Sam’s Team
Posted: October 12th, 2015 | Author: Tommy Lawlor | Filed under: Philadelphia Eagles | 222 Comments »There was a lot of hope in the summer of 1995. New coach Ray Rhodes brought in offensive coaching prodigy Jon Gruden to teach the West Coast Offense to Randall Cunningham and the Eagles. At the time, the WCO wasn’t all over the league. It was best known as the offense of the Niners and Packers, two great offensive teams.
We all just knew the new offense would get Cunningham back to form. He had grown stale in Rich Kotite’s offense. A new scheme, new coach and new coordinator would bring out the best in him.
Oops.
Cunningham didn’t embrace the offense or Gruden’s tough-love coaching. He was benched in favor of Rodney Peete, a player who wasn’t nearly as talented. The difference is that Peete listened to the coaches and was a good leader. The players responded to him.
Peete had the “it” factor. Cunningham never did. Players responded to Cunningham’s ability, but never his personality or leadership. If Cunningham had any kind of intangibles in the prime of his career, who knows how good he might have been. Ideally you want your star QB to be a good leader and high character person. Tom Brady is the best example today. He has great QB skills, but also great intangibles. The guys respond to him. They love him.
What about the 2015 Eagles and Sam Bradford?
The players say all the right things about him publicly. He seems like a high character guy. He certainly looked like a leader in the preseason. He marched the team up and down the field and the players seemed to really respond to him.
The regular season has been harder to read. An epidemic of 3 & outs and sloppy play left everyone on the offense frustrated, to say the least.
The offense showed some real hope in the 2nd half of the Washington game. Bradford threw 3 TD passes and was more aggressive and assertive. He looked confident. He ran the ball once and got out of the pocket to throw a TD pass on one play. Bradford took chances. He didn’t play not to fail. He played to win. He threw the ball to receivers who were covered, giving his guys a chance to make plays.
I wondered if any of this would carry over to the Saints game. I hoped it would, but the fact the Eagles lost the Skins game made me wonder if all the good would disappear as quickly as it seemed to come out of nowhere.
And then we heard the shower story.
This has nothing to do with hygiene or a horrible scene from Oz. Instead, this might be the moment that the Eagles became Sam Bradford’s team. Before the Saints game, Bradford pulled the offense into the showers and gave them a pep talk. Per Lane Johnson:
Before the game today, Sam pulled us back by the showers here and we had an offensive meeting and said it’s time to go,” said offensive tackle Lane Johnson. “We have the talent. We have the ability. We have to go out there and get it done. It’s just a matter of executing.”
That’s hardly compelling rhetoric, but I love the fact Bradford talked to his offense. That shows ownership. He’s the QB. He’s getting paid the big bucks. Be the leader. Be the alpha dog.
Chip Kelly said in his PC that this isn’t the first time Bradford has done something like this. That may be true, but the circumstances were different and it sounds like the talk was different.
Jason Kelce on Sam Bradford pep talk w team before #Eagles game, "Sam was different and more vocal for this pep talk." @FOX29philly
— Howard Eskin (@howardeskin) October 12, 2015
There is a lot of season left. The Eagles offense showed what it could do on Sunday. Bradford threw for 333 yards and a pair of TDs. Even when he screwed up and threw Red Zone picks, there was no panic. The offense looked confident all game long. They played that way, moving the ball up and down the field. Facing a crappy Saints defense was a big part of that, but I also think Bradford’s talk helped.
Bradford doesn’t need to give pep talks every week. It is far more important that he make good reads and accurate throws, especially in the Red Zone.
But I do like the fact Bradford is now comfortable enough to be the leader for this team. Hopefully the next talk will be in the huddle right before Bradford throws the game winning pass in a key victory.
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In case you didn’t click the line above, click this. Jimmy Bama had some fun with the shower story. You’ll either love it or hate it.
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Caleb Sturgis will remain the kicker. Chip said there was an issue with the snap/hold on the miss. Overall, he praised Sturgis.
I’m sure part of that is coachspeak. If there were better options, Chip would go for one. There aren’t any good kickers available so you talk your guy up.
That said, I think some of the praise is legit. Sturgis missed his first two kicks in the WAS game. The next two were right down the middle. He was 4 of 4 on FGs on Sunday. He did miss the one extra point, but Chip felt the snap/hold affected that play. Kickoffs have mostly been deep.
