Some OL Talk
Posted: September 19th, 2014 | Author: Tommy Lawlor | Filed under: Philadelphia Eagles | 142 Comments »The Eagles offensive line was a big part of the success last year. They gave Vick and Foles time to throw. They opened holes for Shady to get through. More than a mobile QB, great RB or specific type of WR, Chip Kelly’s offense needed a good OL.
The line play this year has been more erratic. There isn’t the same stability and that hurts. When you do put backups out there, you also lose ability. Evan Mathis is one of the best OGs in the NFL. You’re not going to plug in someone of equal ability. I think some of the Red Zone issues are tied to the OL. Because it is a condensed area, I think execution trumps scheme. Chip Kelly can’t draw up perfect plays to get guys open. You sometimes have to simply beat the man in front of you.
While injuries and the suspension of Lane Johnson have hurt the team, there is a positive side. The Eagles have a chance to develop some depth on the OL. I wrote about that for BGN.
Not all the answers are going to be good ones, but if Dennis Kelly, David Molk or Matt Tobin show they can be part of the future, that will really help. I left Andrew Gardner out because of his age (28) and the fact there isn’t an ideal position for him.
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Make sure you check out this great PC from Bill Davis. He talks about adjusting to the Colts run game. He talks about how the coaches view sacks vs pressure, and his points are right on the money. Davis is complimentary of Casey Matthews and that’s hard to accept, but all coaches are going to break into coachspeak at some point during a PC.
I do love hearing Davis talk about defense. Smart and interesting guy.
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Watching the JAX/WAS game felt almost like a waste of time. The Jags were just awful. Give the Skins credit for playing well, but that game was more about how awful Jacksonville is right now. Gus Bradley is a defensive guru, but they have left RBs, receivers and TEs wide open for the past 2 weeks. You can live with a play where Cary Williams bites on a fake and gets burned. That is one player making a mistake of aggression. When pass catchers are running around open, play after play…that is disturbing. The scheme works in Seattle. Are the Jags players that bad or is the coaching an issue?
I did come away impressed with Jay Gruden and the WAS front seven.
Gruden was smart to keep the stretch run game as a key component. That is perfect for Alfred Morris and the Skins OL, which still needs a lot of work. Gruden also kept the bootlegs, which are crucial to making the stretch runs so effective. Smart coaching to see that something was working well and didn’t need to be changed.
DE Jason Hatcher is playing lights out right now. He was a monster for the Skins last week. The JAX line played so poorly that RT Cameron Bradfield was benched in the game and then cut on Monday. Ryan Kerrigan gave him fits.
The Eagles OL is going to get a major test on Sunday.
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The highlights of Jax/wa was crazy. Jax want playing defense, receivers wide open on blown coverages everywhere.
The OL is very important to eagles success, hard to beat the man in front of you with backups.
Tommy,
Do you consider shady’s struggles so far as the offensive line not being 100% or do you think the “Desean Jackson not stretching the field” theory carries some of the blame?
Not sure if Troll or just troll?
One would think that since DeSean could be found about 10 yards from the line of scrimmage pretending to block his man on most of Shady’s big runs that the OL is a bigger factor…
WR are getting open. Biggest impact so far is that we’re missing production from WR screens, because DJax is a better runner than Maclin in terms of vision and agility. We’ve replaced it so far with Sproles.
We have not faced a defense where DJax’s loss means anything, yet.
Jax is the least talented team in the NFL (Tampa Bay has more talent, but Lovie is clueless right now), they played the 1st half of our game on scheme and adrenalin, but were then exposed, with Cyprien hurt, the talent level dropped to a top NCAA team. Clemons at 33 is finished, stick a fork in him. The offensive line is dreadful (which is why Henne is the starter, Bradley’s no fool, don’t ruin your kid QB by having him play behind that group until they have time to grow up and jell).
The OL didn’t play well before the injuries, Peters and Mathis both gave up bad sacks, but the injuries kept them from settling in. However, in one sense, this could be a blessing down the road, because Mathis (33) and Herremans (32) have limited lifespans, they’re learning what Kelly and Molk can do (look for Molk to get some OG reps in practice since you only dress 2 backups), and hopefully Tobin can get in there. If you can develop a couple young OGs, then you can draft later for depth there.
