It's Not All Bad

During football season, we roll out a twin TV setup in the living room with the DirecTV Sunday Ticket package showing on both.  This past week we had a couple of Texans fans over and the Eagles weren't playing, so we watched the Houston game on the big screen. 

The Texans really are a different team this year under first-year coach Gary Kubiak.  They're still not the most talented bunch, but they play hard and look like a well-coached team ... most of the time. 

Their passing offense is particularly interesting.  When they run quick plays out of three-step drops, they look unstoppable.  Carr has great timing with his receivers and they're very adept at picking up nice little chunks of yardage.  However, any time Carr extended his drop to give deeper routes time to develop, all hell broke loose. 

Without seeing the coaches tape, it's hard to say exactly what was going wrong, but "jailbreak" is a pretty reasonable description.  Carr was sacked four times in the game and it could easily have been more. 

That game illustrated, once again, the importance of the offensive line.  The Texans have a decent quarterback and very good receivers, but without the blocking needed to get the most out of them.

As bad as the Eagles' season has been so far, fans haven't been in much of a mood for passing out compliments to any part of the team.  But the offensive line really seems to be doing a good job this year.  My dominant offensive recollection from the beginning of the year is Donovan McNabb bouncing on his toes in the pocket for seemingly an eternity before flinging the ball 40 yards downfield to one of his receivers.  The last couple weeks that has gone out the window, but the line has picked up the slack by run-blocking extremely well for Westbrook, Buckhalter and -- oh right, the explosive Ryan Moats doesn't even see the field any more.  So just Westbrook and Buck, then.

Of course, our eyes can deceive us, so I went back and looked at some statistics from past years in a way that will be sure not to satisfy the sabermetric baseball phans who show up here, but is still at least somewhat illuminating.

The specific contributions of the offensive line are pretty difficult to measure, but I think three statistics can probably give us a pretty good idea of how they're performing: yards-per-carry, yards-per-completion (does the QB have time to wait for deep routes to develop) and sacks-per-attempt.  Obviously, the performance of a lot of other players goes into these numbers, but the Eagles have been pretty stable at the skill positions, with Westbrook and McNabb being the featured players for some time now (leaving aside he who must not be named).  Here are the numbers:

This year's line is tops across the board, even exceeding the performance of the great Eagles offense of 2004, with Owe-- oops.  Not only has the line been better, it's been a lot better, despite all the struggles of recent weeks. 

Now clearly we would expect the yards-per-completion number to go down, both because Garcia doesn't have McNabb's arm and because opposing defenses are being very careful in the secondary against us.  But there's little reason to believe the other numbers will get much worse (assuming Westbrook stays healthy / please God grant us this one small favor / it can't be good that I'm starting to refer to him as Brian "Knock on Wood" Westbrook).

Offensive linemen don't get much credit even in the best of times, but it's worth pointing out that a unit Reid has been overhauling over the past couple years is looking like a real bright spot.  Maybe the talent evaluator knows something after all.

One more note.  The Football Outsiders guys have their own crazy deep offensive line rankings.  By their numbers, the Eagles' line is among the best at run-blocking, but mediocre in pass protection, which certainly seems counter-intuitive. 

But if you scroll down that page a bit, you can see their figures for running success behind different parts of the line.  Not surprisingly, the Eagles are particularly good at running over right tackle, and quite good everywhere else but left tackle.  With former USC standout Winston Justice already in the bullpen, that could be a sign that William Thomas' days as an Eagle are coming to an end. 

Long Snapper, Long Story

The Eagles signed Jon Dorenbos yesterday to replace Mike Bartrum as the team's long snapper.  The Inquirer story mentions that Dorenbos is a "part-time magician," but that's not the half of this guy's interesting life story. 

Read a lot more here.

This Is Your Team

"We want Jimmy.  We want Jimmy.  We want Jimmy."

"I would hope you'd support who we are, not who we are not.  These six individuals have made the choice to work, the choice to sacrifice, to put themselves on the line 23 nights for the next four months, to represent you, this high school. That kind of commitment and effort deserves and demands your respect.

"This is your team."

------------------------------------------------------------

Ahhh, Norman Dale.  Now there's an inspiring coach.

After the crowd at Hickory High starts the Jimmy Chitwood chant, Dale strides out to the microphone and delivers one of the best put-em-in-their-place speeches in the history of film.

