Iggles Blog - Philadelphia Eagles Blog

The BountyBowl Guy Finishes Things Up (Part 10)

Right here.

Penultimate Postravaganza (Part 9)

Then we came to the end.  I'm tempted to do this entire post in the first person plural as a tribute, but then people would probably just think I was aping Will Leitch.

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8

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Gabe,

Since this is my last post in this little series, let me start by thanking you for the back-and-forth.  It's been fun.  Hope it's been entertaining to read as well.

Housekeeping first.  Yes, I admit the reputation of Eagles fans can, in the right situations, be rather cool.  Of the two dominant strains of Eagles' fandom -- 1) hard-core, 2) self-pitying -- [the former] is by far the more appealing. 

I just despise the tendency of national commentators to use that reputation as a crutch to score easy points.  It's lazy and intellectually weak-sauced.

With that said, I was amazed while watching the NBA playoffs to see how hard the Boston fans were rooting for Ray Allen during his struggles.  The place went nuts every time he managed so much as a bounce pass to an open teammate without turning the ball over.  Of course, Allen rebounded in a big way later in the playoffs and ended up being an important contributor to the championship.

One can't help but wonder if the same result would have occurred in a town where the only cheers he heard would have been when he walked back to the bench.

As for the arrogance thing, the key point I've tried to make is NOT that Reid / McNabb are any different than any other coach / QB pairing in this league.  I don't think it's possible to succeed at that level without going to bed every night feeling pretty cocky about how you do things.

The problem for Andy is that that's all we see from him.  All signs point to Reid being a good, (relatively) humble, interesting and humorous individual, it's just that he locks that part away any time the microphones are on.  I realize that's his way of coping with this job and also how he thinks he can best win football games, but the end result is that no one cuts him any slack based on how good a guy he is. 

I should mention at this point that I DON'T CARE ABOUT THIS AT ALL.  I like Reid, I think he's an excellent coach and I hope he's here for the next 10 years.  But I think it explains why a guy who's won so many games in this town has to deal with the kind of crap he takes.

But let's consider your hypothetical and say he moves on after this season.  Who would I want to see as coach?  The answer, I think ... depends.

A couple years ago, I would have been right there with you on the Jon Gruden thing.  The guy has a great offensive mind, he's a perfect fit for a veteran team that needs a little bit of edge to get over the hump (see Bay, Tampa), and he would eat this town for lunch. 

My problem, however, is that 1) I'm not sure "veteran team needing an edge" is a good description of where this franchise is right now and 2) I think there's a very good chance Gruden would completely destroy Kevin Kolb.

Whatever Gruden's strengths may be, it's hard to argue that he hasn't completely jacked up his quarterback situation in Florida, to the point that he may only have been saved by the magic that is The Jeff Garcia Experience.  And now even Garcia is pissed at him. 

Do we really want to hand the keys to yet another promising young quarterback to Gruden, with the knowledge that it would likely lead to lots of jerking the guy around, playing AJ Feeley, benching AJ Feeley, and endless rumors about trying to lure McNabb back from Chicago?  I don't think so.

Bottom line:  while he might be the guy to give you the best crack at a championship right way, it could come at the cost of ruining your potential franchise quarterback for the next 10 years.  I'm not sure that's the smartest risk to take.

Jeff Fisher?  Meh.  I realize he's one of the apostles, but to me that's a blah choice.  Only if everyone else said no.

The Ryans?  I'll let you have your dreams.

As for my picks, I'll give you my top and bottom three.  First the no-way-in-hell-ers:

3.  Dick Vermeil.  You know the drumbeat would start.  I like Vermeil and I think he's a great coach, but I don't like the idea of picking a short-timer.  Stability on the sidelines is important.

2.  Brad Childress.  Looks to an outsider like all he's done is turn around a bottom-feeding franchise in Minnesota while also having the foresight to draft the best running back we've seen come out of college in quite some time.  So why does everyone in at least three states hate his guts?  Seems weird.  He's also not the kind of guy who passes the split-screen coach's test the Sports Guy is always talking about.

