Reviews

THE RIVALS 2019 (PT 3 of 3)

Posted by The BEAST on 2020/01/12
Posted in: Conversations, NFC East, NFL, Reviews, Rivals, Uncategorized. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

NFC EAST

IT’S THAT TIME AGAIN KIDDIES!!!

GENERALLY when I talk football, it’s about my Eagles. I tend to keep mum about our rivals, unless we have a game coming up against one of them. Otherwise, I’ve reserved most talk about them for my Pre-Draft Preview, which drops each April. (Look for it).

In 2017 however, I decided to try something new, and give our fan base a running commentary of what the division is doing around us. This ensures that Eagles fans ARE actually the best informed, and most knowledgeable fans, in the NFL. (Provided you visit this site often.) These updates will come out three times during the season: After Weeks 3, 9, and 15.

Note: This was supposed to come out weeks ago, but since the Eagles playoff push was going to affect how Dallas’s season was viewed, I pushed it back so that a clear verdict could be written for the Cowboys season. Then there was the workload for OUR playoff week…

Since then every team beside the Eagles, has fired their head coach. This report will focus on the state of the team as of season’s end, and not attempt to calculate the impact of the firings or hirings. I almost skipped this, but this report HAS to happen so that I can wrap up the 2019 season.

This is where we left off in PART 2.

This is where things are today:

Washington Redskins: 3 – 13, dead last in the division

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Congratulations on the number two pick in the next draft! (That’s assuming that the next draft doesn’t involve Iran.) If they could, the ‘skins would use that pick to draft an entire offense. They need to. Ranking 32nd in points and passing yards, 31st in yardage, and 22nd in rushing, is a sign that maybe your team has trouble winning ball games.

Defensively they’re nearly as awful. While coming in 31st vs the run, 27th in both points and yards allowed, they fared okay vs the pass. They managed an 18th ranked spot there, despite the most injury decimated secondary in the division, and possibly the NFL.

Washington’s RB of the future is Adrian Peterson and their best QB is Case Keenum. They spent a 2018 second round pick on RB Derrius Guice, and he’s played less than six games in his two year career. 2019 First round QB Dwayne Haskins started 7 games, and threw all of 7 touchdowns. Which was equal to the number of interceptions he tossed. They do have WR Terry McLaurin, but that just seems like a punchline to a joke with no set-up. For instance: “THE ARISTOCRATS!” See? The set-up is important.

They have a front seven worthy of my envy, as pass rushers. However, their 2019 3-4 system, exposed them to any offense where the QB was awake for 60% of the game. I’m gonna miss that predictability. 

New York Giants: 4 – 12, 3rd place in the division

Look at that sweet #4 draft spot!

What’s to say about this team? The floundering started in 2018, after the new GM started a fire-sale and divested the team of key talent. So this was a continuation of that. All season long, the giants looked like a team with no focus, no direction, and no personality.

This was only natural, given that they took keys to the kingdom from QB Eli Manning, and gave them to rookie QB Daniel Jones. Basically, in search of a “spark”, the coaching staff switched from Dasani to Evian. 

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Okay that may have been a bit harsh. March of Dimes may not be the most exciting guy, and might not have the best arm, and might lack any major intangibles, and…and… Where was I going with this?

Oh, right. In truth, rookies are just trying to figure stuff out. So it was only natural that the team looked a little lost out there this season. It will be interesting to see how Jones approaches his first pro offseason.

Dallas Cowboys: 8 – 8, runner-up in the division

How does such a “talent-loaded” team finish .500? This despite a very healthy roster, in a division where half the teams are rebuilding, and the division winner was decimated by injuries. How indeed! I’m not going to talk around the issue. You already can, and already do, get that from any professional journalists. I’m a fan. So let’s real talk this motherfucker, shall we?

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The Owner’s answer to Dallas’s woes, was poor coaching. So poor coaching is how a team finishes offensively 1st in yardage, 2nd in passing yardage, 5th in rushing yardage, and 6th in scoring. (In case you’re wondering, that’s solidly a Top 10, and likely a Top 3 offense.)

It’s also why they finished 9th in yards allowed, 10th in passing yards allowed, and 11th in both rushing yardage allowed, and points allowed. (That’s also a Top 10 unit.) Yeah. That sounds like some pretty shitty coaching, right? (In case you missed it, that was sarcasm.)

The fans and media’s favorite flavor of the month, is blaming the Owner for meddling all the time. It’s true that he does, but this team was poised to win even with the meddling. In fact, the Owner has meddled every year since he bought the team. If you want to blame him for the meddling when it doesn’t work, you have to praise him when it does work.

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The problem wasn’t the coach, and it isn’t the Owner. Well, it is, but not how you think it is.

This team is loaded with players who can’t deliver in the clutch. How many Cowboys games this year turned on just a handful of downs? Division rivals won’t want to hear this, but the Cowboys were probably 15 to 20 made plays away from being 12 – 4 or 13 – 3. And I mean 15 to 20 plays collectively on the season.

Because the Owner doesn’t hold his players accountable for anything, on or off the field, nobody on this team has any deep motivation to give all-out effort when the Cowboys backs are to the wall. You saw how they rallied to save their coach’s job, and how hard they fought to win what everyone knew would be the division’s lone playoff spot. (That was also sarcasm.)

The team is wall-to-wall with guaranteed money. It’s a boarding school filled with rich kids, and now they’re getting an interim (7 – 9) headmaster. And trust, this is an interim (6 – 10) situation. Being that it’s the Owner, not the coach (5 – 11) who’ll sets the culture of the Cowboys, you can expect a similar mindset from the players for next season.