This is far from ideal, but there are worse kicking situations out there.
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The Eagles did work out 4 players on Monday. None were kickers. BGN has the details.
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Kinda driving me nuts this article isn’t named Sam’s Club
Ah yes..the middle of the pack wholeseller club just like Sam is a middle of the pack QB right now.
How did I miss that title?
My version of a dropped pass on 3rd/5.
TommyCooper
Funny you bring up HBO’s “Oz”, Tommy, because watching the Eagles for most of the season is how I imagine a character on that show felt.
Jimmy, Jimmy, that article…
Sam Bradford as a leader: http://www.tonysoftli.com/2011/10/11/sam-bradfords-body-language-speaks-volumes/
good find!
We’re not getting that 4th round pick, are we?
Id settle for a refund a this point. Best thing for both teams
I would go there… I’m sure that extra 5th round pick will look good to everyone in a draft where we don’t have a 2nd round pick.. If boykin wasn’t on an expiring contract, I would definitely agree with you, but I’d rather have an extra pick then a bench player back for 10 games… I wouldn’t do the trade again back in August, but This point, Id rather have a 6th round pick than only have boykin for 10 more games..
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Lol and if you are a big boykin fan, after his humbling steelers experiemce he might change his opinion about being “just a nickel” on a competitive team
Difference between a 4th and 5th is pretty insignificant. And I need to see chip actually get a decent player in rounds 4 and 5 before I can worry about a 30 draft spot difference in the mid rounds
Taylor Hart does not count? Shepard looked like the real deal before getting hurt
Didn’t we get Beau in the 5th too?
7th
Ahh, well that’s a very good pick at that spot.
I was clearly talking about rounds 4 and 5… Shep was drafted in the 6th, and you might want to see him take a preseason snap before you count him as a good pick…I wasn’t talking about rounds 6 and 7 where chip got a gem like Beau Allen,.., for whatever reason we are doing a poor job finding playërs in rounds 4 and 5 in the past 3 drafts…. If Chip can’t at least hit on former Players he coached like Hart, we are really screwed..
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Barkley is in Arizona
Wolff I don’t think is even in the NFL
Jaylen Watkins is in Buffalo
Ed reynolds is on the practice squad for his 2nd season
Hart is the ONLY player contributing from the mid rounds in the past 3 drafts. Unless there are a bunch of 4th and 5th round former players from Oregon in the next draft, WE HAVE TO START DOING A BETTER JOB GETTING TALENT In rounds 4 and 5….
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But partaining to the Boykin trade, 30 spot difference is pretty minimal when you get out of the top 100 picks… Really hope to see them do a better job of finding Talemt in the middle rounds…. We have done a pretty good,job,drafting for the most part These last 3 years, start Also hitting in the mid rounds and our drafts go from good to great
What does that have to do with anything?
Under no scenario do we get a 5th back next year.
Is this a conversation about Boykin or Bradford? The OP commented around the end of the Steelers game and I assumed that’s who he was talking about.
If it is Boykin, we get a 5th. If it’s Bradford, you’re right we get nothing.
Ah, correct if Boykin.
Original post could apply to Bradford as well.
Yeah, and it’s confusing. We need to clearly identify the who in this subject.
Meant Boykin. Sorry!
NOPE.
Unless Bradford gets hurt in one of the next three games.
I’m confused. Is this about Bradford or Boykin?
Edit: Posted before I intended.
Yeah that first pick was a bad throw. I thought Austin may have rounded his route out too much at the top on the 2nd pick.
No one is blind to the fact he threw 2 picks. But even in the games we lost and Bradford played bad I feel like he did enough for us to win in ATL and Washington.
Guys are dropping passes or getting offensive PI calls because they cant run a rub route. Kickers cant kick and OL haven’t been blocking until recently. Hard to put on all that on Sammy.
And its only been 5 games… we have the whole season to evaluate him and decided to either resign him or let him walk. I think Kelly finally took the chains of the guy, I just hopes the offense keeps building because the Defense is bringing it every game.
I don’t think people are blind to the two picks, but a different outcome to that game and we are talking nonstop about those two picks. With the win, it’s added as a comment along the lines of “Even when he screwed up and threw Red Zone picks….”