1.  Marty Mornhinweg.  I realize Andy Reid thinks he's a great coach.  Fine.  But to me he just seems like a pale imitation of Reid himself.  I'm a big fan of the original, I'm just not convinced that hiring the Mini Me version is the answer. 

Now, for the good ones, I'm a big fan of John Harbaugh as well.  Whatever it is that guys like Marty and Childress don't have, he seems to exude in spades.  But the problem is that he's not going to be available any time soon unless things completely blow up for him in his new gig ... which might change my opinion of him slightly as well.

3.  Jim Johnson.  I understand the problems with this choice.  You could even argue that by doing this you would be going down a notch at both the head coach and defensive coordinator positions.  But hear me out.

Do you think the Eagles have a good thing going and should strive for continuity?  Johnson gives you that.  He's been here forever, has the respect of every guy in the locker room, and wouldn't be looking to change things up too much.  He might even consider running the ball more often when he has a lead in the fourth quarter.

On the other hand, are you a little tired of the way Reid runs things?  Think the team would benefit from a guy with a bit more fire?  Well Jim Johnson is your man.  He's the one coach on the staff who will tell you point-blank which guy screwed up out there.  He's also got a reputation of being a hardass on players who don't do things the right way.  If Lurie is looking for a little bit more of a "bad cop" from his head coach, Johnson is the pick.

There's also something to be said for having earned your chance.

2.  Jason Garrett.  Yes.  I know.  But if we're just picking names out of a hat here, Garrett has to be in the mix.  Not only is he by all accounts a great offensive mind, he perfectly fits the mold of a guy you could hire and then set up for the next 10 years.  He's exactly the kind of coach I'd love to see Kevin Kolb play his career under.  And you can't underrate how bad this signing would be for the Cowboys.  That's a win-win-win all the way around.

1.  Bill Cowher.  And my number one guy is sitting out there right now, just waiting for a phone call.  Cowher is the perfect pick:

• Fits the franchise's self-image;
• Track record of success;
• Immediate respect from players;
• Has a ring and can tell fans to shut the hell up;
• Smash-mouth background that would play well in Philly but also be a nice change of pace for this team;
• Understands PA; and,
• Has his offensive coordinator already on staff.

The only thing I don't like about this choice is that I'm still hoping he'll go to Penn State instead.

And so with that, I'll let you have the last word... 

...unless my self-control in that regard is no better than it was in not responding to comments.

And ... We're Backstravanganza (Part 7)

UPDATE: Gabe's response is up.

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Ok, I think I've now given Gabe enough time to recover that it's time to post this. 

Catch-up for the latecomers:

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6

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Gabe,

Very good, long, thoughtful post.  You raised many excellent points, all of which I'm going to ignore so I can focus on the true meat of what you wrote:  the psyche of our franchise quarterback, how we got to where we are, and what it means for the future.

I first want to say thank you.  As someone who spends most of his time blogging about the ways in which football fans (both here and there) are wrong in how they view the Birds, I don't typically have the opportunity to defend Philly fans and how they/we root for our teams.  This is a nice change of pace.

Let's start with how you said Donovan's problems were all our fault:

"It’s just obvious that this was never the right place for him.  I don’t think he’ll ever forget the boos on draft day.  Never." 

See, one of the things that drives me so nuts about all the commentary regarding Philly sports fans is that people always act like we're the ONLY FANS EVER to act in a manner that would be out of place at, say, a somewhat fancy tea party. 

I'm sorry I don't have the cite handy, but I remember reading an article in one of the local papers a couple years ago that pointed out if a fan in Philadelphia -- rather than San Diego -- had thrown a syringe onto the field at Barry Bonds, we'd never hear the end of it, like that stupid teenage Santa Claus.  But because it happened in Southern Califoria, it was just, "oh, one crazy fan, how about that."

