Iggles Blog - Philadelphia Eagles Blog

I Know...

The blog has been fairly uninspired recently.  So have the Eagles. 

Assuming the team can take care of business this Sunday, the second season starts in earnest next week as they prep for the Giants.  I'll be back on the horse by then.

Chills

US CAN!!!

Blogger Faux Pas

Gabe, Gabe, Gabe.  This one's gonna hurt:

Brookover reports that the Eagles are not likely to hand out any extensions this year — exactly how he knows this is never explained, but he’s a reporter and he talks to plenty of folks who’d prefer not to be quoted down there (perhaps this is a topic for another post?). So I’ll take him at face value.

At your service, big guy:

[T]he NFL owners' decision in May to opt out of the final 2 years of the collective bargaining agreement has made it unlikely that any Eagles will be signing extensions between now and the end of the season.

"It's a little hard to go do deals right now when you don't know what the landscape is going to be going forward," Eagles president Joe Banner said earlier this week...

"When you don't know what the rules of the game are going to be, it kind of hinders doing a long-term deal," Banner said. "Players don't know if they're going to be free agents after 4 years or 6 years. I don't know if the cap's going to stay relatively flat or take a significant jump.

"I'm a little reluctant to lock in to too many players without knowing what the next cap will be. Also, we're only a couple of years away from the next round of television deals. So you don't know what's going to happen with that. You don't know what your player costs are going to be. I'm glad that, for the moment, we don't really need to do anything."

Keep Digging, Lito

Geez, this guy just won't quit:

"I always tell them this: First of all, you have to do what's best for you and your family, but second of all, let's put it like this, if you don't take that money, watch how they do you," Sheppard said. "If you take it, you just better hope you're not mad two or three years down the line...

"If you're on offense, they can limit your production and not let you do what you've been doing, and on defense, they can start finding fault," Sheppard said. "Every little thing you do, they can use it against you."

Sheppard said he thinks that's what happened to former Eagles safety Michael Lewis two years ago.

This is normally the moment where I get to point out the obvious, but Brookover took care of that for us this time:

Sheppard isn't the only one in the Eagles' locker room who feels as if Lewis got a raw deal after he didn't sign a long-term deal, but the safety's benching was about performance rather than money.

Defensive coordinator Jim Johnson felt Lewis could not cover anyone, and it was a valid point. Johnson does not care how much any of his players are making. The problem was that Sean Considine was not the right guy to replace Lewis. Quintin Mikell has fixed that problem.

Bill Lyon Sighting

I'm hoping we get to read another one from him tomorrow.  For now, this will have to do.

Wow, An ST Signing Worked

Since the end of last season, the Eagles have brought in a couple handfuls of guys who were supposed to help the special teams.  With only a couple partial exceptions, this hasn't really worked out. 

Thanks to the weekly ST production tracking of reader/commenter "shlynch," we know that Tank Daniels is the only "new guy" in the team's top ten most productive players.  And even he's a repeat visitor. 

Shlynch sent me the updated numbers after the last game, though, and folks, we finally have a winner.  Reserve linebacker -- the guy who won't be getting an Igglesblog Christmas present this year because he took Tony Hunt's roster spot -- made an immediate impact, putting up 35 production points in his first game with the Eagles.  That's the biggest number anyone's dropped all year (Akeem Jordan has a 33 and a 34). 

So it looks like the team may finally have found someone.

While we're on the topic of special teams, what's going on right now with Sav Rocca?  I don't think his kicking last week was a consistency issue.  It looked like a couple of times he saw the returner lined up pretty deep, so he actually took something off the ball, trying to make it un-fieldable.  So rather than, say, a 50 yard punt and eight yard return, he was going for just 42 yards, no return.

The thing is, it didn't really work.  The first punt came back 16 yards. 

Or maybe I'm overthinking this and Sav is still just inconsistent.  After all, that last punt (you know, the one that was "muffed") only traveled 34 yards.  And it was definitely catchable. 

Wonder what's up there.

In Which The Universe Continues To Screw With Philadelphia

Yes, I know.  This is an Eagles blog.  Roger that.  There's a reason I don't try to cover the Phillies or Penn State or the weather (ha!) or anything else in this space. 

All Eagles all the time.

Except right now.  Because -- and you'll have to forgive me for this -- this is the closest those of us in the 30(ish) age group have ever come to a championship we could actually remember. 

Which means this morning, yes, I read the Eagles coverage, but only after I checked out everything I could find on the Phillies.  And this evening, rather than spending time writing up tomorrow's no doubt scintillating statistical examination of the Eagles' recent trend for not beating teams quite as badly as maybe they ought to, I made dinner, plopped down in front of the television, and prepared to either scream my head off in celebration or start to get very, very worried about the rest of this week.

What I did NOT expect, however, was the great cosmic screwoff we just got tonight.  I mean, seriously, can we please for the love of Andy just put this thing away? 

Here's the central problem with being a Philadelphia fan.  It's not that our teams never win.  Oh no, it's that because they never win, we can't even enjoy it when they do. 

The Phillies are up 3-1.  They have four chances to score versus only three for the Rays.  Our bullpen has been lights out all series.  Even if we don't put this away tomorrow (or Wednesday?) we still have two more chances. 

And I feel sick.

We'reThisClose

I literally can't believe this is happening.  And I do mean literally, in the sense that I still don't believe it. 

Can this finally be the time?  Will the city finally get its championship?

You know you're a Philly fan when (#6,376):  Your team is up 3-1, finally starting to tear the cover off the ball, has its best pitcher on the mound tonight and you're thinking, "Uh-oh, this is one heck of a set-up." 

Immediate Reactions

Stop the run, win this game.  Atlanta has one trick.

Lot of Dime being played on third and long today.

Gocong is so much better when he's attacking the line of scrimmage and not trying to hang back and read stuff.

Thank you, Asante, for taking care of that pick in the first quarter.

I wonder if McNabb's wild highs come from having two weeks off to rest his arm.

That was the worst roughing the passer penalty in the history of professional football.

Also, Dallas is losing.

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Dammit, Typepad:

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Weblogs are currently not loading for some users. We are aware of this issue and working to resolve it as quickly as possible.

That's why my blog is in and out ... on game day.  Have these problems on Saturday, TypePad.

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Second quarter reaction.  Since I can't post in the comments because Typepad can't keep my site up, more thoughts:

What does Asante's "L" sign mean?

Did we work on nothing but stopping screens all week?  It's like magically our defense can finally recognize them.

Announcers are right, the Eagles are playing with huuuuge A-gap splits this week.  Wonder what that's about.

Rocca is amazing.

When we got shotgun draw, I think it's an auto-read based on the number of defenders on the weak side of the formation.  If we have numbers, the handoff goes there.

McNabb is about 10x slower than he used to be.

Was Akers the one guy in the stadium wearing green NOT rooting for the Birds to get into field goal range there?  Way to squeeze it in, though.

Refs are totally screwing the Bucs.

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You wwre screaming "SHOVEL SHOVEL SHOVEL" at your tv, too, weren't ya?

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You know, what, as many different ways the refs have screwed the Eagles the last few years, they deserved this one.

And boy that was a terrible call.