As for winning/losing these games, I think we could have won despite Bradford’s play rather than saying he has done enough to win. I know we are essentially saying the same thing, but we have different spins. Maybe you are right, and trust me, I hope you are and I am wrong, but so far I just don’t see him as a franchise QB.
I don’t know if Bradford is the answer here…. but he’s all we have this year
ags nullified 2 tds. i also agreee w/ rounded route giving db space to undercut
He’s been getting called for that since pre season
Ultimately Bradford is 24th in the NFL in QB rating right now. That needs to improve.
But I think it will.
I completely agree with you. I don’t think Sam has been nearly good enough to justify the traded assets and the salary thus far. But, I think the important thing, given the situation (no meaningful snaps in almost two years prior to Atlanta, minimal practice/preseason reps, all new supporting cast, new offense to learn, an Oline that wasn’t blocking well at all, a running game that was until recently the worst rushing attack in NFL history, and WRs that were posting 3-4 drops a game), that Sam has shown a decent amount of promise. The important thing at this early stage is that we see traits of a top QB, not necessarily the results. So far I think he’s shown some very good attributes and the inconsistencies are things it’s reasonable to expect will improve with more reps. By the end of the year, the grading curve will shift and we’ll need to see better results. But, for now I think he’s shown why he’s a potentially big upgrade from Foles. He’s basically 2 or 3 throws per game away from playing exceptionally well. Let’s hope those issues iron themselves out by years end. If not we’ll have a real interesting decision to make at the games most important position going into next year.
Ah, Jimmy Bama – classic stuff there. And the comments nicely added to it.
I felt the need to lather up all over afterwards. Thanks Jimmy!
Wonder if Sam has kids…”I do not like pics on the road, I do not like pics at the link. I do not like them in the zone, I do not like them under thrown. I do not like them when there’s two, I do not like them when fans boo. I do not like pics, Sam I am.”
Not married / no kids, but evidently lacks a winning attitude because he decided to star in a video called “I Am Second.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sam_Bradford
I definitely could have gone without knowing that one.
Offense certainly lacked cohesion first few games. Leaders, usually the QB, can help cohesion. A confidant QB, who knows the ins and outs of the offense, can take the pressure off of individual players, the QB has the big picture in mind pre-snap (with help of the center), the other players go and just do their small important part, like blocking or running a route.
Bradford has not been able to be that type (Brees, Rodgers, etc ) of on-field leader. Being new to the system he is still gaining experience and confidence in it, and is not fully there for the other players. But with coming off of his injury, Bradford’s brain was not fully there for Bradford the QB. Part of his brain in the first two games at least was devoted to “Watch out for the knee! What are you doing with 300lb men running at you hitting your leg!?”, and part of his brain was thinking “What am i supposed to do with this play” (still not second nature.)
Now hopefully, his knee is not a worry during the game and he is developing second naturedness so he can start to think more of acting as QB or leader for the whole offense.
Not trying to start any irrational debate, but so far, has Sam Bradford been better than Sanchez was last year?
To push it a bit more, if Bradford was picked up as a FA, and not a former first pick, wouldn’t we at least have the discussion about putting the Sanchize back there (think Hoyer/Mallett)?
Bradford is 24th in the NFL in QB rating.
Sanchez was 18th last year.
Sanchez was just as down as he was up last year, so I’d want to see a lot more of Bradford before putting Sanchez in; no matter what the method of Bradford acquisition.
Add to that the fact that we have seen improvement in Bradford throughout the season. You don’t want to derail that now that it’s gaining momentum.
Hard to argue with the numbers, but it’s important to take context into account. Sanchez was playing with a 9-3 team in mid season form with the Oline getting healthy and McCoy starting to hit his stride, with Maclin at WR not dropping a bunch of passes. Sam has been playing with the worst rushing attack in history for the better part of this year, with a completely discombobulated Oline and WRs dropping a league leading amount of passes, all while taking his first meaningful snaps in almost two years in a new system with all new weapons he’s playing with. I think Bradford, while admittedly being very inconsistent, has looked vastly better than Sanchez at times while looking about the same as Sanchez or slightly worse at his worst moments. Plus he’s been steadily improving. Gotta see what you got in Bradford, regardless of salary or compensation. This team isn’t winning a championship with Sanchez.