Didn’t even need the mic for that.

So that’s the state of our division rivals as your Eagles head into the offseason. It’s about time to start looking ahead to how these four teams will go about re-arming for the 2020 season. 

FOUR THINGS REVIEWED – WILD CARD ROUND – SEAHAWKS

Posted by The BEAST on 2020/01/06
Posted in: Coaching, Defense, Four Things, NFC East, NFL, Offense, Players, playoffs, Reviews, stats. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

NOBODY quit. No matter how bad it got. No matter who was hurt, no matter what the situation was when they got injured. The fight never left this team.

I feel pride and anger for this bunch. Obviously, I’m proud of what they accomplished in winning the division. I’m angry because they deserved a better ending than the one they got. It’s funny. I wasn’t angry during or immediately after the game. But now? As I sit here and do the autopsy, I see the scars, and the wounds, and the sacrifices laid bare before me. This isn’t anger. This isn’t anger at all. It’s sadness.

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EAGLES 9 – Seahawks 17

We lost QB Carson Wentz (1/4 – 25.0% – 3 – 0 – 0) nine minutes into the game, to a helmet-to-helmet hit, where the defender then dropped all of his weight onto Carson, driving his head into the turf. That means there were two penalties on a play that could have resulted in an ejection. No one so much as reached for a flag.

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Enter QB Josh McCown (18/24 – 75.0% – 174 – 0 – 0 / 5 – 23 – 4.6 – 0 – 0), playing in the first playoff game of his career. Given the situation and the lack of weapons at his disposal, he acquitted himself well. He showed more poise than leadership, and a great deal of plucky gamesmanship.

It bears mentioning that TE Zach Ertz (2 – 44 – 22.0 – 0) played through a broken rib and lacerated kidney. He wasn’t just a decoy as he was targeted 4 times in this game.

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The Defense played as well as they did during the season, but with no offensive support, you can’t expect miracles. DT Fletcher Cox (3 – 0 – 0 – 0) played a far more dominant game than his stat sheet reveals. He spent all day running over, through and past Seattle’s interior linemen. If we understood the concept of contain, the defense could have won this game singlehandedly.

I hear you asking, “What about all the stuff that stats don’t reveal?” Well, that’s the reason for these “Four Things” articles. We introduce an idea of what needs addressing BEFORE the game, so that fans have to honestly answer questions about those things, AFTER the game. This helps to get us, and keep us, all on the same page.

So, of the Four Things we were looking for in this last game, what exactly did we see?

1) Keep them in their base: This happened, but I’m not sure if we triggered it, or their injury issues helped them play into our plans. In any case, they stayed in a defense that we had a legitimate chances against, all game long. (DONE)

2) Keep contain: HA!!! This, even more than Wentz’s injury, is what cost us the game. Their QB is at his best, when he can get outside of play design, because free-form offense breaks down defenses. Our DE’s were far too inconsistent with their rush depth and rush angles, which allowed Seattle to convert long third downs all game long. (NOT DONE)

3) Be the aggressor: That went up in smoke when the playbook had to be simplified to accommodate McCown. We leaned heavy on a handful of plays, where the only times it seemed the ball was in the air for more than 8 yards, was on a few passes to TE Dallas Goedert (7 – 73 – 10.4 – 0). Everything else was dink and Dak. (Sorry, force of habit.) (NOT DONE)

4) Cover more, don’t blitz: Don’t use the Safeties to blitz. Our only sack was from SS Malcolm Jenkins (7 – 1.0 – 0 – 0), who was sent after their QB a few times. Usually resulting in a big play. (NOT DONE)

This game’s Four Things score is 1 of 4. Thus players clean out their lockers tomorrow. Some for the last time.

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On The Whole:

If we were blown out after losing Wentz, it would be understandable. But we weren’t. If we lost to a far superior team, it would be understandable. But we didn’t. (I mean, you can’t look at the score, and think that if Wentz were in, it ends the same way.)

With the Eagles it’s a number of small things. And we saw them made manifest on the field in this game. Things like a lack of contain, receivers schemed to run free in our Secondary, the lack WR help in a passing league. There are a number of things that need to get cleaned up on this team.

Not going to get into that yet. Instead, I’m going to put out a LONG overdue Rivals Report this week. Then I’ll take a couple weeks off, to start formulating my offseason outlook, and do some general site maintenance.

 

2019 SEASON REVIEW: FOURTH QUARTER

Posted by The BEAST on 2020/01/04
Posted in: Conversations, Defense, NFC East, NFL, Offense, Players, playoffs, Reviews, Roster, Special Teams, stats. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

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SEASON Reviews are usually done at the end of the season. (Duh, right?) A few are done at the halfway mark, and/or at the end. Starting in 2017, Eaglemaniacal.com began treating the season like a game, and breaking it into four quarters. Since football is a hard sport, we’ll take a hard look at where our team stands at the moment (in relation to where it started), and where it needs to go next.

STATUS: 9 – 7, WINNER of the NFC EAST, 4th Seed in the NFC, Sole Playoff Representative of the Division.

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OPPONENTS:

W New York giants (4 – 12)
W Washington Redskins (3 – 13)
W Dallas Cowboys (8 – 8)
W New York giants (4 – 12)

Combined: (19 – 45)

OVERVIEW:

We needed to win all four games. We won all four games.

People can talk about how “unpretty” the wins were. They can talk about how bad our opponent’s records were. Doesn’t matter. We’re here, and no argument made against that, can change that. We fought. We clawed. We earned this, because we kept believing and we stuck together.