Redskin front seven is solid, but with Cofield out and Golston possibly out for Sunday, they’re paper thin up front right now. The secondary is still a mess, Jax couldn’t exploit it, but Chip can. Hatcher is playing great right now, but he faded last year and should fade faster this year, given too many snaps and his age.
I’m not impressed with Kerrigan, getting 4 sacks against a poor offensive line; he was nonexistent against Houston in their week 1 loss. I’m expecting Brent Celek to be pass protecting more this game to help out Gardner on the edge.
Other than that, I think the backup offensive linemen will get better with more playing time; especially with the talented vets that are around them.
Did you see the sacks? Nothing special.. Wasn’t like he was using awesome pass rush moves,to beat his man…Jags OL was just Incompetant. They got to run the ball against us the entire first half because they had the lead, which allowed them to mask their pass blocking issues… They didn’t play with a lead against skins, so they had to do throw, and their OL wharts were revealed…. Hell will freeze before I go into a game fearing Kerrigan, and Orakpo is gettin Jason Petered this week. Jason petered is a new verb.
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I’m sure seeing the damage Sproles did in screen game will slow that pass rush down..
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By the second half, tempo will kick in, and the DL will wear down, pass rush dissapears, we take advantage of the secondary..
Yeah I saw the sacks… Wasn’t impressed. Kerrigan caught a nice break facing that horrible line. Won’t be happening on Sunday.
I think Orakpo enjoys getting Jason-Petered.
Isn’t Kerrigan going to be facing Gardner, though?
He certainly is. Celek will help pass protect.
Yes! Props on use of the verb Jason Petered!
“Davis is complimentary of Casey Matthews and that’s hard to accept”
Hard to accept is an understatement. I have come to hate Casey Matthews with the fire of a thousand white hot suns. If he is anywhere near the field on Sunday there will be enormous trouble. Acho has to play. Even Smith, a guy who’s never played the position before would be better. Anything.
I don’t think I’ve ever agreed with anything more in my entire life. I’m sure you’ll get some backlash for suggesting that Smith should be at ILB for any reason other than an emergency, but you’re right on. Matthews is flat out terrible. My head hurts just knowing he’s on the field and my eyes bleed when I have to watch him. I don’t care if Smith has been practicing ILB for 3 days or 3 minutes, he can’t be worse than CM. In fact, he may actually make a play or two on talent alone.
Gardner vs. Kerrigan should be an adventure.
I just hate it when Dan Snyder gets something right. Everyone thought he was crazy for shelling out that money to a 32 year with a bum knee, but dude is still playing great. Isn’t Washington where veteran players go to die?
Even a blind squirrel finds an acorn once in a while.
Sad but true
On a side note, squirrels only find about 30% of the acorns that they bury. Is ridiculous as that seems, it’s still a way higher percentage than Snyder hits on.
Sneaky trees, getting squirrels to do their planting for them.
give it a few more weeks. karma has quite the running tab on Snyder an is sure to come knockin’
Between Cousins bootlegs and Alfred’s stretch play, that’s like 50% of the skins attack on Sunday…
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Our DL is pretty darn good at moving laterally down the line of scrimmage. We match up well against the stretch run play… Hoping Barwin can get in front of cousins bootlegs, jump up and make it hard for him to complete passes…
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Skins won’t score 24 on Sunday…and you know we are hanging 30 on the scoreboard
If fans can acknowledge how important OL stability is, then fans should have adjusted expectations and expected our Offense not to run like the well oiled Machine they were accustomed to seeing when two inexperienced backups had to replace starters….. Fortunately backups had two games, and weeks of practice so hopefully we are getting closer to working the kinks out so we can gets back to watching our offense operate like a point scoring machine.
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If the great shady isn’t playing up to par behind a makeshift line, Then it’s probably not rational to expect the OL not to effect FOles..
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Backups can get better as they gain more experience and reps.. So hopefully this OL issue won’t doom out offense for much longer… My guess, the backup OL have a much better outing on Sunday
I get what you’re saying about shady vs Foles and the o line. The o line is certainly affecting Foles’ play too. But I don’t think that’s the whole story. Shady’s numbers are down, but it still looks like he’s running well and making something it of nothing.
Foles seems to have some vision/accuracy issues he’s working through. Foles is having protection problems but he’s not playing as well as he could anyway. I’ve always loved his size, ability to manipulate the pocket and throw on the (slow) move, and his cool under pressure/having protection problems since college. Some of that appears to be missing right now.