It's the same thing with Donovan getting booed on draft day.  The last couple years, ESPN has run a 90-second package during the draft that is just Jets fans booing their team's first round picks.  (Many of which were truly awful.)  You could fill up entire newspapers with stories of fanbases furious with the picks their team made, in every sport. 

But because it's Philadelphia, and because we have that reputation, it's somehow different.  And the fact that a guy got booed nine years ago because a bunch of people who had never seen him play happened to think he was the wrong choice is not only some sort of permanent stain on our record, but also an excuse for why he just never really felt comfortable here.

Furthermore -- and this is the part that really burns me -- the fans weren't actually booing McNabb.  This is one of the things outsiders just never get about Philly fans.  Just because a guy happens to be on the field / in the batter's box / on-stage at the moment we're booing, that doesn't always mean we're booing him.  It's always (ok, usually) more complicated than that.

In 1999, for example, no one in Philadelphia cared two bits about McNabb.  He was just a guy our team might pick instead of the guy we (yes, shamefully, I was in the Ricky camp) wanted.  Paul Tagliabue could have announced our selection as "Jesus Christ, Nazareth Vocational College" and people STILL would have booed. 

You obviously understand this completely.  As you mentioned in an email to me this morning:

"Was at CBP for the Phils yesterday.  You gotta love booing Stephen Drew for being related to JD Drew.  Awesome."

It's the same thing with McNabb.  We weren't booing him -- we were booing NotRickyWilliams.  They just happened to be the same person.

And to be fair, given the recent history, it wasn't exactly a stretch for us to believe the Eagles had just hired yet another coach who would screw everything up.  We didn't know then that Reid had his act together.

So that covers the booing, but what about your next point:

"Being the quarterback of the Eagles, much less the NON-WHITE quarterback of the Eagles is easily one of the top-five worst jobs in American sports. "

So playing quarterback in a town with passionate fans, solid ownership, a stable coaching staff and plenty of talent around you is somehow one of the five worst jobs in American sports?

Are you sure you hadn't started the festivities a little early when you wrote that?

It's certainly true that there are easier places to play sports than Philadelphia.  Evidently in St. Louis you can suck for 10 years without hearing even so much as a nervous cough after your fourth strikeout of the day.  Philly isn't ... like that.

But there are plenty of guys who thrive in Philadelphia and the atmosphere here.  Look at Brian Dawkins, Jeremiah Trotter (never should have left, dude) and Brian Westbrook.  All of these guys are/were great players who seemed to feed off the emotion of the town and never ended up getting too bruised from the experience.

They all have something else in common as well. 

Speaking of St. Louis, doesn't the Scott Rolen case pretty much prove the point that if you're a headcase in one place, you'll be a headcase everywhere else too?  I mean, sure, he had some issues here that were outside his control, but then he went to the land of cornfields and low expectations and still couldn't keep his act together. 

No, McNabb's real problem with the Philly fans is that he thinks he's better than us.  That's the one absolutely unforgivable sin in this town.  We can smell that shit a mile away and we don't like it one bit. 

It's the same problem Andy Reid has.  Every NFL coach is convinced he's always the smartest guy in the room.  That's the only way to survive in that profession.  But most other successful coaches give us other things to go on to round out the picture.  Buddy Ryan hated the Cowboys as much -- or more -- that we did.  (And it was a real hatred, not a fake, we-happen-to-be-in-the-same-division happenstance.)  Dick Vermeil cared so much that boy we just cared right along back with him. 

Andy Reid gives us zippy. 

He sits up there, basically tells us he on top of things so we don't need to worry, and never gives us even a glimpse at the rest of who he is unless something happens to his kids and it's time to get a feel-good article out there about what the family is going through. 

Not to go all after school special here, but if Reid would actually come out of his shell once in awhile, he might find he no longer needed it as much.

As for Donovan, the fact that he's actually right about what he thinks doesn't help.  Nor does it matter.  