Losers fall apart (giants). Losers tap out (Like Zeke did). Losers change horses midstream (See: Dan Snyder). Winners win because they don’t quit. They give an all out effort. Winners get to feel elation. Winners get to know that they were vindicated. Losers? They can only wish to stand where we do today.

GRADES:

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QB: (A) Carson Wentz put this team on his back, and made those around him better. Amazingly enough, he also made himself better as over these last four games he’s been more cognizant not holding the ball forever as he waits to make a big play. The game winning touchdown he threw at Washington, was an example of him trusting his receiver to make a play, not just his own arm. As a result, he’s now doing a better job of throwing guys open. There are still overthrows of his deep ball, but I suspect that will iron out when he gets some higher grade firepower back on the roster.

RB: (B) Some fans would give this position a higher grade, but that would mean only seeing the good and not the bad. Jordan Howard hasn’t touched the ball in this quarter. So Miles Sanders and Boston Scott have taken up the load. They both have at times, been dynamic with the ball and reliable as blockers. What neither has been, is an inside runner who consistently finishes runs hard. Both are great to keep on the field, especially as compensatory pieces, but neither is a true Alpha. Teams don’t get worn down and tired, tackling those guys. Howards absence has highlighted the need for him. (Or at least someone (Holyfield) like him.)

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TE: (B) This position is usually the Zach Ertz Show. However, injuries have given Dallas Goedert and Josh Perkins a chance to strut their stuff, showing not just talent, but reliability. Goedert in fact, despite being a back-up, developed into a Top Ten player at his position (10th in yards, 9th in catches, and only 6 players at his position have more touchdowns).

Perkins leaves something to be desired as a blocker, but for a 3rd string target, he’s an absolute luxury. He’s the Range Rover that you only drive when your Tesla Model X, and Mercedes G-Class are being detailed. Good thing we had these guys too! The broken rib that Ertz suffered in Week 16 would have been a death knell for teams like Kansas City, or San Francisco. However, since our reserves are so silky smooth, Philadelphia hardly felt a bump in the road.

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WR: (D) Greg Ward by himself would get a “B” grade. Over the last quarter he’s put up 21 catches for 210 yards (10.0 yards per catch), and one game winning TD. The other 3 players active at this position, over that same span, posted 8 catches for 113 yards (16.6ypc) and no scores. To be fair to Deontay Burnett, he only played in the last game and still caught 2 for 48. That means the other two players produced just 6 catches for 85 yards over 4 games. Amazingly, our Eagles won 4 straight games despite this.

OT: (C) We’ve played the last three games without Lane Johnson. We instead relied on Halapoulivaati Vaitai to man the right side. Vaitai hasn’t been great, but he’s been servicable. In fact, many of his mistakes seem more attributable to coaches not compensating for his athletic limitations. Jason Peters has been Jason Peters as a blocker, but his name is being called far too often for penalties recently.

OG: (C) Isaac Suemalo remains an up and down player. While he moves well in space, he’s not particularly stout at the point of attack. Brandon Brooks was playing at a Pro Bowl level, until he was hurt during the last game of the season. Matt Pryor stepped in and handled himself well, but he hasn’t played a single full game in his two year career.

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C: (B) Despite less than stellar Shotgun snapping, Jason Kelce is doing a good better of the blocking calls, so there were fewer “A” gap rushers running free this quarter.

DE: (B) Brandon Graham isn’t getting sacks like he did around midseason, but he is doing a much better job of playing the run first and keeping contain. So I find myself not missing Chris Long quite as much, as I did around midseason.

Derek Barnett would do well to study containment. He flattens out too soon to chase down the line, and usually gets neither the pressure nor the tackle. Instead of doing his job first, he’s trying to make the play first. He’s playing inside-out and it frequently leaves us vulnerable on his side whereas Graham is locking down the other side.

2019 Vinny Curry on the a Dak

Vinny Curry! We won a Super Bowl starting that guy on the blindside. In the two games he played for the injured Barnett this quarter, Vinny was making a case that maybe we have the wrong guy starting. Hey, I’m just being honest! Josh Sweat has cooled off somewhat since midseason, which is probably part of the reason that Philly’s own Shareef Miller was added to the active roster as the season came to a close.

DT: (A) Statistics don’t tell the story of the job that this position is doing. They are playing excellent team concept football, dictating that RB’s can’t run up the middle and that QB’s can’t step up or hang I the pocket. They aren’t recording many stats, but they’re causing opposing offenses to run off-schedule. Amazing.

2019 Fletcher Cox Daniel Jones

Adding man-mountain Anthony Rush to the rotation with Fletcher Cox, has helped limit teams desire to run the ball inside. In fact, we went from a 3 – 4 team before Rush, to 6 – 3 since. I assure you that’s not a coincidence. If you think it is, check out both Dallas games, both before and after Rush was added.

OLB: (C) T.J. Edwards is an upgrade over Kamu Grugier-Hill. He’s more physical and instinctive, and so far there’s nothing to indicate that we’ve lost anything in underneath coverage. Nate Gerry hasn’t made a splash play in a while, but he’s making a lot of clean, unassisted tackles. Nothing is being schemed for him, but that feels like it may change in the postseason.

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MLB: (B) The feel of the Defense has changed since Nigel Bradham took over for Nate Gerry in the middle. Opponents haven’t been able to rely on their run games in weeks, so we’ve made offenses one dimensional against us. And not just against bad offenses. We held the NFL’s #1 offense to 9 points (3 field goals). Bradham isn’t making splash plays, but he’s everywhere we need him to be, when the moment arises. We didn’t have that with Gerry, and we didn’t always have that last year, with Jordan Hicks. We may be making plans for Nigel to play on the inside if the Eagles pick up his option.