I think he’s young and facing tough circumstances. He’s managing to win and post good numbers despite his own issues and those of the team around him. He’ll work through it and come out fine on the other side.
FOles leads the NFL in 4th quarter Quarterback rating..
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Even tho he has struggled some, he has been really strong against the blitz… Guess who blitzed the most in the NFL so far combined? Ding ding ding..Haslett and the DEADskins!
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Kurt cousin started 12’for 12, after that he went 10-21…
On Sproles fifth round trade:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/early-lead/wp/2014/09/16/eagles-darren-sproles-shredded-the-colts-showing-the-saints-made-a-mistake-by-trading-him-away/
Thinking we are going to get to see Marcus smith play snaps on defense this week. Expect them to use his ability to drop and cover, since Acho and Casey can’t cover opposing teams waterboys…..
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I’d like to see Acho and smith take over for Mykal. NO CASEY!! I’d rather play James Casey at ILB than Casey mathews
someone asked before, but what is the difference between OLB and ILB (Kendricks role not thumper)? Could Markus do this?
when we say “do this” he is now competing with Casey Matthews not BG. The bar is a little, tiny bit lower.
He can do it maybe in a certain package, designated to blitz or drop him into coverage against a running back or something like that since we probably don’t trust Casey defending a RB catching passes…
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This kid has little experience on defense…it would take a while to turn him into a 3down ILB… He is athletic enough to where he may be capable of it, but that’s a long shot, and it’s certainly won’t provide a quick fix..
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I would give him an ILB package out of desperation, but i would keep him at OLB Longterm.. It’s a more valuable position and I have no doubt he will develop into a quality OLB
Maybe we could train him to be demeco’s successor? If he doesn’t seem to workout at OLB or we basically just train him at both positions and let his natural ability determine where he should or could play.
Thee is no fuckin reason why he won’t work out at OLB… Just because he isn’t providing instant gratification, doesn’t mean he won’t grow into a fantastic OLB.
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There is NO reason to be down on the kid as an OLB right now.. He is athletic enough to where we could prob groom him to replace Meco, but he can be a better OLB than ILB, not to mention OLB is way more valuable and harder to find than an ILB… I’d bet we draft Mykal Kendricks brother to play ILB behind meco
i’d rather spend the game in dime and get run all over than have casey in there
Casey is a Duck.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i_WEMCUhF0E
Posted this elsewhere but couldn’t resist a second time.
Anyone hear any rumors on what Goodells 3:00 press conference is about? Is he stepping down?
ESPN says he’s going to answer questions. Wow, he’s going to lower himself like that? what an honorable guy.
show us the destroyed tapes or resign!!!
he said nothing really. but i don’t think there’s anything he could have said to appease espn / media. owners love him, sponsors are wavering, but it’s over for media and players.
I live in the DC area and I hope we crush this team. I’m tired of listening to how good this defense is, or that the two teams are similar. I think we win 31-17, but if our O plays well the first half, we are going to roll. We have injuries on both sides and what a statement that would send if we could roll on this team.
tons of injuries this year — we might be limping through the season
We are going to stomp on this silly team
Goodell’s press conference was terrible. He lacked emotion and humanity, dodged every question, and essentially “mansplained” to every woman who asked a question.
He’s the worst. Has no clue.
Owners need to fire him, he is single-handedly destroying the league’s image.
mo money mo problems?
I wouldn’t go so far as to say that Goodell is “single-handedly destroying the league’s image”… seems like there’s quite a few other hands in this. Sadly, quite literally…
This is true, but he could have saved the league’s image the same way Adam Silver did.
If he did the right thing from the start, the narrative is “a couple of bad apples.”
Now the narrative is that the league is tone deaf and can’t be trusted to police itself.
Oh he’s definitely fumbled the ball many times and I agree – he hasn’t done anything to help the image. But I also think there’s larger issues at play here than managing the narrative.
Hypothetical:
Kaepernick for Foles.
Who says no?
Kap is a young Vick. Super athletic and can make plays on his feet. He has a canon but doesn’t throw with touch and doesn’t make great reads. I’d prefer to stick with what we know.
People seem down on him in SF.
But he’s ultra talented.
It’s interesting to think about.