Eagles fans right now are a restless bunch.  Worried about the future of the team and unsure about whom to blame, the fanbase is lashing out like a blind prizefighter, swinging wildly at any target within reach.

I understand the frustration.  I've spent a lot of Sunday nights this season apologizing to my wife for being such a grouch that Sunday afternoon.  In fact, the way things are going, I should probably just get a standing Monday morning order in for flower delivery. 

FTD: "The usual, mate?" 
Me:   "Hmmm, terrible loss to the Titans, better make it a double."
FTD: "Two dozen roses, coming right up."

There's something I don't get, however.  My shit list for the loss to the Colts goes something like this:

1. Walker
2. Cole / Howard
3. Trotter
4. Jim Johnson
5. Donte Stallworth
...
146. Jeff Garcia

So why is it that so many Eagles fans are up in arms about Garcia and his alleged shortcomings?  The guy went out there, played a very fine, controlled game, and did exactly what a backup quarterback is supposed to do -- give the team a chance.

Now, since they were playing Indy, there wasn't much of a chance anyway.  The Eagles weren't going to beat this team even with McNabb under center.  But check this out:

Manning - 14/20, 183, 1 TD, 94.4 RAT
Garcia - 19/23, 140, 2 TD, 121.0 RAT

That's Peyton, folks, not Eli. 

Of course, Manning is a far better quarterback than Garcia.  I'm not suggesting he isn't.  If he were our backup we'd be in great shape.

But Garcia played well, he looked like he gave a crap, and he wasn't the guy who got run over by every single blocker.  I'd rather root for that guy than complain about him. 

I know there are lots of people who love AJ and want him to play instead.  But look at the situation we're in right now.  There are three possibilities for this Garcia thing:

1) Garcia plays well the rest of the year and still wants to start somewhere else. Eagles trade Garcia for a respectable draft pick and improve the team.

2) Garcia plays well and is fine being our backup or potential season-opening starter depending on Donnie's rehab. Great, we're set for next year and we've got good depth with AJ.

3) Garcia craps the bed the next three games, Reid benches him in favor of AJ for the last two and we find out what we have there. That's the worst-case scenario for this season, but we still have time to figure out next year.

It's possible I'm just reading the wrong message boards, but there seems to be a real anti-Garcia vibe going, which frankly I just don't understand.  I don't usually ask for comments, but if you've got one on this Garcia thing, I'd love to hear it.

Size Doesn't Matter

In the NFL, when you lose, there's always a new controversy of the week.  Last week, for obvious reasons, it was the quarterbacks.  After watching Westbrook slamming away out there late in a meaningless fourth quarter against Indy, I'm hoping next week's won't be whether Reid should have been more careful with his star running back's health. 

This week, the local sports pundit class has decided to focus on the size of the Eagles' defensive front seven.  (I'm not invited to the meetings, but I get the minutes afterwards.)

This line of thinking goes something like this:  The Eagles defense, which is predicated on disruptive speed and quickness, is simply too small to match up against opposing offenses and this lack of size is why the team struggles to stop the run (speaking charitably).  Of particular concern are the defensive ends, who aren't much bigger than Jeremiah Trotter and had trouble sealing the edge against the Colts (again, speaking charitably). 

You know what's coming, don't you?  Let's take a look-see at the old NFL.com stats page and see who the best rushing defenses are in the NFC.  First off, you have Minnesota, but that's a misleading stat since Brad Childress' team has such a terrible pass defense that no one really bothers to run against them.  Next are the Cowboys, but they run a 3-4, so they're harder to compare.  In third-place are the Chicago Bears, who also happen to be first in the league in total defense, so let's take a look at how their front seven stacks up against the Eagles:

Well, what do you know?  The Eagles' ends are actually bigger than their Chicago counterparts.  The "undersized" tackles are a bit, but only by a handful of pounds.  Of the linebackers, only McCoy comes up a bit short, but we already knew he was small.  Taken as a group, the Philadelphia front seven is actually seven pounds heavier than the Chicago group.  And Corey Simon is no longer around to mess up the average.

Of course, this comparison depends upon the listed weights of the players being accurate.  My guess is that the Bears DTs might be a little bigger than what's shown on the roster, but that wouldn't explain the problems on the outside for the Eagles, where the ends look every bit their listed weights.

Maybe Andy Reid is right after all when he said a defense that could hold down Tiki Barber ought to be a little less generous with Travis Henry and Joseph Addai. 