Blogstravaganza Update

Gabe is wrapping up kind of a big deal weekend, so the schedule is going to shift today.  I'll have my response up around mid-day and then we'll see how quickly he can recover.

Yes, the honor of Philly fans will be defended.

Even More Dialogue (Part Five)

SECOND UPDATE:  Wow, someone's been saving up some wild stuff about McNabb for a long time now.  Seriously check that out.

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UPDATE:  Part 6 available over on Gabe's site.

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You know the deal by now.  Part five is below. 

For those catching up:  Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4. 

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Gabe,

I'll be honest.  Yesterday was a little straitlaced for what we're trying to do here.  I knew I was in trouble when I asked my wife to read through the post last night and got the:  "It's just not ... I mean ... it's really good.  You made some good arguments.  I just didn't ... [pause] ... I think it's really good."

Kiss. Of. Death. 

So tonight you'll be happy to know I've taken adequate precautions to avoid a repeat performance.  Besides being ready to pick more than a bone or two with what you've written, I have also taken the liberty of fortifying myself with a glass of homebrew (relax, don't worry...), my fair share of a bottle of quite good Zinfandel, and, if I'm being honest, half a bottle of this. 

Of the latter, I am partaking for solely educational purposes, since we are currently trying to determine what expression of this style we want to be making for the holiday season.  (I'm looking for something with a bit more complexity, by the way, but maybe that's the downside of moving from wine back to beer.)

All of which is to say writer's block should not be an issue.

As for your point about the wide receivers, THANK GOD you made it, since things were getting a little boring with all the agreement.  To recap:

[L]et me propose a theory: not only am I sick of the wide receiver discussion, but I’m even more sick of one of its most ridiculous offshoots — the contention that Donovan McNabb’s career is somewhat wasted because he “only played with a True Number One Receiver for one year.”  (GCobb loves this one.)

Um, how about this: Donovan McNabb is privileged to play with the best back in the NFL in 2007 (not my opinion, the results of the Football Outsiders stats).

I'm a little "off" Football Outsiders right now, mostly because I reminded you that the PFP 2008 was coming out this week and yet somehow you received your copy two days before I received mine.  Next year I'm going back to BN.com. 

As for the point about the wide receivers, that's where I'm going to have to disagree with you.  GCobb is (basically) right.  The Eagles had one heck of a window during the Donovan McNabb era to win a Super Bowl, and sadly they always came up one guy short. 

This is, in fact, where I draw the line between myself and the truly committed stats geeks out there.  The real stat-heads will go to their graves arguing that the Eagles' offense in 2004 wasn't really that special -- that they were just as good in 2003, but because of a tougher schedule and some bad luck, things didn't work out quite as well.

Bull.

Look, I respect the heck out of the people who make these arguments.  They are people like former Wingheads (and current EMB) mega-contributor Austin/ArlingtonFan who know their Birds, have ample statistical evidence to support their cases, and generally aren't the type of people you want to be arguing multiple regression analyses with.

They're still wrong. 

You can win a lot of football games just by having a solid team, excellent coaching, and good schemes.  But the unfortunate truth is that in the playoffs all the teams fit that description, at least after the first weekend.  Which means it takes something more than just "solid" to get the job done.  You need to have playmakers -- guys who can do something special when everything breaks down and the game becomes just man-on-man across the field.

Ironically enough, I came to this unshakeable conclusion during a period of time when I wasn't able to be much of an Eagles fan.  It was the late 1990s and I was living in a state of relative poverty (yes, I could pay my electricity bill, but no, I didn't have a bed) in San Diego.  Not only did I not have NFL Sunday Ticket back then, I didn't even have cable.  In fact, to get my fill of football, I used to watch the spanish rebroadcast of Sunday Night Football from the station in Tijuana late at night, hours after the game was done. 

And yeah.  It was fuzzy.

In fact, if memory serves, I didn't even get to watch the Eagles when they came to San Diego to play the Chargers because the game wasn't sold out and so was blacked out in the local market.  Tough times. 