I say no. Outside of running, Kap has zero of the qualities Kelly wants in a QB (pre snap reads, play progression, touch etc.)
Might as well just take RG3 instead, Kap’s contract is ridiculous.
No.
Foles, luck, Wilson. That is it in that order.
Wow, I drink the green Koolaid unabashedly, but even I would be taking Luck without a moment hesitation.
Loses in clutch situations, and he’d never make it out of wawa alive with a beard like that.
Are you kidding me? Loses in clutch situations? Wtf. Kid is two years in the league and has like what, 11 game winning drives?
Sorry, mate, that is not against Nick, but I don’t think there are more than two or three teams (I couldn’t even name them) who would pass on Luck. He’s a young version of Rodgers, he gives you everything you ever want out of the QB position.
Like a loss?
I love me some FOles..but Luck in this system could be scary.. We would prob be favorites to win the SB this year with Luck.
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Now talking about FOles for kAp is an absolute joke
Luck never played with a great O-Line. I think he dreams about Jason Peters and Evan Mathis protecting his blind side. He never played with a great RB – we have Shady.
Like I said, nothing against Nick, but Luck is really great and he’d be scary with our team and our coach.
For all who wants Dion Jordan, not sure Kelly is going to trade for him. He is now out 6 games instead of 4 because he has been taken for Meth.
like WTF are you thinking?
How much of a bust he’s been so far.
Lol.
You realize this makes it more likely that they will trade him right? Lol.. Poor GEAGLE? GEAGLE been dancing since he heard the news…remember GEAGLE when Dion becomes an Eagle next offseason.
When doin starts dominating the NFL as a 4-3 DE, THATS when you see me cry myself to sleep lol
Yea sure his value will drop. Why would we want him though? PEDs + meth in a year and a half? It’s been pretty clear that the organization didn’t want any more bad apples that had skeletons in their closet.
You are welcome to feel different, I’d personally bet money we add him next offseason if Vegas offered odds..
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Talking about a serious talent, at a crucial position, that we will have to address… If you want to add OLB talent like Dion, it will cost you a top 5 pick or like 50 million in free agency…
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Dion hasn’t been a bad enough apple yet for Chip to turn his back on him yet,,, Chip loves that kid..as opposed other knuckleheads like Kiko that Chip never got that close too..it’s one thing if only Chip liked him. Azz loves hit he kid, and gamble thought very highly of him as an OLB
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We will see,,, the moment I saw the news, big smile came on my face tho..
I wouldn’t care if we got him. He went from high risk-high reward to low risk-high reward. He’ll be cut from Miami once his cap hit is manageable enough.
If there was a trade for a suspended plater to be done, it should be for Josh Gordon.
Apparently he’s still high.
Yeah but I don’t think Cleveland would trade Josh. As dumb as he is, he is their best player
They’ll want a first and maybe more if they did try to trade him. I would give that up for the #2 WR in the league and that’s with the ridiculous amount of WR talent in the league right now.
No way Miami wont or can demand a 1st now. I say a 3rd highest and that is if we really value Jordan
GEAGLE then what would happen to Smith, or you think eventually it’s Smith and Dion as OLB. I assume that is what you are thinking. Just making sure wanting Dion doesn’t mean you think Smith isn’t good.
If we get Jordan (slime chance), I think Smith’s future might actually be ILB (I know im not alone in that thought)
Possibly… But we could also opt to go with smith/Dion as the OLBs, and we could possibly see Barwin replace Meco at Thumper
What would happen to Smifh? First of all you need 3 OLBs that you can play in games..
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Dion/smith/Barwin rotate… When Barwins contract is up! he either slides inside or we don’t re sign him and we will have Dion and Marcus left…
His ped suspension was for meth like product, but new policy changes meth from ped to substance abuse, people just assumed his was peds because of his huge weight gain
LOL @ people thinking Dion Jordan is smoking crystal meth!!! Hahahaha I can assure you it’s NOT THAT serious.. Probably Ecstacy or something
I just put everything related to amphetamine under Meth because its easier to write. see this:
“His ped suspension was for meth like product” Also MDMA (ecstacy) has meth in it (the MA part of the name refers to methamphetamine)
Gotcha.. And you are absolutely right… But you should see the text messages I’m getting “hahah your boy smokes crystal meth dude”…. Lol people are nuts..