We saw during the TC and pre season that Bradford was much better than Sanchez.
Agreed completely. Sanchez is a really good guy to have here as a backup, but we all know what his limitations are as a starter.
What we saw out of SB in preseason has never translated into regular season though. Not even close.
Note: I’m not advocating for Sanchez at all, just for the sake of discussion, comparing both of their performance is interesting…
It takes time to master the offense, any offense. What we saw during the preseason was both QBs running an offense that matched the sophistication of the defense. Bradford showed that he is better than Sanchez.
What we have seen since is an offense that is building, but behind established defensive systems. Once our offense catches up, I think we will see play that gets closer to preseason.
Using the “familiarity with the offense” argument, you could make the case, as long as you partially discount offseason results, which I do (I think SB’s main issue is that he is “shell shocked” from his Rams days, and is a lot more nervous now than he was during PS), that Sanchez is more familiar this year than he was last year, and therefore could be expected to perform better.
But that is shortsighted. If you don’t play Sam this year, you can’t know whether to keep him next year, and then he is gone.
If you don’t believe Sanchez will ever be good enough (I don’t), then taking that approach is a dead end.
Besides, I believe we are talking about a timeline of weeks here, not months.
Possible that he’d be marginally better in the immediate present, but nothing that would lead anyone to believe that he’s the answer at QB or that he’s capable of leading this team to a future Super Bowl victory. However, Bradford very well might be our answer at QB going forward, even if we have to go through some early growing pains initially. The potential reward of finding a franchise QB is so great that it dwarfs the potential difference in starting Sanchez over Sam to start the season.
No we haven’t seen the preseason Bradford yet, but you can’t pull the plug after 5 games. You especially can’t do that after Bradford has shown flashes of ability that Sanchez just can’t match. Bradford has shown he can play well, he just now needs to be consistent.
And, consistency is something we should have expected Bradford to struggle with initially given the circumstances and is probably the easiest attribute for an athlete to improve with more reps.
You shouldn’t expect it to translate initially. Preseason is stripped down and simplified, it takes time for everything to settle. Think about how crazy the first month of the season always is. Also, learning curves aren’t linear, they are more like an “s” with a slow start before a Rapid increase in ability that slows as it reaches a ceiling (sometimes there are multiple steps). Bradford has reached the steap part of the curve as we have seen in the last 2 games. Right now we need to ride that.
Well said!
Well to be fair, it certainly hasn’t translated in its entirety. He’s been very inconsistent. But, it’s showed up throughout the second half of the Atlanta game, for parts of the Jets game, the second half of the Skins game and in all but 2 throws this past week. It’s possible he’s just a middling inconsistent QB, but it’s also possible that he’s a top talent at the position that just needs some more reps to round into form. If nothing else this year, we gotta find out what we have in Sam.
You’re absolutely right. The key here is upside. Sanchez may be a better QB in Chip’s system right now. The issue is his ceiling. Can he beat a good defense?
Obviously Chip didn’t think so. Time will tell.
. sanchez didn’t event show half of the year two progress I needed to see..instead of taking advantage of the valuable game time he was given last year and growing in his command of tbis offense, he regressed in the preseason.. He should have been clearly better than a guy who hasn’t played in two years who was only cleared to start running this offense om august 1st… Was really dissapointed in Sanchez during the preseason
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Very dissapointing summer for Sanchez. Showed zero signs whatsoever of the growth we hoped to see in yeàr two
There’s a lot of rust on this old car, and unfortunately we won’t know if it’s worth restoring until we’ve sunk some time and money into cleaning it up. I’m more excited about this project than I would have been starting the season out with our minivan.
I agree on this point. The fact of the matter is this: Sanchez, at his best, is a limited QB. He cannot effectively throw the deep out or any deep passes. SB has that ability, yet at times seems hesitant to try. It’s frustrating. However, we have to remember he is new to this offense, hasn’t played in nearly 2 years, and our O Line has not been very good. I think that SB has made some WOW passes at times. The INTs this week were terrible, but I think that those were throws that he can make and generally will hit on them. With Sanchez, he just simply lacks the arms strength to attempt such passes. I personally was dismayed when we resigned him. I was so sick of watching him play last year by the end. But he does have great hair…….