S: (C) Malcolm Jenkins is even playing Special Teams. That is leadership by example. It says no job is too small or unimportant. It sends a message that every play, every down, is all hands on deck. Rod McLeod is frequently in tough positions when the ball is thrown long, some of which he can’t recover from. The scheme does him no favors.

CB: (B) Since Miami the DC seems to be letting these guys play a little more Press Coverage at the line. It’s still not enough, but some Press, beats no Press at all. The results speak for themselves. Players at this position have 18 passes defensed in the last 4 weeks. An unit that showed improvement last quarter, continued that trend.

Sidney Jones (whom I all but left for dead in my last report), has made clutch plays in three of the last four games including an interception while covering a receiver, who in a previous game had skinned us alive. Rasul Douglas lacks the long speed to be routinely put in man situations, but if the ball isn’t thrown over his head, he will try to get his mitts on it. There is also no denying that Jalen Mills and CreVon LeBlanc add a fiery competitiveness, that has rubbed off on their fellow corners.

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Talent-wise, we have no A+ or even A type players, at this position. We have a number of B level guys, who all have some sort of obvious limitation. So what we have here, are no stars, but a stable of solid to very solid players. That being said, due to the system we play, these guys will give up big plays here and there. However, recognizing all this doesn’t mean I graded them on a curve. This position got what they earned.

LS: (A) Rick Lovato is consistent.

P: (B) Cam Johnston stepped his game up in these last four games. Last quarter saw 20 punts for 12 returns (60% return rate), for 79 yards (6.5ypr). This quarter had 22 punts for 9 returns (40%) for 51 yards (5.6ypr). That’s across the board improvement, but those aren’t the most baller stats.

Of those 22 punts only 3 were fair caught and only 1 was a touchback. Of our 28 punts down inside the 20 this year, 11 were in these last four games. Of the 9 punts that we downed this year, 6 were in this quarter. That says that Cam took a real hard look in the mirror and opted to work within the system. That’s some real big boy stuff, right there

K: (C ) Jake Elliott was 5 for 8 kicking field goals this year, but two of those misses were from 55 and 53 yards, outside, with intermittent gusts of wind. Spend a day attempting 30 yarders, before you judge this guy too harshly for those. Kickoffs remain a concern though. 21 kickoffs, 10 returns (47% return rate), for 245 yards (24.5ypr).

That return rate is up from 36%. The returns ar up from 23.7. We are trending wrong people!

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PR/KR: (F) I won’t even post the numbers. Our return game is a wide-open wound.

KC: (C) Teams are taking more chances trying to make a big play, by attempting returns, that means it’s only a matter of time before someone gets lucky against us. Worse yet, when teams do return it we don’t stop them well short of the 25. So for opponents, taking a chance on a return is a risk-free proposition.

SINCE LAST QUARTER:

We won the division and made it into the tournament that will determine the league champion. We got our shit together when we needed to, and we had our selves a successful season. Yes, I said it was a successful season. As in Regular Season.

Now we’re trying to have a successful Post-season. THAT success will be determined by hoisting the SB trophy in February. Make no mistake though, we accomplished the first part of that quest already.

Bask in that. Until Kickoff Sunday at 4:40, vs the Seahawks.

2019 malcolm jenkins and nate gerry

MISSION FOR THIS QUARTER:

The regular season is over. We are now in the post-season. There is no quarter given here. Not by the calendar, nor the fans, nor the opposition to come. There is however, a mission, and it is this:

Win one game. Win a second. Win a third. Then win that fourth game.

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FOUR THINGS REVIEWED – WK17 – GIANTS

Posted by The BEAST on 2019/12/30
Posted in: Coaching, Defense, Four Things, NFC East, NFL, Offense, Players, playoffs, Reviews, Rivals, Roster, stats, Uncategorized. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

EXCUSES

THE PHILADELPHIA EAGLES ARE YOUR 2019 NFC EAST CHAMPIONS!!!

Once again, I predicted score wrong, but I was pretty on-point about the spread. (I predicted 18 points, the margin turned out to be 17.) At no point this week, did I think this game would be close. Turns out, I nailed it. 

EAGLES 34 – giants 17

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The story many will tell, will be of RB Boston Scott (19 – 54 – 2.8 – 3 – 0 / 4 – 84 – 21.0 – 0), taking over after Rookie RB Miles Sanders (9 – 52 – 5.7 – 0 – 0) went down with an ankle injury. The REAL story is of how QB Carson Wentz (23/40 – 57.5 – 289 – 1 – 0), continues to make everyone around him better, regardless of their Draft pedigree.

While Boston Scott led the Eagles in receiving yards, it was WR Greg Ward (6 – 43 – 7.1 – 0) who paced the roster in receptions, TE Dallas Goedert (4 – 65 – 16.2 – 0) who led in targets with 10, and TE Josh Perkins (4 – 50 – 12.5 – 1) who caught Wentz’s lone scoring strike. The point is, Wentz spread the ball around. Perfectly conducting the Offense, to make us more than the sum of our parts.

We made plenty of noise on Defense as well, with DE Derek Barnett (2 – 2.0 – 0 – 0) playing this game of the other side of the line of scrimmage, as both of his tackles were for losses. The same could be said of DE Brandon Graham (3 – 1.0 – 0 – 0) who also made all of his tackles in the backfield.