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It’s BAD because he is in the league program, and any future trouble with be heavily penalized…but it’s not so bad that the kid is tweeking in some crack house lol
Low risk high reward, filling a premier position. To get a caliber OLB like Dion you either need a top 10 pick or 50 million in free agency… Why wouldn’t we exploit this and take a flier on a low risk, super high reward player at a premier position that we need to reconfigure next offseason?
Lol he doesn’t smoke meth man
Blaming Anders here.
MDMA is a meth like product, so where have I ever written crystal meth?
It was all planned.
Lol.. When Miami stole him from us, I assumed we had to wait til he becomes a free agent to make him an eagles.. At this point, I’d be pretty damn shocked if he isn’t on our roster next year, especially with the change in general managers…
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Hopefully we can get our hands on Dion without having to give up Vinny Curry…that would be HUGE!
I wondered if anybody was still jonesing for Jordan. Not surprised to hear he’s gone to rehab if he’s been using meth. That stuff gets ugly.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ApHRFM2NI9s
Watch from about 1:30. 125 kmh = @70 mph.
In the city.
IMO this makes it more likely he becomes an eagle.. Another reason for new GM to trade him, lowering the price tag for the team trading for him…If Vegas had Odds for it, I would definitely put some money down on eagles AQUIRING him next offseason.
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We won’t be adding many troubled players.. But Kelly and Dions relationship trumps this news
meth though? what are you doing? They definitely need to re-do drug policy things. Should be able to be around team during suspension, especially a guy like Dion who needs the reps.
Many have said the same with Gordon, as a guy like him needs to be with team and not alone with the bad influence.
Gordon for some reason is allowed back in the building.
Not letting Blackmon around the jags practically ruined that kids career..
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It’s a joke that Goodell is letting Aldon smith around the Niners.. That is a huge advantage. Either they can all remain with the team or Aldon can’t be around the Niners either. It’s absurd to let Aldon but not the other players because it’s a really big deal, both in helping the kid get and stay clean and out of trouble, and it’s a he advantage for when his suspension is over and he can step back in the lineup…
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I have a major problem with allowing Aldon around the team, but not the other problem childs
Maybe, it depends on if Kelly think he can stay clean because Kelly seems to only care about what you do inside nova care, but amphetamine addiction can drive a wrench trough discipline
There is no way WA can stay in top ten in any defensive category, can they?
Nope
Possibly, don’t they have a four-game home stand against the Jaguars coming up soon?
They wish.
Nick FOles has the #1 ranked QBR in 4th quarters so far this year.
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Even when he struggles, he has been pretty darn sharp against the blitz… Guess which defense blitzed the most so far this year? You guessed it, Mr. Haslett… Also pretty difficult to blitz a team that’s tempoing you to death..
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All the people scared of the drastically over rated skin defense… Their defense has made noise because it’s been successful blitzing… That plays right into our hands, not only can they not blitz us as much because of our tempo, but history says, you don’t want to blitz Nick Foles
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Our DL lateral agility matches up really well with the skins bread and butter stretch run play, and Barwin does a good job chasing QBs and getting in NTHEIR face when they bootleg, which is what cousin will do a ton of,
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End of last year shows Cousin can’t handle the blitz.
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He started off 12 of 12 against the jags! then they figured something out and he was only 10 of 21 the rest of the way..
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No doubt we win on Sunday..I’m done studying this match up. This game is ours!
Bbut they less league in sacks!!!
An tomorrow they will be leading the league in getting gashed for screen play yards
Nicky Bigtime, nice. I’m a fan of St. Nick still myself.
#rainmaker
#deathharbinger?
We only have 1 ILB playing. Remember that before you call it a lock.
Boo hoo.. So Rey helu has a favorable matchup…
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Have you seen the redskins secondary…. Their secondary is so bad, the cut the safety that started for them, baccari Rambo…
The Philly Inquirer suggests Riley Cooper’s role in the Eagles’ offense has been diminished this season by the addition of Darren Sproles and ascension of second-year TE Zach Ertz.
And it doesn’t help that Cooper has played very poorly. He has just 37 yards on 11 targets and dropped a touchdown in last Monday night’s win over the Colts. Cooper basically admitted he’s a role player in Chip Kelly’s offense. “Those are the type of people he wants in here,” Cooper said of Kelly. “He doesn’t want … me complaining about, ‘I’m not getting this many catches.’ I just want to win games.”
