says that only something truly bizarre could keep us out of the postseason.
Let’s be clear, the point of the postseason is to win games. If we go, then we’re going as a wild card team. Period. That means no home games. To go to the playoffs and not win a single game, would blow a high Draft position for nothing. If we’re going to make this push, THIS WEEK has to be the beginning of us getting our shit together.
So let’s talk about the Four Things we need to look for, Week 13 versus the Bengals:
1) Get off the bus running the ball. We’re a better team when we make a hardcore commitment to the run. On top of that, Cincinnati sucks (28th) at defending the run. RB Ryan Matthews is out, and RB Darren Sproles is undersized and nursing sore ribs. This means that RB Wendell Smallwood will see 18 or more carries if we’re serious about winning.
2) Start the Presses. The 5 to 8 yard cushions that our CB’s give up routinely, have reduced our pass rush to nothing. We have to start disrupting the timing on throws, to make QB’s have to make reads during the play and not just pre-snap.
3) Treggs, Treggs and more Treggs. WR Bryce Treggs has been extremely effective in the limited number of downs he’s played so far. While he doesn’t have great stats, his biggest contribution is the clear-out routes he runs, which create space for others to get open. It would be smart not to waste him on Jet Sweeps. Instead line him up in the slot and have him run Safeties out of position, and maybe even free him up one-on-one.
4) More wrap artists and fewer hits. Eagles DB’s (right Nolan Carroll?) need to bring their arms to the tackle and not just expect a player to fall from a pop. Too often opposing players are bouncing off of, spinning off of, and running through these shoulder lunges. Even when a player is made to fall from one of these hits, they routinely are falling forward for an extra yard or two. Players in our Secondary are simply not man enough to lay guys out. If they aren’t going to cover their man, they should at least get him down after he makes the open, usually uncontested catch.
This game (like Detroit) should be a gimme. Whether we’ve learned anything since Week 5 will be on display here. The only question is: Are we willing to step up and commit to closing this team out?
NOW that the dust has settled (and the leak in my kitchen floor has been dealt with), we can look back at the game on Monday night. We can look at it for what it was, and with less of the anger and disappointment at FAILING SO HARD, in the moment.
Packers win 27 – 13. The win isn’t the headline. The headline here is the 13 points. I know in the last few days, sportswriters covering this have made the story about our QB, the WR we benched, Green Bay’s QB, our Secondary struggling. All of those angles are important, but the most relevant angle is 13 points. We scored only 13 points against a team on a 4 game slide, that came into the game giving up an average of 27 points per game.
This points to a recent, and systemic failure that hasn’t given us a large enough sample size to dissect reliably yet. Another week like this and there’ll be enough statistics to make for a story and not just a headline.
But what about the stuff that the stats don’t reveal? That’s the reason for these “Four Things” articles. To have an idea of what needs addressing BEFORE the game, so that we’re forced to honestly answer questions AFTER the game.
So, of the Four Things we were looking for in this last game, what exactly did we see?
1) Don’t let Rodgers relax. I mentioned that the night should be spent pushing QB Aaron Rodgers to his left. On the rare occasions where we did, he generally didn’t look nearly as sharp. We however, let him start the game scrambling to his right and we hardly got any pressure on him in the pocket. NOT DONE
2) Take it easy. Completing passes against the Packers secondary wasn’t hard at all, as QB Carson Wentz completed 66% of his passes on the night. DONE
3) Score when you can. Head Coach Doug Pederson didn’t leave any points on the table, by gambling on 4th down, or settling for an ill-advised FG instead of getting a touchdown. We didn’t produce, but it wasn’t due to careless coaching. DONE
4) Throw to the flats. Funny thing, we did a fair job of this and even used the Slant route better than we have at any point this season. Where we failed was in not taking advantage of WHY we needed to do this. The idea was to open up the middle for the run game. Minus Wentz’s 4 runs, we only bothered to run it 14 times all night long. We set a beautiful table, then proceeded to stand on it, squat, and take a shit in the middle of it. NOT DONE
This weeks score is a weak 2 out of 4. We had ONE central mission (harass Rodgers) and we failed at it so abysmally. Let’s hope the Bengals game is more fun to watch.
EAGLES 13 – Packers 27
WELL that was as much fun as being jabbed in the eye with a pointy stick, wasn’t it? Apparently “wrapping up” is no longer a part of the process of tackling. Which would have been less of a problem if we could have gotten some heat on the Packers QB, or if our entire Secondary wasn’t trying to win the Izel Jenkins Award
All in all, it was a shitty night be an Eagles fan.
The regression of QB Carson Wentz (24/36 – 66.6% – 254 – 0 – 1) has become impossible to ignore or dismiss at this point. The lack of an established offensive identity has him just throwing balls to open players, instead of playing QB.
In the absence of a legitimate run game, you have to have a QB who can carry a team on his shoulders. Last night we ran for 81 yards on 18 carries (4.5ypc). If you take away Wentz’s 4 runs for 33 yards, the remainder of our ground game was weak (14 – 48 – 3.4 – 0)
Hey here’s a thought: Defense! Wouldn’t some of that have been nice? Where can we buy some pass rush? Because we’re apparently out of it.