Since I couldn't watch the Eagles, the team I most enjoyed watching during that time was Tampa Bay.  They had a player from my noted football powerhouse of a college, a stifling defense (I've always been a sucker for stifling defenses), and a demonstrably good guy coach in Tony Dungy (ditto on good guy coaches).  What they didn't have, however, was a single offensive playmaker anywhere on the roster, which absolutely killed them in their 11-6 loss in the 1999 NFC Championship Game against the Rams.

That was my formative moment.  To this day I remember discussing that loss the following Monday with a guy I worked with who'd played tight end at Utah.  We both agreed that Shaun King wasn't a great quarterback, but if he'd had even one guy who could make a play, they could have won that game.

Fast forward to January 18, 2004 and what was maybe the most humiliating loss in the history of Philadelphia sports at the hands of the Carolina Panthers.  I covered this in detail a few weeks ago, so I'm not going to rehash it here, but if we ever needed proof that the playoffs are about playmakers, there it was. 

So yeah.  In hindsight, the Eagles screwed up.  There's no reason they couldn't have won at least one Super Bowl if they'd had a true #1 wide receiver for more than a single, glorious season.  (Did you know, incidentally, that last year the Eagles had not one, but two guys on the roster who'd been drafted ahead of Randy Moss?)

Where I diverge from the hanging jury that is the local commentariat, however, is in how I parcel out that blame.  Clearly, prior to the 2004 season, Andy Reid didn't think he needed "that guy."  This was probably a product of his time in Green Bay, where the story has always been that Brett Favre didn't truly reach his potential until after he had to give up the "crutch" that was Sterling Sharpe. 

But after that Carolina loss, Reid has done nothing but try to bring in that big name guy.  They signed Owens and Stallworth, but more importantly we also know they've gone after Moss, Johnson, Fitzgerald and (maybe) Williams.  In fact, I'm not sure there's a top-flight wide receiver anywhere in the league that the Eagles haven't at some point tried to obtain.

You know what, though?  Sometimes things just don't work out.  And as we all know, the only surefire way to get a truly elite talent is through the draft, when the player doesn't have the option of signing somewhere else.  But a quick look at the history of the "can't miss" first round wide receivers of the last few years shows that many of them in fact do.  So it's a little hard to blame them for not going that route either. 

None of this is to knock the guys the Eagles now have at the wide receiver position (much).  They're quality players.  It's just that they're not the kind of wide receivers McNabb does his best with -- as I've discussed many, many times before.

They should be perfect for Kevin Kolb, however.

Of course, all I've really done so far in this post is argue in favor of conventional wisdom.  Knowing how much I hate that, I've got a question for you:  What pieces of offseason conventional wisdom among Eagles fans do you think are most and least likely to actually be true by November? 

Please show your work.

And since I know you're dying to discuss the mental state of Donovan McNabb, please know that I'm all ears.  Not to give too much away, but my own personal tipping point with McNabb rhymes with "Ram Toliver."  I still haven't gotten over that. 

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p.s.  As for recanting my position on B. Ryan, don't hold your breath.  Defensive genius and personnel savant, no doubt.  Not my style, however.  Give me winning with class every day and twice on Sunday over I-don't-care-what-your-excuse-is-fake-kneeldown bullshit.

IBvBB Part 4

Response is up.  Stuck in a meeting, so you can read it before I do.

Episodes you may have missed: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3.

IBvBB Blogstravaganza (Part 3)

This is part three of our discussion with Gabe, the guy who continually makes oblique Simpsons and sci-fi references while discussing the Eagles over on BountyBowl.com.

For those who missed the beginning, part one is here on my site.  Part two is over on his.

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Gabe,

It turns out the hardest thing about this little discussion we're having is avoiding my comments section all day.  It's not uncommon for me to write something that's less than crystal clear in my posts -- and by "not uncommon" I mean it happens pretty much every day. 