The way Chip has this team set up… everyone is basically a role player. Play your position and if the defense gives us the run it will be Shady. Take away the run and it may be Coop or Maclin. Blitz and it may be Sproles, Shady and the WRs in the screen. Get mismaches on the TEs, goes to Ertz and Celek.
I’m not a fantasy football person, but I have read how hard it is to have Eagles players on your team. You never know who will have the big game.
Cooper can block and that is part of his role. One reason DJax is gone. His day will come. Just like Foles will have a big game, hopefully Sunday.
eagles put up so many yards they can support a lot of fantasy players (except wrs). I’m excited for parkey, think he’s going to be the most active kicker this year.
For extra pts and kick offs I assume.
I have FOles, Ertz, Maclin and our defense.. So far, even in quiet games they manage to give me decent fantasy points… A bad game for them is much better than a bad game for other players… Just look, fans have acted like we suck these past two weeks, as much as we struggled we still have the #1 offense…. How many points will these players give me, when we actually have a good game?
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Even Sproles is managing to be a good fantasy player, playing on the same team as shady… Plus we running like 20 more snaps than many other teams..
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But you are right, that the goal of Chip is to build a well rounded arsenal of different stylistic weapons, and week to week roles will increase and decrease depending on the matchup… Don’t think he wants a traditional #1, #2 #3 reciever.. He is just going to look at the weakness of the defense we are facing, and use the best player suited to exploit that weakness..
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Some weeks Maclin will be our #1 WR, other weeks Sproles or Ertz will be our #1 WR… This offense will morph on a week to week basis depending on the defense.
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Chip is actually predictable. But it’s logic, where as Andy was the king of outsmarting himself. Andy would just stick to what his stubborn brain wanted to do, he would often ignore opposing teams weakness and continue to attack their strengths…
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It’s easy to predict the eagles under Chip. Study the defense we face, and whatever the best chance to exploit mismatches that you see, is how Chip is going to attack them. He doesn’t want to trick you… He will take your weakness, match it up against one of our dangerous weapons, and create a ton of space for our weapon to exploit that weakness. Opposing coaches knows who he will attack…but if we execute, it won’t matter..
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Chip philosophy’s is “to have ANSWERS for whatever problem they throw at us”…so when teams get tired of us exploiting that weakness and they allocate help to shut that down, it will open up another weakness, and Chip simply adjust and attacks the new weakness…. He is very predictable.. Not in the sense that you know what he will do,… But you can easily know how Chip will attack you. If you have an advantage in a mismatch and you execute..it doesn’t matter that they know what you are going to do
Cooper is still playing a lot of snaps, he just isnt catching as many deep balls as last year. Once Shady, Maclin, Ertz and Matthews begin wrecking havoc, Cooper will get a lot of 1v1 (more so than now)
Needs to be an.upgrade there next year. Even if small.
AC, would love to hear your take on the recent ESPN article about the Rice case. You know, as a true independent lawyer.
There is no possible circumstance where the Eagles O-line having a bad game vs. Washington is acceptable. This needs to be a win and a win where we score the football with ease over the length of the game.
It would be unnaceptable if Johnson and Mathis were in. I can accept if the Oline doesnt have a good game. I cant accept if we lose however. You just cant create talent when there isnt any. We are down to backups, and backups backups.
By the second half, when the tempo kicks in and their front 7 is gassed, our OL will be fine!
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I will judge their progress on their play in the first half. Hopefully we don’t have to wait til the second half this week for our backup OL to get their shit together….but worst case scenario I think we can count on them in the second half thanks to our coaches tempo…
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We can’t expect them to be as good as the studs they are replacing, but now they have two games under their belt and two weeks of snaps n continuity with the ones… I am expecting to see Gardner and Kelly play better then we have seen them play so far! which hopefully equates to not having to wait til the second half to get our offensive flowing,
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This is a Rythem offense. Let us get in a flow early, gaining positive yards, no penalties, so we can put the peddle to the metal and give them a heavy dose of tempo, and our offense will put up first half points… If we stop play with penalties, lose yards, FOles and the offense will struggle in the first half..
Just get 3 or 4 yards per play early, let us get into a rythe,, and we can run this team out of the Linc…
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If our backup OL struggle, than it will be a rough first half and we will have to have a crazy second half again to win..