There’ll be no media coverage of how the Eagles defensive interior pissed all over the line of scrimmage, and marked it as their own territory. DT Timmy Jernigan (2 – 1.0 – 0 – 0) played like a someone was holding his family hostage. He absolutely wrecked any semblance of a blocking scheme, and he seemed to always be caving in the point of attack. DT Anthony Rush (1 – 0 – 0 – 0) strong-armed his way into a TFL as well.

2019 Fletcher Cox Daniel Jones

DT Fletcher Cox (1 fumble recovery) doesn’t make much of an appearance on a stat sheet, but his 4th quarter recovery of a fumble forced by SS Malcolm Jenkins (7 – 0 – 0 – 0), put the game out of New York’s reach, for good. And Sidney Jones (3 – 0 – 1 – 0)! Did you see that step for step coverage of giants WR Darius Slayton (4 – 50 – 12.5 – 0)? Slayton fell cleanly on the play, and Jones plucked the ball out the air, driving a dagger into the face of the giants hopes. Slayton had a very different day in this game, than he did when CB Ronald Darby (IR) was playing human turnstile, in the last match-up.

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I hear you asking, “What about all the stuff that stats don’t reveal?” Well, that’s the reason for these “Four Things” articles. We introduce an idea of what needs addressing BEFORE the game, so that fans have to honestly answer questions about those things, AFTER the game. This helps to get us, and keep us, all on the same page.

So, of the Four Things we were looking for in this last game, what exactly did we see?

2019 Wentz sees Perkins

1) Protect the QB: The Eagles did decent (not great), job of getting Wentz outside of the pocket. However, the coaching staff left most of his protection up to the clock in his head. Wentz didn’t disappoint, as he made a point of either quickly vacating the pocket or throwing the ball away.

In fact, my second favorite pass of the day was an incompletion. On the third play of the 2nd quarter, Wentz spotted pass interference, and threw to WR Robert Davis (no stats), to draw the officials attention to the penalty. That’s an Aaron Rodgers, Jim Kelly, Peyton Manning kind of tactic. It worked, and we got 13 yards out a pass that never stood a chance of being completed. Nothing protects a QB like his own saavy, and Carson Wentz’s saavy magnified his physical protection in this game. (DONE)

2) Take away Barkley: RB Saquon Barkley (17 – 92 – 5.4 – 1 – 0 / 3 – 25 – 8.3 – 0) did what he always does. He spends most of a game under wraps, and then makes noise with one big play. This week it was a 68 yard rushing touchdown. Before that he had 11 carries for 10 yards (0.9 yards per carry), then the 68 yarder, and afterwards 5 carries for 14 yards (2.8 ypc). We made him not matter. We took him away from being able to help his team, on all but one down, and made his team play around him for the rest of the game. (DONE)

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3) Vary our attack: Boy did we ever! HC Doug Pederson emptied the attic this week. Strikes to WR’s on the outside. A 28 yard laser down the middle to Dallas Goedert, 14 yards worth of toe drag swag to Goedert on a clutch 3rd and 8, a cross body throw to a third string TE for a 24 yard score… And then when Sanders went out, Scott came in and we continued to pound the rock inside. That is, when we weren’t running Jet Sweeps, and throwing 39 yard screens… We threw a little bit of everything at the giants. I’d hate to be the team that has to watch tape and figure out what, or whom they need to stop. (DONE)

4) Hold auditions: This was done, but not the way I envisioned it. Due to CB Jalen Mills being out, and Darby being just placed on IR, both Sidney Jones and Rasul Douglas (3 – 0 – 0 – 0) had to start, and play the whole game. There was no way to play one off of the other. Instead of two half game auditions, we got two full game auditions, for Darby’s spot in 2020. During which both players defensed three passes each, and allowed no WR more than 68 yards (68, 50, 39, and 12). (DONE)

That brings the week to a perfect 4 of 4, and the REGULAR season total to 38 of 64 (.593), which is just about commensurate with our record of 9 – 7 (.562). To have gotten it to match exactly, our record would had to have been 9 – 6 – 1.

Given that over the last 4 weeks we’re 15 of 16 (.937) in Four Things, and are undefeated during that span, it would seem that the team is peaking at just the right time, because we’re taking care of exactly the right things.

On The Whole:

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This was an excellent victory. It was a slugfest that more or less became a blowout, on the road, in inclement weather, while still losing key players. I defy you to ask for better character building on the doorstep of the playoffs.

Now we begin our journey to the Super Bowl.

FOUR THINGS REVIEWED – WK 16 – COWBOYS

Posted by The BEAST on 2019/12/23
Posted in: Coaching, Conversations, Defense, Four Things, NFC East, NFL, Offense, Players, playoffs, Preview, Reviews, Rivals, stats. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

ONCE again the Eagles are back at the head of the division, and please don’t start with how “unsexy” the division is. Your car isn’t a Rolls Royce, but you still love it and fuss over it, right? Well in that same spirit, this division may not be the NFC West, but we’re gonna drive this motherfucker ’til the wheels fall off.

2019 opponent-rival mock

Yes, yes, I know! That’s not to say that the East is ours free and clear. We still have one more payment to make on it. And it’s due next week.

EAGLES 17 – Cowboys 9

Despite all the missing weapons, QB Carson Wentz (31/40 – 77.5% – 319 – 1 – 0) led his team to (what right now is) the signature game of his career. That’s not to say that he was without help. For the second week in a row, rookie RB Miles Sanders (20 – 79 – 3.9 – 1 – 0 / 5 – 77 – 15.4 – 0) put up 150+ yards from scrimmage.