That's sort of the deal with this blog (and most others).  I can either churn out an endless series of first drafts with the goal of putting forth the greatest number of new ideas possible, or I can spend a few hours each night trying to polish what I've already written, with the inevitable result being that I would write much, much less.  I think the first option is better, plus it allows this site to continue to be my writing playground and escape from a world where I must ensure our messaging leverages our existing brand position and is strategic, on-target and impactful, while also offering applicability to a wide range of possible audiences, whether corporate, consumer or political...

The problem is that if I venture into the comments to respond to something I wrote earlier, I'm basically clarifying/adjusting something that you should get a first crack at.  That makes it a moving target and isn't really fair. 

So I bit my tongue all day.  Which now leaves me with this:

1. Not sure the Marlins intended to tear everything down after the first WS.  I think I remember instead that when the stadium deal didn't go through, ownership had a tantrum.
2. Easy to forget what 10 years of sucking feels like.  It sucks.
3. I've been to two Redskins games in Washington.  Both times the Eagles won.  Both times the fans walked around after the game yammering about how the Eagles had never won a Super Bowl.  Didn't stop us from kicking your asses five minutes ago, dude.
4. Agreed totally.  I loved the Jeff Garcia experience, but felt the same way.
5. Exactly.
6. I said "classless" not "clueless."  And because it's my hypothetical. 

You bring up an interesting point about the 1993 Phillies.  Were those guys really a "fluke" though?  They sort of came out of nowhere, but after that 17-5 start, it felt all season like there was something special going on there.  If anything, not winning because of a couple of horrific blown saves felt like the fluky part.  That was a team of destiny.

Moving on to your specific questions, let's talk first about the Eagles' data-driven approach, since nothing drives sports blog traffic like an in-depth discussion of spreadsheets. 

I'm like you on this one -- totally without any hard facts to go on.  All we ever get are those occasional cryptic remarks from Andy Reid where he says something like, "I've looked into that and found that basically you idiots don't know what you're talking about."  But something has to be in that famous big fat binder, and it can't all just be calisthenics schedules, right? 

In fact, I'm still waiting to hear an explanation for one of those remarks Reid made last season:

On what his ideal run-pass ratio would be:
"I don't do that. I know that this offense is the best when it's as close to 60-40 or 50-50 as you can get it. I also know that, through studies that I've done, with a number of Super Bowl winners, that really doesn't matter as you go through there. You guys might take your time to do a little homework on that." 

If you follow the link to that post, you'll see that I actually did go back and "do a little homework on that."  What I found is that either my methodology didn't match what Reid meant ... or else he was kind of full of crap on that one.  I'd still love to find out what he was talking about some day. 

I also think there's a clear Moneyball slant to the team's thinking about personnel acquisition, but it's a LOT more refined these days than it was a few years ago when it basically seemed to boil down to: "Don't spend money on linebackers."

The biggest thing we've seen the past few years in the draft is the Eagles drafting more than their fair share of guys who dominated at the small-school level.  It's one thing to draft those Wheaton guys with freebie picks in the sixth round.  It's another thing entirely to be consistently taking guys from Cal-Poly, McNeese State and Saginaw Valley in the top half of the draft. 

All of which leads me to conclude that the Eagles think there's a market inefficiency around small-school players in the draft.  And it's one they think they can exploit.

The rumor for years for why the Bengals drafted all those thugs young men with character flaws was simply because the team refused to invest in its scouting department.  Faced with an inability to identify the best all-around prospects, the Bengals figured they would be better off gambling with those character issues, since even a blind squirrel could see these guys had talent. 

What if the Eagles are in the opposite situation?  What if they provide more resources to their scouting department or have otherwise figured out a way to increase their efficiency there?  Then they could -- in theory -- invest time in a broader range of players.  This would give them the chance to really do their homework on guys from schools where scouts don't usually hang out.