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But we should see those two OL play better, it’s all about the first half, because we can count on being fine in the second half once tempo slows down the defense
These teams all go with “next man up” philosophy and I don’t see Reggie White playing for Washington.
You Dont need Reggie White to cause problems for us right now. The Jags were able to do it, Wash will be able to with Hatcher, Kerrigan and Orakpo. Like i said, if our line was 100% i wpuld be upset if they gave us fits. However our line is far from 100%, so i wont be upset if they have problems, lol as long as we win. Matter of fact i would be highy imoressed if we didnt.
Hate to say it because Djax was one of my favorite eagles, but he does look good in red and gold. Sorry if i just spoke heresy. Stating the obvious here, but with Kendricks out that really hurts, but at least the Skins starting TE Reed is out. Might soften the blow. I really hope Djax doesnt play.
Goodell double-downed and said exactly what I thought he would say almost to a T. What preconceptions people had of him before the press conference weren’t likely changed at all.
I guess I am in the ‘prove it’ camp on Goodell moving ahead forward although I doubt the Muellar-directed probe will find much. If Goodell did what he said the NFL is going to do in the press conference yesterday, it will be a better league moving ahead forward. Goodell is right that these are widespread (child abuse, domestic abuse) issues in society as a whole and there isn’t evidence to support that NFL players somehow much worse offenders than the general public as a whole on them.
Personally, I think he is calm, cold, and calculating with a huge understated ego and not a whole lot of empathy or understanding for the victims in these issues. Doesn’t make a horrible guy or much different from people of position in power. Just makes him someone I don’t care much for personality having been around this type of executive the past few years
Agree except I’d omit understated.
I would love it if he were to go.
Problem is there is no clear cut successor waiting in the wings…
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The other leagues had clear cut successors that could step in whenever commissioners stepped down… Goodell has made it so it not really a pyramid of power.. It’s more like Goodell at the top, and a bunch of underlings with very little power..
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If there was a clear cut successor in house that the owners trusted, Goodell would be gone already… But it’s not likely that the owners would be thrilled to fire Goodell. And bring an outsider in to succeed Goodell… Goodell made them billions. Not likely that they are thrilled to hire some outsider to replace him….
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Gotta find a way to replace this fraudulent piece of shit
Thinking the game plan this week is pretty simple.
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First half spread the BIG defenders out and run the ball, forcing them to tackle us in space. Step on the gas, Ricky Bobby style, and tempo tempo tempo.. Don’t let their big front 7 substitute and just keep spreading them out and forcing them to tackle shady and Sproles… When we need to throw the ball, they will be really aggressive rushing the QB, so we should be able to burn them in the screen game…
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Second half, all the body blows we hit them with(1st half tempo) will start taking it’s toll and the defense starts huffing and puffing, pass rush slows down, so FOles should get some time to really attack down field and take advantage of a laughable secondary…
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On defense, it will be the opposite of the colts game plan. We will take Alfred Morris out of the game, use our lateral agility to defend those stretch runs they love to call… Force Kurt Cousin to beat us. We will have to defend a lot of bootlegs…we saw at the end of last year, that when you blitz Cousins, his arm strength shows it’s wharts and he struggle fitting the ball in tight windowns..
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He started of completing his first 12 passes against jags, then he went 10 for 21 the rest of the way…nothing special.
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can’t wait to squash this Cousin hype, like the bug that he is… Hopefully we make it really simple, Fletcher Cox knocks him out of the game, it’s been a while since we knocked a QB out of a game…this is a good week for it 🙂
Mcnabb was the best QB I ever rooted for as an eagles fan…but he was the ultimate front runner who sucked at the end of games..
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Now we are seeing a young QB struggle, but get it together and lead the league in 4th quarter QBR. When we need him most, Nick has played his best ball. Kid is becoming clutch! The last drive in the playoffs where he took us right down field and into the ENDZONE… On the road in Lucks house, he didn’t ke us lose that game, it was an up and down night for him, but as soon as the defense stepped up and got that 3 and out against Luck, we saw Saint Nick take the field and complete that big pass to Ertz to get the game winning drive started… Last year in the saints game, he left too much time on the clock.. This time we saw him lead us down field, kill the entire clock and put kicker in great position to ice the game..
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Mcnabb and Reid were 2-47 trying to comeback in 4th quarters.
Chip/FOles are already 3/5 in 4th quarter comebacks..