No one can deny there are issues with this defense, and swapping the larger Brodrick Bunkley in for the disintegrating Darwin Walker might be a good first step (assuming the rookie buys a new watch), but the real problem has less to do with the size of their butts, and more to do with the size of their hearts and brains.   

Subtle Change from Reid

Win or lose, Andy Reid pretty much says the same thing in his post-game remarks.  But after last night's loss he made a subtle shift.  Here's what he usually says:

10/26/05
"We need to do better and that is my responsibility. I need to make sure I am getting these guys in the right position to make plays."

1/19/04
"Offensively, I could have put guys in better positions. We had some calls that I would love to have back. I think generally, when getting opportunities to make plays, we need to do a better job at that.

10/20/2003
"You see guys that make a play, and then miss a play. I've seen most of these fellows for at least two years, some three and four. I know what they're capable of doing. It's important that we step up and do a better job. It's important that I continue to work at getting guys in the right position. I can do a better job of that."

Compare that to what he said after the loss to the Colts:

"We just didn't make the plays out there. I'm going to step up and tell you it starts with us, as coaches, and I've got to continue to take a close look at that and make sure we're putting the right guys in the right positions." 

Interesting.

This is Pretty Funny

From the Daily News:

"Brodrick Bunkley not only missed the Eagles' Saturday charter flight to Indianapolis, guaranteeing himself a substantial fine and being deactivated. But any chance the rookie defensive tackle had of keeping his screwup out of the public eye went down the drain when the commercial flight he took happened to include a half-dozen reporters."

The Season Isn't Over

Wow, I expected the day-after coverage to be pretty negative, but between the message boards and the newspapers, someone should be flagged for piling on.  I think you can blame this reaction on three things.

The first is obviously that the Eagles defense really did get manhandled last night.  They deserve most of the scorn being heaped their way. 

The second is that Eagles fans/writers haven't yet come to terms with how bad these guys are.  You throw around terms like "effort" and "heart" to explain away bad performances by talented players.  The truth of the matter is just that too many of these guys aren't that talented, or as in the case of Jeremiah Trotter, are simply over the hill.

A lot of people seem to feel that if these guys would just try a little harder, the defense would solve its problems.  That ain't it.  I can play Kobe Bryant one-on-one as if my life depended on the outcome, but he's still going to whip me 11-0.

It may take a few more games for reality to sink in, but last night should have demonstrated that when it comes to ability, our defense is no match for one of the league's top offenses.

The third and final point is that I think perhaps people don't recognize just how little Jim Johnson could do last night facing Peyton Manning.  Typically, if a team starts running all over your defense, a coordinator is going to start bringing up safeties and concentrating more guys around the line of scrimmage.  The problem is that you can't do that with Manning.  If he sees a stacked front, he'll just audible to a pass play that more likely than not is going to burn you.  So all night the Eagles were hesitant to put more than seven in the box (one of whom was often Sheldon Brown, since they played so much nickel), which ended up being a recipe for disaster in stopping the run game.

I'm not saying this is actually a good run defense.  It's a terrible run defense.  But a big problem last night was that they faced a Hall of Fame quarterback who would have killed them had they overloaded to stop the run.  No matter how great everyone thinks Tony Romo is right now, that's not going to be a problem the Eagles have to deal with from here on out.

There are lots of people calling for Jim Johnson's head right now.  I understand the frustration, but I think it's mistaken.  He clearly doesn't have enough talented pieces with which to work.  Look at his decision to play so much nickel last night.  He practically had to because his linebackers are so limited in coverage.  If the Eagles had come out in their base defense against the Colts, how many people think Manning wouldn't have exploited the linebackers' weakness in coverage?  Anyone?

Furthermore, we can look around the league and see that it's really talent, not coaching, that determines how good a defense can be.  Look at the Colts, for pete's sake.  They brought in Tony Dungy because they wanted to fix their defense.  It's going on five years and the Colts' D still isn't that good.  Same thing with Marvin Lewis in Cincinnati.  And Dom Capers in Houston. 

Maybe JJ has lost a step on the rest of the league.  I'll admit it's possible.  But those who claim to know for sure that he should be fired have to acknowledge that maybe, just maybe, he's still got it but his players don't.

