Let The Hitting Begin
Posted: July 28th, 2013 | Author: Tommy Lawlor | Filed under: Philadelphia Eagles | 42 Comments »Today is full pads and actual contact. In the immortal words of Tony Bruno…”Beautiful.”
My PE.com column focused on one of the big needs for the 2013 Eagles…to be more physical. Last year we had the Charmin Brigade at CB and Self-Tacklin’ Jeremy Maclin at WR. We had giant King Dunlap playing like Tiny Tim. We had a Safety who wanted to hit, but was physically over-matched (Kurt) and another with good size who struggled to be physical (Nate).
This year you get tough, play tough or hit the road. Simple as that.
Goes for bloggers too. Bama, I’m coming for your knees. Better have your head on a swivel.
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Mike Still wrote a notebook type of piece for the Inquirer. I’m not familiar with Mike, but he had a couple of good notes. Check it out.
This was kinda cool.
Being a punter can be lonely at times, especially when the rest of the team is running a wide range of plays together that include nothing for special teams.
To pass the time on Saturday, rookie punter Brad Wing held a competition against himself. With five trash cans arranged in a line, Wing booted punts from about 40 yards out attempting to land one in a trash can.
Wing didn’t make any in about a 15-minute span but rimmed out twice, putting his hands to his face and dropping his jaw in disbelief each time.
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Donovan McNabb will officially retire an Eagle on Monday. I’ll write a full piece on this. One of the greatest Eagles ever, but a guy that has been harder and harder to like in recent years. Just says some strange things.
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So why not have the Eagles go after a starting caliber WR?
What is Chip Kelly looking for? Too often people see a player on the street with good skill and good stats and think “Let’s go get him.” Fit is a crucial part of the equation. The player must fit in your locker room, in terms of personality. The player must fit your scheme.
The Eagles would be looking for a small WR with RAC skills or a big, physical WR.
Brandon Lloyd is neither. Laurent Robinson is neither. Randy Moss??? Austin Collie has concussion issues. Go look at the list of top FAs. I don’t see anyone who jumps out. Donald Jones would make the most sense.
If we ran more of a traditional passing game, Lloyd and Robinson would make sense. The big hold-up then would be Lloyd’s character. He’s bounced around the league for a reason.
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Many of you want to know what Jeremy Maclin’s future is. We need to see how 2013 plays out. If Riley Cooper or Arrelious Benn or Damaris Johnson plays lights out, Mac is likely done as an Eagle. If those guys play like backup WRs, Mac might get another shot. He could re-sign here for one year and hope to earn a big contract from that.
Of course Mac will also study how Chip Kelly uses WRs. I think we need to understand that under Kelly the importance of skill positions goes like this: QB, RB, TE, WR. Mac might not want to come back. Then again, maybe the run game will open things up and the WRs will make a lot of big plays.
Just too many unknowns to have a good feel for Mac’s future.
Jeremy is a high character guy. Everyone around the team loves him. He’ll work hard to get back for next year. He and the Eagles will have some tough talks next March. Hopefully things will work out for both sides.
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According to Philly Sports, DeSean might be our punt returner. I say this is good news. He’s so explosive at pr, always seemed a shame to keep him on the sidelines. I was never convinced by the “risk of injury” arguement, the mojo he brings to the return team is tremendous.
Yes it does sound like he is our PR..Danger! danger! danger! I too hate the risk of injury argument. seems that when you play scared, injuries bite you in the ass anyway. When a starting WR can blow out his ACL after the play, jogging back to the LOS, there really is no point in playing scared. Desean is a probowl PR, a game Changer back there…I hope we don’t waste his ability because of fear of injury…
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as they say in a North Philly craps game on the corner of 19th and Diamond…lol “Scared Money don’t make Money!!!” lol
And it helps me out with return yards if he’s on my fantasy team. Let’s get our priorities straight guys!
Fear of injury is for pussies who don’t love the game. It’s a violent game, OK? You play smart and with intensity. Desean has UPPED his game this year – opposing teams better pay attention.
Yeah Boy!
Personally I would prefer Shep to make the roster and take over those duties
Let The Hitting Begin!!!! raaaawr!!! Lol…Let’s hope good health for our boys!
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My guess is Mac signs a 1yr prove it deal with the Eagles that pays him what he makes this year…For the 2013 Eagles, the loss of Maclin is NOT devestating. but Maclin is a high harever guy who has been busting his but and handling the contract situation like a fan’s dream. if a guy didn’t deserve this it’s Maclin. had he held out and made a stink. We would have crucified him…now his future is in jeapordy..I’m not the biggest Jmac fan but I ally feel bad for the man.
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hopefully Jarius Byrd is paying attention to all these camp injuries and makes the Bills life hell!
The Bills are in a foolish position with Byrd. Mediocre talent Weddle got 5 years / $40 million. All hit, some cover Goldson got slightly more than that. Byrd is a 5 year / $45 million player……just to start the conversation. Put up or trade out Buffalo.
Weddle is the best overall safety in the NFL right now.
Donnie Mc5 was never the same, as a person or a player, after the great T.O. fiasco of 2005.
2008 and 2009 McNabb was really good
2008 McNabb was highly erratic.
2009 was the year that decided McNabb’s fate in Philly–consecutive chokes against Dallas to end the year. Great example of how meaningless a Pro Bowl selection is.
2008 was that awful Cincinnatti tie season and the Baltimore benching.
Because 2009 had nothing to do with us losing Jamaal Jackson and Ratliff living in our backfield. No it was all McNabb.