Well said. I think Sanchez is an adequate back up. There’s just not enough good QBs to fill 32 teams with starters let alone backups that can win you a few games. Just look around the league. The Cowboys had a 36 year old QB with a back held together by duct tape in a year that they were expecting to compete and the best plan B they could come up with was Brandon Weeden and panicking to pick up Cassel last minute. The Steelers lost Ben Roethlisberger for a month and the best they could do was signing a 57 year old Vick off the streets. You can do much worse than Sanchez as a back up.
That’s about as well said as it gets. 2 years is a lot of rust. We’re going to still see some bad with the good. But so far, the good is starting to outweigh the bad, and I believe that trend will continue.
Sanchez has a ceiling and CK knows that ceiling. It’s not very high. Bradford has a higher ceiling.
The ceiling argument is crap, because Nick Foles ceiling was at the minimum a 27 TD / 2 INT season.
I’m not sure what Foles has to do with the question about Bradford vs. Sanchez … but let me try and understand what you’re saying…
so, you’re saying, CK rated the 3 QB’s as: 1 Foles, 2 Sanchez and 3 Bradford. He took that rating and traded away a number 2 pick to get his 3rd QB?
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That IS not only Foles ceiling, those might be his most career ever TD mark. CK wants more than that. So why is think Foles will never throw more than 27 TD’s crap? IF that was Foles floor, you’d have an argument. Right now after 5 games, he has 6 td’s 5 ints’.. prorate that out over a season(roughly) that’s < 20 td's and around 15 int's. Again, I'm not sure of your argument. In CK's eyes, Foles met his ceiling – in CK's system. CK wants better.
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We don't know how good(or bad) Bradford can be. At the same time, we know how good/Bad Sanchez IS. Can Bradford be better? We don't know. CK is trying to find out. I don't think looking at someones ceiling is crap — I think it's actually rational and smart.
I was just trying to make the point that obtaining players and trading them based on a nebulous ceiling isn’t something that’s happened, at least for QBs. Right now, if you’re going by ceilings, Nick Foles is far and away the best QB of the three, hell, maybe even all time. But we all know that isn’t true.
“ceiling” is just a word. Ok, what can we infer here? We can go from point A to Z and say Foles is not what CK wants(re: his ceiling) or we can go by points A, B, C, D, E etc etc….. CK did his homework, he did he analysis. Foles, for CK’s owns reason, is not suitable for his offense. Foles “ceiling” or athleticism or smarts or mobility or whatever word you want to use — “ceiling” sums them all up. CK doesn’t like his, so he shipped him off.
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Why does CK measure college players hands? Why do they have those spider charts? They are not only looking at what college kids did in college, they have to also try and “predict” what kind of player each kid will turn into — to put it short — what’s is player X’s ceiling? It’s impossible to predict(which is why players like Brady and Rogers fall in drafts) but you have to have some baselines to evaluate players.
Sam has had 5 games, Mark has been here 3 years – if they are “the same caliber” I would think Sam has the upper hand by a long shot.
I thought this was Sanchez’s 2nd year.
It is
I wanted to enjoy a win before I posted something negative, but Bradford cannot throw 2 red zone picks. He just can’t. The Saints are a mess so it didn’t hurt, but against a better team, that’s going to cost us a game. That’s now 3 picks in the end zone for season.
Outside of those picks, I thought Bradford played well and with confidence. This is the first time all year that he seemed calm in the pocket. He played with poise and the team responded. Now let’s do it again.
Despite questioning some of his early season schematic choices, the reason I still have tremendous faith in Kelly as a football coach is simple. One, his teams consistently perform better after half-time. In a chess match between coaches, this coach like all others, can be initially outschemed. There’s just too many good coaches out there for you to always have the best possible game plan to start every contest. But, when it comes to adjustments, this team, under Kelly, routinely out adjusts their opponents at half time and fixes any schematic issues that might have bore their head in the first half.
Second, he routinely adjusts his game plan week to week to fix problems from the previous game. Gone are the days, when we’d clearly have a bad plan of attack at the beginning of games and just continue to hit our heads against the brick wall waiting for different results. Gone are the days of truly wondering if the coach will mix things up moving forward week to week so that the same problems keep manifesting over and over.