However, with all of that said, this season isn't over.  Look at the remaining schedule.  It's all NFC teams and the only squad playing particularly well right now is Dallas.  Few teams have the thunder and lightning offensive approach that so bedeviled the Eagles last night.  If the defense can just hang on a little bit, given what we saw from the offense last night, four wins from here on out isn't out of the question. 

So hold off with the obituaries, folks, there's still some football left to play.

Eagles / Colts Game Recap

Well, it certainly is a strange new world we're living in. 

During the fourth quarter of the Giants-Titans game this afternoon, when the score was still 21-7 and the game seemed out of reach for Tennessee, Vince Young completed a short pass that went for a first down near the sideline.  The crowd in Tennessee applauded and I remarked to a friend that it was interesting watching an up-and-coming team with fans who appreciated any signs that better days were ahead.

And you know what?  That's exactly where the Eagles are.  After five years of being at or near the top of the NFC, they just aren't that good, so what's important is how they start working their way back up.

By that standard, there was a lot to appreciate about tonight's game.  Aside from a couple of fumbles, the Eagles backup quarterbacks did an admirable job filling in for Donovan McNabb.  Jeff Garcia was 19-23, for 140 yards and two touchdowns.  Those aren't MVP numbers, but they're good enough to win ballgames. 

The rest of the offense showed a lot of life, particularly Brian Westbrook, who notched his third-straight 100-yard rushing game on only 20 carries.  Reid and Mornhinweg crafted an excellent post-McNabb game plan that even included some new formation wrinkles. If there was a disappointment with the offense, it was a key drop by Donte Stallworth on a second-half post pattern where it looked like he short-armed it as he saw the safety coming. 

On the other hand, the defense could qualify for federal disaster relief at this point.  Colts' rookie Joseph Addai not only had the first 100-yard game of his career, but actually went for 171 yards and four touchdowns against an Eagles defense that got pushed around all night by the Colts, a finesse team not known for having much of an edge.

That's a little bit like getting bullied in high school by the drama dorks.  Pretty embarrassing.

This is truly a bad defense.  It might be better with rookie first-rounder Brodrick Bunkley on the field, but we wouldn't know since Bunk seems to have trouble with his alarm clock.  The rest of the defensive line got pushed around all night, particularly the defensive ends, who had no answer to a Colts running attack that was based primarily on stretch plays to the outside. 

The linebackers are flat-out terrible.  Matt McCoy is too small.  Jeremiah Trotter is too old.  And Dhani Jones is too bad. 

Sadly, Dhani looks like the best of the bunch these days.  Trotter finished with 10 tackles, but I lost track of the number of plays where he was squared up on the hole and the blocker just swallowed him up.  If Gocong takes Jones' job next season on the strong side, Dhani might be able to slide back over to the WLB position in place of the diminutive McCoy.

Sean Considine looks like he needs to get bigger too if he's going to stay at strong safety in this league.  On all the Colts big running plays it looked like our LBs and most of our secondary were dancing with Colts blockers who just kept leading them down the field.

The worst sign for the Eagles defense was the last touchdown scored by Addai late in the fourth quarter.  Dawkins had a free shot at the guy as he crossed the goal line and didn't even hit him.  The old Dawk would have laid that guy out.  The current version just sagged and looked beaten.

So what does it all mean?  Well, as expected, the Colts are much better than the Eagles.  No surprise there. 

But the good news was that the team kept fighting all night.  As bad as the NFC is this year, this team honestly has a shot to make a run at the playoffs.  It won't be easy, nor perhaps is it likely, but the opportunity is there.

In the long-run, the issues with the defense are simply impossible to ignore and will have to be addressed.  But that's an off-season project.  For now, what matters is that these guys can wake up tomorrow and look themselves in the mirror, and that's the first step back to the top.

Good job, Iggs, keep on fighting.

Deserve's Got Nothin' To Do With It

My college roommate grew up in Temple, TX, a decent-sized city located north of Austin and south of Dallas.  He was in middle school when Jerry Jones bought the Dallas Cowboys and unceremoniously dumped legendary head coach Tom Landry in favor of upstart Jimmy Johnson.  That fall, one of his football coaches pronounced gravely that "God would never let the Cowboys win another Super Bowl after what they did to Tom Landry."

Evidently, He is very forgiving.