NFL: Dallas Cowboys at Philadelphia Eagles

Dallas Goedert scores the go ahead touchdown in the first quarter.

Stepping up for TE Zach Ertz (4 – 28 – 7.0 – 0) who injured his ribs early on, was TE Dallas Goedert (9 – 91 – 10.1 – 1). Geodert hit pay dirt with a 6 yard dart from Wentz. Don’t look now, but WR Greg Ward (4 – 71 – 17.7 – 0) may be trying to coax Wentz into throwing the ball down the stripe a little more, after breaking off a 38 yard gain for his QB. Even rookie WR JJ Arcega-Whiteside (2 – 39 – 19.5 – 0) made a declaration of sorts, by opening the game with a 27 yard grab, and catching both balls thrown to him.

Defensively, the stat line for MLB Nigel Bradham (2 – 0 – 0 – 0) doesn’t tell how instrumental he was in rendering Cowboys RB Ezekiel Elliott (13 – 47 – 3.6 – 0 – 0 / 7 – 37 – 5.2 – 0) ineffectual for the day. The same can be said for DT Fletcher Cox (3 – 0 – 0 – 1). It’s a shame that the fumble he forced, didn’t turn into points.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it until it happens. DE Vinny Curry (2 – 1.0 – 0 – 0) needs to be brought back in 2020.

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DE Josh Sweat (2 – 1.0 – 0 – 0) is justifying the coaches patience with him, and is starting to look like the steal he was drafted to be. (Though he has a tendency to flirt with neutral zone infractions. Crown of your helmet Josh!) DT Anthony Rush (1 – 0 – 0 – 0) gives us a physical presence inside that makes it hard for a run game to get traction. I thought I saw him make a Tackle For Loss, but the (generous) spotting of the ball made it a run for no gain. In fact, Bradham (1), Curry (1) and Sweat (2) all had TFL’s. Just what we needed against this team.

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Much maligned CB Sidney Jones (1 – 0 – 0 – 0), made yet another excellent play on the ball, in a critical fourth down situation. In fact, the play he made was potentially what saved the game, and possibly the season. He still tackles like a young Deion Sanders, but if he can get his confidence back up, we may have a guy that we can trade out of the conference. (Tackling is too important to risk keeping him.)

I hear you asking, “What about all the stuff that stats don’t reveal?” Well, that’s the reason for these “Four Things” articles. To introduce an idea of what needs addressing BEFORE the game, so that fans have to honestly answer questions about those things, AFTER the game. This helps to get us, and keep us, all on the same page.

So, of the Four Things we were looking for in this last game, what exactly did we see?

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1) Keep Bradham clean: Our D-Line not only kept Bradham from having to fight off offensive linemen, they made plays on the other side of the line of scrimmage! This was the deluxe version of what we needed here. (DONE)

2) Force them into their base defense: Apparently the Eagles coaches and I see things very similarly. According to a Next Gen stat that was put up on the television screen, deep into the 4th quarter, the Eagles had run 2TE formations, 56% of the game. That forced the Cowboys to play newcomer OLB Malcolm Smith (2 – 0 – 0 – 0) clearly more than they wanted to. So much so that at one point you could see that he was visibly winded. This allowed us to victimize him several times. Good show! (DONE)

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3) Gut the middle: The idea was to keep them in their base, and make their LB’s play chase all day long. If they’re chasing, they aren’t dictating the action or making big plays. So we made them chase TE’s, and we forced them to follow Sanders all around the formation. We also threw 6 passes to RB Boston Scott (3 – 12 – 4.0 – 0 – 0 / 6 – 7 – 1.1) and he caught all of them. Almost all of them were routes towards the sideline to force LB’s into lateral coverage, or pull a Nickel out of position. We even ran Wentz a couple times on designed runs. Worked like a charm, and the Cowboys stayed off-balance all game. (DONE)

4) Don’t over-commit vs the run: Since the front seven played well enough on it’s own, there wasn’t much call for that. We showed some heavy fronts, but they never really brought the house aside from short yardage moments. We did a lot of “threaten and bail”, which forced Cowboys QB Dak Prescott (25/44 – 56.8% – 265 – 0 – 0) to read our coverages more often than film study would have suggested was necessary. We didn’t over-commit to the run, and made it harder for him to throw the ball against us. (DONE)

For the third time this year, we nailed a perfect 4 of 4 for the week, boosting our season tally to 34 of 60 (.566). Next week we can clinch the NFC East and a home playoff game with a win vs the giants. That game by the way, has been FLEXED from 1:00 pm to 4:25 pm.

On The Whole:

Cowboys Season Kevin Hart1

We’ve been a team in need of consistency for weeks now. Recently our QB play has gotten more stable and creative. Carson was moved around a lot today. Bootlegs, called QB runs, split out wide… Everything except QB Sneaks. (Weird, right?)

Play at RB has become more dynamic recently. I said after the Miami game that Sanders reminded me of Brian Westbrook. Weeks later, I stand by that. He is effective both with, and without the ball in his hands.

Lots of people want to draw a comparison between he and LeSean McCoy, probably due to body type. However, young McCoy was a more dangerous natural runner, but needed the football to make plays. Sanders is a much scarier draw out-wide, than McCoy ever was.

And then there’s situational football. As you could see on Sanders “Take a Knee 2.0” today, for him making the play isn’t always about what you do as a runner. He gave up a TD in exchange for sealing a win.

Defensively we need to decide on who we are. If we’re going to be a team that doesn’t rush 5, we need to scheme more rushes or packages that actually get hands the QB more. For two years I’ve been saying that we don’t cover long enough for the rush to get home. That wasn’t true today.