Did you notice?
With about 11:30 to go in the 3rd quarter, the announcers started talking about the Eagles championship drought. They didn’t say we didn’t have a championship; these NFL employees said we were suffering from a championship drought.
Green Bay Packers
MONDAY 8:30 Lincoln Financial Field PHILADELPHIA, Pennsylvania
NEEDS TO STEP UP:
DT Fletcher Cox: For the first time this year, I’m calling out the big guy. Even if he doesn’t record a sack, we need Cox to crush the pocket and keep the Packers QB from being able to step into his throws consistently.
WE MUST CONTAIN:
QB Aaron Rodgers: Like I said in my Four Things article, if we shut down Rodgers, we shut down the Packers. The smartest thing we can do is force him out of the pocket and to his left. When he scrambles he like to slide, then tries to get back up. If he does that, nailing the shit out of him would go a long way towards making him reluctant to run. Then you get him throwing away more balls, and either rushing or forcing some passes.
EAGLES STORY LINE:
Weeks like this are where losses to teams like the Lions and giants really hurt us. Even if we win this game and get to 6-5, we’re still on the floor of the division until at least next week. With Dallas likely to win the East, if we’re not going to tank for a better playoff spot, we’ll need to win a wild card berth. For that to happen, we need to win this Conference match-up.
We have the tools to do this job. It’s just a matter of using our tools correctly this week.
BOTTOM LINE:
If we don’t win this game, the math starts to add up against us, in relation to a wild card spot.
PREDICTION:
EAGLES 24 – Packers 22
THERE is absolutely no quit in us. Nor should there be. We got off to an amazing start. We exceeded everyone’s expectations. Including our own. Then we hit some adversity, which included a few self-inflicted wounds. Stupid and costly errors that stalled our progress and set us back. Today we are a .500 ballclub, sitting at the bottom of the division. Realize however, even at the bottom we are still this good and have the chance at so much more ahead of us. That is, if we come together as a team and don’t quit.
No one is saying that the journey back up will be quick, but we’ll start with small steps. One week at a time. This week we don’t have to worry about a whole football team. The Green Bay Fudge Packers are basically just one guy: QB Aaron Rodgers.
We stop him, and we’ll stop them.
Generally it’s frowned upon to make such a statement about a pro team, but fuck that. I’m not a journalist and truth is truth. Name one Packers player besides Rodgers who worries you. I’ll wait….. If your first thought was a WR, then you just made my point. And please don’t mention the vastly overrated, largely one-dimensional, OLB Clay Matthews–
Shut up Clay.
Look, there really isn’t much to this team. Offensively they go as Rodgers goes, but their defense is a hilarious tragedy. Particularly the part they call a secondary. The going excuse for why they don’t cover anybody, is because they have a bunch of injured starters. Seems to me, if you pay a back-up to play a position, he should be able to play that position, at least competently. Instead, it’s like fucking F-Troop back there. But I’m getting ahead of myself here.
So let’s talk about the Four Things we need to look for, Week 12 versus Aaron Rodgers (ostensibly the Packers) :
1) Don’t let Rodgers relax. He’s a pretty good and fairly aggressive scrambler, so when I suggest getting him to run, it’s well considered. Bringing heat from his right, will force him to his left. He can make those throws, but they are among his least sharp passes. Also he tends to hold the ball longer in those instances, which gives us more time to lay tooth-rattling hits on him.
2) Take it easy. Completing passes against the Packers “secondary” has been like taking candy from a baby for most teams. This is a great opportunity for the Eagles to blow it by getting cute with the play-calling. The blueprint on this has already been drawn up by prior opponents: 1) Create spacing around a WR, 2) Throw the ball to that open WR, 3) Catch the ball, Mr. WR, 4) Why are you just standing there?! RUN DAMMIT!
3) Score when you can. Don’t leave FG’s on the board. Don’t try to own time of possession. The Packers offense can heat up quickly, and from out of nowhere. This is not a team we want to have a shootout with, but deliberately trying to make it a low scoring game can set us up for a stunning, last-minute loss. When points are available this week, take them.
4) Throw to the flats. Getting the ball out to the flat-
-will draw the OLB’S away from the box and give our RB’s room to roam. We have to keep QB Carson Wentz in the upright position, and nothing keeps a QB’s jersey clean, like being able to run the ball.
Beat one guy and you beat the whole team. This is a simple recipe and I’ll be stunned if we can’t pull it off. Playing the Packers this time of year makes me nervous. When we play in Lambeau. However, we aren’t playing in the godforsaken, cheese addled, wasteland known as Wisconsin. Instead, we’ll be at home, in the Linc, hanging out with 69,000 of our nearest and dearest, pushing the Eagles ahead to victory. True, we’ve hit some bumps this year, but adversity won’t scare us, stop us, or keep us down. Because we’re strong. Because we’re fighters. Because there is absolutely no quit in us.