I doubt that old coach ever stopped rooting for the Cowboys.  But my guess is he took at least some satisfaction from watching the team go 1-15 the year after Jones shoved Landry out the door.  I imagine it's like getting dumped by your former fiancée.  In the long run you probably would wish her well, but if she first stubs her toe on some loser her mom never liked that much, well, that's ok too.

...

I struggled a bit rooting for the Eagles at the beginning of last season.  The combination of my favorite team and my least-favorite player required a careful calibration of interests that was massively complicated by the fact that their success was inextricably linked, given how much of the offense flowed through his (stone) hands.  It was a relief when they finally benched his idiotic butt.  The team wasn't as good, but at least I didn't have to root for that preening little jerk.

There's a little bit of the reverse going on this year.  Winning this week against the Colts is going to be really, really tough.  But the NFC is so flat this year that the Birds could conceivably lose two of their remaining six games and still make the playoffs.  I still believe the talent is there.  What has been missing all year is focus and consistency, and if the loss of McNabb gives this team a little feeling of desperation, maybe things will start to fall into place.

Honestly, after watching these guys blow major opportunities all season, I can't say I really think that's going to happen.  But there's a chance.  And if it does, it may be partly because Jeff Garcia gives some of these guys the kick in the pants they've been missing. 

So why am I not really hoping to see that happen?

Because of McNabb.

Because I don't want to hear stupid, know-nothing commentators from around the country opining that McNabb was holding this team back.  I don't want the Sports Guy to pick the Eagles in a first-round playoff upset because "they have Ewing Theory potential."  I don't want the idiots running around Philly right now saying that it's time to give up on McNabb to grow in number.

And I do NOT want to hear the inevitable TO interview on December 24th where he explains why he thinks the Eagles are "better off without McNabb."

Yeah, if the Eagles pulled off the improbable, I'd be right there rooting for them, but McNabb doesn't deserve that any more than he did another season-ending injury. 

Unfortunately, as William Munny, Clint Eastwood's character in the classic Western "Unforgiven," says to Little Bill right before he kills him, "Deserve's got nothin' to do with it."

...

So what am I rooting for?  Signs of life.  A 4-2 or even 3-3 finish that helps this team understand what it needs to do to have success next year, but doesn't take us into August with a quarterback controversy.

Capable performances from the backup quarterback(s) that don't give us visions of Mike McMahon.  And maybe some young receivers who learn a little something from Garcia's hard edge. 

Brian Westbrook reaching the end of the season with 1,000 yards rushing and a healthy body.

Development from some younger players.

Ryan Moats on the field.

More use of LJ.

Pride.

...

Even before McNabb went down, I knew this was likely going to be the first game all season where I picked against the Eagles.  I just don't see it happening.  The Colts are too good.  And as much as everything has gone wrong the last 18 months for the Eagles, the Colts are looking like the team that may have everything going right. 

Without McNabb, we don't have the offense to keep up and Manning is practically un-sackable, which means it comes down to coverage, intelligence and tackling on defense.  We've been a little short on all three this year.

No final score prediction, but if most of America hasn't turned off the TV by the middle of the third quarter I'll be surprised.

Look, I'd Still Rather Have McNabb, But...

I think this is just what this team needs right now:

"Not taking anything away from how we were prior to me stepping in the huddle, because Donovan has his own way of approaching the game, and I appreciate and respect everything that he has been able to do and how he leads this team," Garcia said. "But we are different in certain ways, and I feel like for myself, there's more of an urgency. I feel like I have a sense of wanting to get in and out of the huddle, get to the line of scrimmage.

"I want to see what the defense is doing. I want to have a certain mentality within this offense that is aggressive, and that is an attack sort of mode. That's just how I approach the game, and hopefully that can rub off on guys in a positive way. Hopefully, we can reignite this offense to where they were playing just a few short weeks ago. I think it's all very capable within this team. There's definitely the tools... and it's just a matter of us clicking together and putting it together on the field."

This is why I've been saying that I favor Garcia starting this week.  Not because I've seen anything in practice or have any basis for comparison from a football standpoint, but because Garcia is a fiery guy who knows he doesn't have many chances left.  Those guys can be dangerous.

Two more things.  Reid has his defense practicing in pads this week.  Good.  Although not sure how important that's going to be this week in the All-Finesse Bowl.

Also, today's Rod Hood update:

Safety Brian Dawkins provided a one-word answer when asked whether he was surprised that cornerback Rod Hood did not play against Tennessee: "Yeah."