If we’re going to affect games, dictate action and cause turnovers, we need our Defense to be more sudden. Our plodding pass rush of the last month has to improve if we intend to make any noise in January.

FOUR THINGS REVIEWED – WK15 – REDSKINS

Posted by The BEAST on 2019/12/16
Posted in: Coaching, Conversations, Defense, Four Things, NFC East, NFL, Offense, Players, Reviews, Rivals, stats. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , . 2 Comments

YEAH. So uhhhh, the Eagles went down to Washington yesterday…

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We asked the Redskins “What you got on our playoff hunt?”, and they were nice enough to hand over a “W”. When their QB saw that it was almost time for us to go, he placed that “W” gently in our hands, so that we wouldn’t forget it.

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Such nice boys. It almost seems mean to beat them with this again.

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For the third year in a row. Chumps.

EAGLES 37 – Redskins 27

These gritty, grind them out games are EXACTLY what I said was needed by QB Carson Wentz (30/43 – 69.7% – 266 – 3 – 0). He needs to be tested and put through the wringer, emotionally. It likely will not result in a Super Bowl win this season, but like building an addition onto a house, the added experience will increase his value for as long as his career stands.

Yesterday, rookie RB Miles Sanders (19 – 122 – 6.4 – 1 – 0 / 6 – 50 – 8.3 – 1) killed more Redskins than smallpox. He piled up 172 yards from scrimmage, while doing anything he wanted. TE Zach Ertz (5 – 61 – 12.2 – 1) and TE Dallas Goedert (5 – 55 – 11.0 – 0) kept us afloat in the first half. The second half however, belonged to Sanders and WR Greg Ward (7 – 61 – 8.7 – 1) whose stat line hardly tells you how clutch he was.

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Look at what that practice squader is doing to what’s left of CB Josh Norman!

I hear you asking, “What about all the stuff that stats don’t reveal?” Well, that’s the reason for these “Four Things” articles. We introduce an idea of what needs addressing BEFORE the game, so that fans have to honestly answer questions about those things, AFTER the game. This helps to get us, and keep us, all on the same page.

So, of the Four Things we were looking for in this last game, what exactly did we see?

1) Throw for Miles: Did you see that touchdown catch by Miles Sanders?

2019 Miles Sanders TD catch

Carson fired a pass that trailed smoke, as it tore through the air, past a pair of helpless Redskin defenders. (Victims pictured above.) On the day, Sanders caught five passes, and even lined up in the Slot a couple of times. The threat of him as a receiver was made very real. (DONE)

2) Take the run away early: We actually did this early on. However, the Redskins surged back in the third quarter, with a 10 play 6 minute touchdown drive, that featured 57 rushing yards (23 on one carry by their QB). After we came back with a run heavy drive of our own, they seemed to lose interest in running the ball, only handing it off twice for the rest of the game. (DONE)

3) Play a lot of Cover Two: Didn’t do it and got spanked on a 75 yard TD pass that left LB Nate Gerry (3 – 0 – 0 – 0) trailing a WR in coverage after a missed tackle by CB Avonte Maddox (3 – 0 – 0 – 0), who’d “Rock and Rolled” from Nickle CB to FS. Weirdly enough, we were also in Cover One, on the 5 yard TD pass that we gave up later.

This game will go down as the statistically best of Redskins QB Dwayne Haskins (19/28 – 67.8 – 261 – 2 – 0) rookie season. If you look at his game logs for this season, no stat line of any game he’s played, even vaguely resembled the numbers he posted today. Yards, completion percentage, yards per pass, touchdown to interception ratio, rating, ALL OF IT.

We made him look like an All-Pro. Even with this game, his rating for the year is 70.2. That tells you how low he was before this game. That tells you how bad this Cover One is. (NOT DONE)

4) Bombs away: We did this. We did it in a way that I wasn’t expecting, but we did this.

What I said was in Four Things was: “he [Carson] has to learn to use his weapons as weapons, not as security blankets. He needs to be more aggressive with the football, and throw that thing down the field more.”

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While he was 1 of 5 on deep passes (two to Ertz, two to Goedert (20 yards), and one to #19), Carson kept putting the ball out there for his receivers to make the play. His 15 yard touchdown to Sanders, and 4 yard touchdown to Ward weren’t deep passes, but they weren’t just “taking what the defense gives you” either. They were extremely aggressive plays.

Carson threw two absolute DIMES in situations where he was imposing his will, instead of living to fight another down. It’s throws like that which win playoff games. We’re used to Carson being defined by the kind of pass that Ertz scored on. Playoff winning Wentz is going to have to look a lot more like the other two scores. And he showed us that today. (DONE)

That brings our Four Things score for the week to 3 of 4, and puts us on the season at 30 of 56 (.535). The hope is that this week’s lessons carry over to next week, as we play for all the marbles, vs the Dallas Cowboys.

The last time we faced to Cowboys we came out emotionally flat for some reason, and our play reflected that. This time, even if playing a division rival doesn’t excite us, the notion of playing for our season, should.

 

On The Whole:

I won’t judge this game as harshly as most fans. We won it with all of our typical deficiencies, but fewer tools to dig out of any hole that we dug ourselves. This was, and had to be, a game of will. This was a game of “How bad do you want it?”And the Eagles found a way to answer the bell.

As I said in Four Things, the “W” is all that matters. Whether the final was 64 – 0, or 9 – 8.

I do however, need to bring up two points that we can’t have a repeat of next week.