IT was a loss. It wasn’t pretty. Those facts having been acknowledged, it wasn’t all bad. You can’t learn from your setbacks if you don’t identify the things you did right, and build on those things. Because the name of the game is improvement.
In case anybody forgot, our Head Coach is a rookie, and he’s coaching a rookie QB who’s expected to be the face of this franchise for the next decade or so. This whole season was supposed to be a learning season in a weak division, that has suddenly and surprisingly, become the strongest in the game. Yet our team is still keeping pace. As I said, not all bad.
We posted our lowest score of the season in the 15 – 26 loss, but at no point did the game ever really run away from us. Given everything wrong that we did, versus everything right that they did, you’d expect us to have gotten blown out. We still ran for 113 yards, with a reliable 4.3 yard average. We also held Seattle to 5/15 on 3rd down. Once again, it wasn’t all bad.
But what about the stuff that the stats don’t reveal? That’s the reason for these “Four Things” articles. To have an idea of what needs addressing BEFORE the game, so that we’re forced to honestly answer questions AFTER the game.
So, of the Four Things we were looking for in this last game, what exactly did we see?
1) Attack the left with RB Darren Sproles. We didn’t get to do much of this as Sproles left the game with a rib injury after just 3 touches. NOT DONE
2) Spread ’em out. (Grumble) We did this, but not nearly enough when RB Ryan Mathews was still in the game. This is a VERY technical grading, but I have to be fair. DONE
3) Challenge their CB’s. The Eagles focused entirely too much on getting our receivers in space, and it played into the hands of the Seahawks as it allowed them to bait QB Carson Wentz effectively for one of his two interceptions. NOT DONE
4) Set the edge. We did a really good job here. With the exception of that early 72 yard TD run, the Eagles allowed 80 yards on 29 carries for an average of 2.7 yards per crack. QB Russell Wilson‘s longest run was 7 yards, and he was kept off the edges and in the Tackle Box for the most part. DONE
So that gets us to 2 out of 4 for the week. It briefly makes me wonder what the result could have been if not for a couple of key injuries. (Particularly with respect to Sproles effect on LB’s in the short passing game.) However, we have Green Bay coming up next. So instead of dwelling on what could have been, I’m more interested in strengthening and perfecting what it is we have. Because the name of the game is improvement.
EAGLES 15 – Seahawks 26
SAFETY Malcolm Jenkins (4 – 0 – 0 – 0) was expecting it to be a “knockdown, drag out” game, and it seemed that we did get knocked down and dragged quite a bit in that game.
You could tell it was going to be a long day at the office, when Seattle’s previously shrug-worthy run game, reeled off a 72 yard TD run to start the day. Which (YAY!) by the way, set a record as the longest run ever in that stadium. We also (ALRIIIGHT!) allowed their QB to catch a 15 yard touchdown from a WR.
It was remarkable to see that their WR’s can even throw passes, as we struggle to teach ours how to get separation on routes and catch balls. All game long we had to hear douchebag Phil Simms drone on and on, about how “overlooked” and “underrated” he thinks Seattle’s WR’s are. Meanwhile, we have a first round draft pick who cost us a touchdown, because he doesn’t pay attention to where he’s lined up.
Having just had my wisdom tooth extracted Tuesday, my blood pressure was up high enough during the game, to cancel the pain killers I’m on. Thank you Eagles. It wouldn’t be a real NFL season without at least one game causing me actual physical pain or a nose bleed from the sheer frustration of watching you. Good times.
Our (lack of) passing game helped kill us yesterday. Not just in terms of drops, but in terms of where we went with the ball. To put it in sharp perspective, we averaged 4.3 yards per run yesterday. However, for the game we only averaged 4.2 yards per play. That’s because we only averaged 4.1 yards per pass attempt.
Once RB’s Ryan Mathews (7 – 31 – 4.4 – 0 – 0) and Darren Sproles (2 – 15 – 7.5 – 0 – 0) were knocked out of the game with injuries, QB Carson Wentz (23/45 – 51.1% – 218 – 2 – 2) got very little help from his supporting cast. Specifically WR Nelson Agholor (errors are only stats in Baseball), who is apparently paid to drop balls and line up wrong. (Dear Eagles, if that’s all you want, I’ll work for half of what he’s getting. Just sayin’.)
On the other side of the ball, don’t be surprised if you see our Secondary on a milk carton. Did you see the way they covered Seattle’s receivers? Of course you didn’t see it, because they didn’t do it! The 5 and 6 yard cushions that our CB’s kept giving Seattle were a goddamned joke. They have guys on that roster who couldn’t run the 40 in 40, and we were respecting their speed?! All it did was lead to a number of cheap and easy passes from a QB who we kept in the pocket pretty well, by rushers who generally stayed in their lanes. Missing from the game was the sort of man-press that helps pass rushers, and causes QB’s to make mistakes.
Did you notice?
Wentz forcing a deep ball to WR Bryce Treggs who was double covered by CB Richard Sherman and FS Earl Thomas. Sherman of course intercepted the pass. Why on EARTH would any QB throw that ball? Also, what could Wentz have seen on that play, that was somehow a less attractive option?
EAGLEMANIACAL.com 