Or maybe the explanation is even simpler than that.  Maybe every team rates these guys the same way athletically, but other teams dock them more "points" in their evaluations for having played at a lower level of competition.  If the Eagles did a study on how those small-school guys have historically performed in the NFL, maybe they realized that there was too much of a discount being factored in.

Whatever, none of those ideas explain why the Eagles -- a team that seems committed to staying with a 4-3 base defense -- continue to draft so many guys everyone else seems to think would fit best as 3-4 outside linebackers. 

Just looking at the roster right now, they have clear 3-4 linebackers in Chris Gocong, Andy Studebaker, Bryan Smith and Chris Clemons.  Heck, that was actually the position Clemons played last year.  You could even throw in Trent Cole and Juqua Parker as two more guys who were looked at as tweeners coming out of college. 

I realize Jim Johnson likes his guys to be versatile, but that's still sort of weird.  For a team that seems to put so much emphasis on production at the college level, there's a whole lot of projection going on at those two positions.

One more NovaCare mystery I'd love to learn more about.

Since I need to wind this down, I want to shift gears to another topic we both care a lot about.  Play calling.  You've mentioned on a few occasions in the past that you feel like you can predict with about a 50 percent success rate what the Eagles are going to do in any given down and distance situation.  Leaving aside the issue that predicting "pass" every play would generally be a profit maximizing strategy in that game, what do you think the problem is and what can be done about it?  

I'm kind of split on this issue.  I do think the Reid/Mornhinweg pairing might be a little bit paint by numbers in its approach to attacking a defense.  That's one of the reasons I'm so irrationally excited about the hiring of the mysterious (and silent) Mark Whipple.  Something called the "whiplash offense"?  Yes, please.  I'll take two.

But beyond that, I'm not so sure the issue is having predictable playcallers as much as it is having predictable players.  After all, if it's a crucial time in the game, 65,000+ people in the stadium know the ball is going to Brian Westbrook.  There are only so many ways for that to happen.  Maybe if the Eagles had a few more -- ahem -- playmakers out there, they'd be able to mix it up a bit more. 

Or is Kevin Curtis really, truly a number one wide receiver and I should just shut up about the fact that he doesn't seem to be able to run past anyone on the outside under the age of 42?

Iggles Blog Vs. Bounty Bowl Blogstravaganza

Update:  Gabe's response is up on his site.  I haven't read it yet, but probably should before I re-respond.  Look for the next post loaded up rightchere tomorrow morning.

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There are many, many good Eagles writers out there, but none are more consistently entertaining than Gabe at BountyBowl.com.  (Of course, by "consistently" I mean "during those 48 hour periods in which he posts six times," not the other 28 days on the calendar.)  Every good humorist needs a straight man, so Gabe and I decided we might try one of those email back-and-forth type things for a few days in order to fill some space during the insanely slow portion of the offseason achieve a greater understanding of the Eagles and where they're headed in 2008 -- and beyond! 

The plan is for this to work like one of those Slate Dialogue things, although significantly more low-brow.  Not Deadspin low-brow, necessarily, but somewhere between the two. 

Here's the first post.  I'll link to Gabe's response when it's up on his site.

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Gabe,

I know we've got a bunch of topics we want to cover here, but let's start with something I've been thinking about for awhile. 

It seems to me the great schism in Eagles fandom this century has focused on the performance of Donovan McNabb.  Either you were "for" McNabb, in that you recognized the man as the best quarterback in (at least) the franchise's modern era and a class act to boot, or you were "against" McNabb, in that you had a stupefying inability to recognize his talents and, quite frankly, wouldn't recognize good quarterback play if it dropped back five steps and bit you on the ass.

We had achieved a nice stasis there for a few years, but I think the events of the last couple seasons have started to bring those two camps together.  I'm not just talking about the on-field stuff, it's the other drama.  The family, the management issues, TO, Pam Oliver, the open flirting with the city of Chicago, the insane pictures of McNabb the Man for All Seasons.  I mean, I really do love the guy.  I'm glad I've had the chance to root for him for so long.  But at some point, it all just started to become a bit much.