First, our Defense has to play more man, and far less zone on the Corners. Our zones do nothing to slow down passing attacks, and allows for first reads to become targets. That needs to stop. We have to make QB’s go through their progressions, so that unlike today, we can get sacks and end drives.

Second, when WR JJ Arcega-Whitseside (nothing) is out there, we are essentially playing 10 on 11 ball. It’s getting to where teams may stop covering him altogether, and just let him run around. He runs poor routes, ends up in other receiver’s areas, drops passes, and draws penalties. As long as he is allowed to dress for games, any message of accountability is FARCE.

FOUR THINGS REVIEWED – WK 14 – GIANTS

Posted by The BEAST on 2019/12/11
Posted in: Conversations, Defense, Four Things, NFC East, Offense, Players, Reviews, Rivals, stats. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

ertz seals it

WE came into this game with just three WR’s, and lost two of them during the contest. But we kept fighting, and we figured it out. We lost our RT, but we kept fighting, and we figured it out. This whole season has been us fighting through, and figuring our way through, one nut-punch after another.

Why should this game have been any different?

Instead of being mad that we didn’t dominate, let’s give this team a hand for sticking together, not pointing fingers, and battling shoulder to shoulder. We need to give credit for the grit that this team showed. I can’t vibe with these fans who think we should either dominate or immediately curl into the fetal position.

 

EAGLES 23 – giants 17 (OT)

The engine that drove this beast was QB Carson Wentz (33/50 – 66.6% – 325 – 2 – 0). On a night where he didn’t have any of these guys

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he still managed to find a way to will his team to victory in the closing two quarters.

Giving Wentz somewhere to go with the ball, were TE Zach Ertz (9 – 91 – 10.1 – 2), TE Dallas Goedert (3 – 41 – 13.6 – 0), and TE Josh Perkins (5 – 37 – 7.4 – 0). By the way, Perkins is a 3rd stringer. We also got a massive effort from yet another of our 3rd stringers, in RB Boston Scott (10 – 59 – 5.9 – 1 / 6 – 69 – 11.5 – 0).

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Scott had to fill-in for a while after RB Miles Sanders (15 – 45 – 3.0 – 0 / 4 – 24 – 8.0 – 0), (filling in for injured RB Jordan Howard), due to muscle cramping.

On defense it was a big night for DE Vinny Curry (2 – 2.0 – 0 – 0), as he started in place of injured DE Derek Barnett.

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We need to make a point of bringing Vinny Curry back in 2020.

There was even a sighting of CB Sidney Jones (one deflection) as he broke up a key third down pass, to end a late giants drive. He looked good in press coverage, didn’t he?

I hear you asking, “What about all the stuff that stats don’t reveal?” Well, that’s the reason for these “Four Things” articles. We introduce an idea of what needs addressing BEFORE the game, so that fans have to honestly answer questions about those things, AFTER the game. This helps to get us, and keep us, all on the same page.

So, of the Four Things we were looking for in this last game, what exactly did we see?

1) No disrespect: The idea was not to overestimate the amount of rust on QB Eli Manning (15/30 – 50.0% – 203 – 2 – 0), by blitzing him like he was a rookie, or practice squader. We did blitz him, but not disrespectfully. There were no Zero blitzes, and we didn’t blitz every down. We did some overload stuff, some “A” gap stuff, but we kept it disciplined. (DONE)

2019 Carson Wentz on the move.jpg

2) Throw the ball: Our play selection was 50 passes to 30 called runs (which included three Sneaks by Wentz.) It worth noting that, that was 50 passes with a depleted WR corps. So there can be no mistaking the Eagles commitment to the pass this week. (DONE)

3) Rush the passer: We did get decent pressure on Manning, we did work the “A” gaps, and we did cause plenty of errant passes. It allowed us to use (but not be reliant on) the blitz. This allowed us to play disciplined, and not eat a trick play for the fourth week in row. So the important part of this was done. That said, I really wanted those one on one victories inside, from DT Tim Jernigan and NT Anthony Rush. (Neither who recorded as much as half of a tackle.) But the idea was to play solid team concept defense, not pad individual stats. (DONE)

4) Screen Carson’s visitors: Our Screen game was so sick, that we’re going to have put Boston Scott in quarantine for a week. He put a move on CB Janoris Jenkins (4 – 0 – 0 – 0) which left that poor fool playing Twister all by his lonesome. (Right hand green, bitch!)

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(DONE)

That brings this weeks Four Things score to 4 of 4, and the yearly totals to 27 of 52. This is the second time this season that we put up a perfect score, but the other time resulted in a loss. What’s funny, is that most of this stuff didn’t really start to take hold until the second half. I sat watching this game with a fairly empty notepad for so long, that I actually put it on the couch behind me, and nearly forgot about it.

In any case, despite the Redskins being just an awful team, we won’t get away with a stinker like this again on Sunday. Not because the Redskins are somehow better than the giants. We won’t get away with it, because Karma won’t reward the Eagles two weeks in a row, for shitty play with so much on the line.

On The Whole:

It was by no means pretty, but we won the damned game. That’s the part that matters. All this talk about how much we struggled with a 2 – 10 team, is utter nonsense. We came in as a 5 – 7 team, and even with this win, we’re still under .500. (For fuck’s sake, we lost to MIAMI last week!)

So folks need to quit talking like we were supposed to be world-beaters in this game. The Eagles are a team that is trying win it’s division, while simultaneously trying to get it’s shit together, as injuries continue to mount.

And STILL, no one in our division has more wins than we do. Isn’t that right, rival fans?

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