It exacerbated the effect, but those back to back performances by McNabb were among the worst during his time in Philly. He can’t be excused for that. He was awful in those games, and the organization felt it was time to turn the page.
The Eagles themselves told you what they thought of Don. McNabb was only 33 years old! You don’t trade a franchise QB who is “really good” just because he’s 33. His stints in Washington & Minny support the decision.
I’m inclined to agree that the Eagles don’t need to get a big name to replace Jeremy Maclin. They already have two big guys (Benn, Cooper) and a fast, small guy (Johnson) in the fold. Plus, Avant is very good at blocking and I think people overlook how much Chip values that trait in his receivers. I don’t know if Chip will keep a sixth receiver, but he might be more inclined to do so now. My hunch is that Russell Shepard will earn a spot on the roster. It’ll be fun to see the hitting start up.
I knew Mike from being a writer for Penn State’s student newspaper, the Daily Collegian. I was a freshman and he was the sports editor. He’s a good guy. You’ll see some good work from him.
I was pissed that we would probably have to cut a WR or two that I would have liked us to hold on to. the silver lining to Maclin going down, is being able to keep an extra, young WR talent and get more time to see how he develops. we didn’t have enough spots for all the WR I wanted to keep, so Promote from within…Next Man Up mentality needs to be developed, and it’s starts now!
Here’s a tweet from Brandon Lee…
“Atmosphere is pretty cool here. You’d never know this team went 4-12 the
year before. QBs come out of the tunnel to a standing ovation.”
It would have been cool if they did Training Camp Live for the open practices. Or at least… This one!
m currently at the Linc, it’s really really cool atmosphere
Awesome!!!
Lucky man.
Some things I’m trying to look out for today:
1) Agility of Graham and Cole
2) How Kenny Phillips moves arond
3) Momah, can be get off to a faster start or will he always need ten yards til he can really get going
4) which young Wideout is coming out with a chip on his shoulder today, trying to get noticed now that Maclins misfortune opened up an opportunity.
5) The battle at the Lie of scrimmage. how unblock able is Cox at this stage in he development
6) Whe is Earl Wolff in. Terms of the secondary? Does he just look like one of the guys, or does he stand out from the rest for positive or negative reasons
How about the safetys? Kurt and/or Nate showin’ anything?
Not to me
The honeymoon period continues . . . tick tock, tick tock.
Until the first preseason game and there are some numbers to grumble over.
Of all of the FA WRs left, I wouldn’t mind taking a flier on Mike Sims-Walker.
SPadaro tried to get Trent Cole to admit that he was our Predator, Trent didn’t take the bait, emphasisng that right now coaches are still evaluating what players can and can’t do, which means we still have to take the roles we see players in at practice with a grain of Salt…Heck Cox two days ago said he doesn’t expect to know what position he will play this year til the gameplan for the first game is installed…
I would be in favor of offering Maclin a one-year extension right now. Offer him a fair price, something in the area of RFA money and tell him the team wants him to focus on his recovery and a gaurenteed chance to show he is back.
The word would get out to the other players: if you are a team guy and high character the team will take care of you. Also, I imagine we could work most of the money into this year’s cap, keeping us flexible in the future.
This makes sense…but only if the Eagles want Mac back. Kelly might rather use the resources on a player that he thinks is a great fit, whether as FA or draft pick.
But if they decide they don’t need him after seeing the other guys play, they could at least shop him next offseason. Worst case (or best case?), they would be spending some of this year’s cap to buy an extra pick next year.
Is it just me or is the national media making the impact of Maclin’s injury out to be worse then it really is for us?
No, it isn’t just you. With idiots like Sal Pal on the creep, it isn’t hard to see the national media continue to mis-cover the Eagles.
I mean, I think he was the best receiver on the roster, so it certainly hurts. But he’s definitely replaceable, especially in this offense.
Mac might get another shot. He could re-sign here for one year and hope to earn a big contract from that.
Without Lowball Banner on board, wouldn’t the highbrow thing to do to be t last offer Mac that at this moment (relatively)?
Only if the contract has zero guaranteed like Revis’s. I don’t think front offices take returning to prior form from an injury for granted. And, for Maclin’s solid production, people are still wary of him because of the lack of toughness he’s shown. Do you want to be that type of organisation? The prove it part of this year was in my opinion mainly about toughness. Otherwise, it’s just the same question as any other player, can he play in these new schemes? You can’t take that for granted either. The Eagles really needed to see how he played under the current regime.
The lack of toughness was endemic of the whole team Colt Anderson aside.
The Mike Still piece was interesting, I took from it that Azz is the bad cop/grumpy cop a la Detective Sergeant John Taggart. However, Chip is dumb/dopey enough to play as Detective Billy Rosewood, so we’ll have to settle for Axel Foley instead. Cue Harold Faltermeyer.
Good stuff T-Law!!! That’s some funny stuff right there…
What if … (after seeing the headline) … what if Foles/Vick don’t separate themselves and prove to be “mediocre”?
Thanks for the link to the Still article, Tommy “Pollard” Lawlor. It’s a good thing it was too early to drink (for me), Azz was cracking me up all day. Vocal is an understatement. I was in sec124, back corner with the DL, 3 rows up from the fun.
Also, moment of the day: during 1 on 1’s, T. Cole absolutely blew past Peters. I was worried for the achilles. Wish I got a pic of that…but, this was also fun:
(spoiler- trash can offense had a few good drives, but consistently turned over in the red zone)