We never would have gotten here without the injuries, of course.  They gave us a glimpse of life without McNabb and we saw that it could be ... OK.  Not great.  Not Super Bowl worthy.  But still not terrible.  Kind of like when you're in college and your girlfriend spends a semester abroad.  Maybe you wouldn't have noticed all her annoying little habits if she'd never left and then come back, but since she did .. and since it turns out she is a little nuts after all ... maybe it's time to at least start thinking about looking around a bit.

And let me take this moment to wish you luck on your impending nuptials!

I would go so far as to say that everything that's happened since about 2005 seems to have had the effect of bringing a gradual resolution of the whole McNabb debate into a Unified Theory of Donovan:

1. Heck of a player. 
2. Good guy. 
3. Pretty much down to his last shot in this town. 

(3a. And probably more than a little annoyed that Brett Favre is even THINKING about coming back as the savior of Chicago.  That was totally his idea first.)

Of course, the problem with resolving the McNabb debate is that we need to find something else to argue about.  Fortunately, because this is Philadelphia, we have no shortage of possible topics. 

The leading candidate at this point seems to be the great divide between:

1. Those fans who appreciate the success of the last few years, understand that the overlap between said success and the tenure of Andy Reid is probably not coincidental, and generally evaluate and enjoy each season within its own specific context, versus,
2. Those fans who believe that a quarter century without a championship is quite enough, thank you, and at this point the only metric for "success" is "winning a Super Bowl."  Anything else is a failure -- of the ownership, front office, coaches and team.

Or, to put it in the terms you used by email earlier

"[T]he Eagles have dominated their division (and, arguably, the NFC) for most of the decade, yet have zero championships to show for it.  The Giants got in as a wild-card after a very rocky season last year (and years of middling to minimal success) and won the whole thing.  Who would you rather be?  I might also add that I hate the f*cking Giants.  A lot."

Probably a good time to commend you for annoying so many Giants fans, by the way.  You must be doing something right. 

As to the question above, I'm a serious number one-er.  Winning a Super Bowl in any given season is really, really hard.  As we saw last year, even having the best team in the history of the NFL -- [insert mocking laughter here] -- is no guarantee that your town will end up with a parade.  You need skill, yes, but also mountains of good fortune, both big picture (i.e., injuries) and small (i.e., officiating). 

Also, it helps to cheat.

That doesn't stop the number two-ers from being extremely vocal in opposition to this point.  I think it may in fact be time to propose a new Godwin's Law for Eagles message boards, which states: "The longer a thread continues, the probability of someone mentioning that the Eagles have FAILED to win a SUPER BOWL in CASE YOU HADN'T NOTICED approaches one."

So who would I rather be?  I'll take the Eagles.  And not just because Giants fans are tools. 

Yes, winning a Super Bowl would be awesome.  But it's not going to be historically awesome for that particular Giants team and its fans.  Right now we're all over Tom Coughlin and Eli Manning, but those guys better cash it in soon, because in about four months everyone's going to see just how few clothes that emperor is wearing.  Mark my words, the Giants will end up being just one more of those fluke championship teams, like the Baltimore Ravens, Florida Marlins or Lovett College.

I'll take it even one step further than that.  If you gave me the choice right now of either:  1) winning a Super Bowl next year but seeing Andy Reid leave to go coach at BYU and being replaced by some classless jackass in the mold of Buddy Ryan, or 2) guaranteeing that Reid would stick around for the next five years, continue to do his thing, and maybe we would or maybe we wouldn't get a parade during that time period, I'd absolutely choose door #2.

Shocking?  Not really.  Sports is about more than just the validation that comes from winning a championship. It's about playing the game the way it should be played, treating people the right way, and -- for fans -- rooting for the name on the back of the jersey, not just the front. 

Coaches don't wear jerseys, but the point stands.

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Tag.  You're it.