Excellent stat! What we have here is clutch a Philadelphia Eagles team.
I find it hard to believe they only had two 4th quarter comebacks under Reid-McNabb… I think think of more off the top of my head…
Eagles at Pittsburgh in 2000
Both games against the Giants in 2001
The playoff game against Green Bay
Against the Jets in 2003
Regular season against the Packers in 2003.
I could go on..
The stat was going into the 4th down a certain number of points.. Can’t think of the exact number off the top of my head.
It’s mentioned at http://www.philly.com/philly/sports/eagles/20140921_Chip_and_the_comebacks.html
The stat is record when being down 14 points at any stage of the game; nothing to do with the 4th quarter. It does help having an explosive offense… Reid’s was often very good, but not this good. His early teams were built more on defense, and by the time the offense got good the defense started degrading. But it may also point to a lack of ability to adjust during the game.
Thanks. If the numbers are 2-47 and 3-5, than it’s the stat I’m talking about… I remember those numbers, can’t remember what the exact stat is.. I dont research post, all off top of my head…
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In 10 years Reid could only comeback being down by 14 at any point of the game only twice? Can be right? We had some good offenses during that decade..
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We still have FOles #1 4th quarter QBR on our side,
The Eagles offenses was good but never great like now. Also it is hard to make comebacks when you have James Trash and Todd Pinkston as your best weapons.
That still seems wrong. Plus the writer explicitly mentions that they never overcame a 14-point deficit in the playoffs, obviously overlooking the fact that the Eagles trailed by 14-0 in the 4th-and-26 game.
That def seems wrong,,,, I’ll dig up where I found the stat.,,.. It was probably Rueban Franks or Matt Lombardo! they usually provide the best eagles stats. I’ll find the exact stat and post it
RE: McNabb in the 4th Q
For what it’s worth, profootballreference.com has McNabb’s 4th Q stats as follows:
15 – 4th-Q comebacks
25 – 4th Q game-winning drives.
http://www.pro-football-reference.com/players/M/McNaDo00.htm
Being (very) old-school, I’ve always been inclined to trust my eyes as opposed to elaborate stat-calcs like WAR.
For the life of me, I don’t remember the Eagles — in the 54 years since Norm Van Brocklin — tallying a *total* of 25 4th Q comeback drives. [exaggeration to make a point]
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By the way, in 1960 when Van Brocklin led the Eagles to the title, the team went 11-2 . . . 10-2 in the regular season, plus 1-0 in the post-season.
Out of those 11 wins, Van Brocklin led the Eagles to 4th-Q wins in 7 of those games.
The 1960 Eagles were like the 1993 Phils — except they won their last game.
WTF… I was young and it was a while ago, but didn’t we kill Mcnabb for his lack of last drive heroics?
Perception is a bad thing right?
Not saying people are right or wrong, but a lot about what is said about McNabb and Reid was related to stuff after 2008, before that we won a lot of games and you only do that by coming back from some.
All I know is that this summer, we used to laugh at the DEADskins,,
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What has changed since then that all of the sudden eagles fans fear this group of frauds? Lighting up the stinking Jags is no reason for us to be hiding under our bed cuz the big bad redskins are coming to town
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Anyone that worried about the foreskins needs to check out the Texans tape.
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This isn’t a different team than the one we laughed at all summer.
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How great can they be when they cut a safety that has started for them this year lol… From starter to waiver wire LOL!
Interesting that Wes Welker is activated for the @ Seattle game Sunday. If this game were in Denver, I wouldn’t really care, but because it’s in Seattle I find it very interesting,
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Denver was scared to death at a neutral Super Bowl site… What’s going to happen when they Have to play them in Seattle where they are at their best?
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Fascinating game for a week 3
The only thing different about the skins defense is hatcher and 37yr old safety Ryan Clark..
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The rest is basically the same group of mutts we beat soundly last year twice.
Don’t forget the ageless wonder from England finally retired.
. . . “mutts” . . .
I haven’t read/heard that since I was a federal prosecutor.
Brings back some great memories.
Mutts aka “humps” or “mopes”
MOPES . . .
Even better.
GE:
How ’bout “Nicky 4-Qs”?
Kerrigan and Orakpo is playing better and Hatcher is just as good as he was last year (when he was one of the main reasons the 2nd game was even close)