Kelly has added multiple wrinkles to the running game to throw off its inherent predictability, he has added in under center runs and play actions, he has adjusted the blocking and pulling assignments to combat the heavy use of stunts and slants against our zone blocking scheme, he has adjusted tempo and snap count and addressed many of the issues that were plaguing this team schematically early on.
Even in the off season, he aggressively looks to address areas of concern personel-wise, whether it be the need to beat man coverage, the need for more accurate QB play, the huge number of turnovers on offense, the lost yardage in the run game, the big plays on defense.
I still wish he would have addressed the offensive line more aggressively and I still think the DeMarco signing and his large guaranteed contract took away a lot of our optionality and that it would have been better to address that position with a low cost young player. But, overall, I’m completely confident in this coach to consistently strive for improvement and to adjust his schemes and play calling to optimize our chances of winning. Now, it truly is on our players (that, to be fair, GM Chip assembled), to go out an execute.
Agree that I would much rather have Chip than a retread coach. There are two sides to risks and you have to be willing to accept the fact that they may not work for the potential that you could hit a home run.
It seemed to me that there was a slower tempo when the OL started to play better and maybe that allowed for more communication and better cohesiveness. Definitely noticed more pointing/talking etc between the OL recently. Anyone else notice this?
Glad to see Peters get back to All Pro form last game. It was just weird to see Peters struggle… Like bland Funyuns to use a Tommy-ism
I noticed it. I felt that the pace of the game was varied, and they snapped the ball quite a few times with less than 5 seconds on the play clock. I belive they did that againt the Jets as well. Varying the snap count and giving the line and Bradford time to digest what the defense is showing them can be a real advantage and I hope Chip sticks with it.
You’re absolutely right! Here’s a great article on how Chip varied the tempo to great effect against the Jets. http://www.crossingbroad.com/2015/09/chip-kelly-mixes-up-the-tempo-bradford-sproles.html
And, we saw the same thing this week too. Glad to see Chip is mixing things up. Basically everything people have harped on we’ve seen him adjust. It’s a pleasant change from Reid (who’s a great coach in his own right but was infuriating in his unwavering commitment to things that weren’t working)
Well said and nice analogy about being willing to take risks to achieve greatness. Id add that were in a very weird situation with Chip. Most coaches that take over a 4-12 team, blow the whole thing up and start rebuilding while using that high pick on some major play maker.
Chip, however, took an unconventional route. He stuck with a largely unchanged roster from the one he took over. With a poor talent pool at the top of his first draft he ended up taking the 3rd ranked OT at the 4th overall pick (great pick by the way given the choices and benefit of hindsight) and won ten games with a team that was mostly the same as the previous years 4-12 team (minus two high priced FA CB and adding two low cost bargain bin CBs). Then he made a few more significant changes the following year, but nothing drastic, and again won ten games with largely the same team.
Now in year 3, after realizing that the personnel he was left with wasn’t conducive enough for his system to win a championship, he has now conducted the full rebuild and roster overhaul that we typically see in coaches’ first years. Any time a coach comes in and over turns 11 of the previous years 22 starters people expect there to be growing pains and will grade a team based on progress and improvement rather than stellar initial results.
This puts us as fans in a tough situation. We’ve seen Kelly have some pretty good success and field two consecutive playoff worthy teams. It’s hard to suddenly treat this year as a rebuilding year which is only compounded by the immense hype that our preseason success generated. But, make no mistake this is a team that was completely rebuilt this year. We have a new QB, new RBs, WRs, Offensive linemen, OLB, ILB, CBs, safeties. There’s new players basically everywhere across every level of the team except for the three starting defensive linemen. It should be no wonder that that’s the one group that has looked the best so far.
The fact is, that Kelly’s patience with his initial squads personnel coupled with their initial success and subsequent delayed rebuilding is somewhat unprecedented. But, on the other hand, it’s no secret that most NFL head coaches do not succeed (especially in their first job) and even fewer that do actually win a Super Bowl. So it remains to be seen whether this is a good method for a coach to succeed, but the returns might still be something special even if the ultimate success of the endeavor has been unexpectedly delayed.
Perhaps we end up avoiding the fate of the Browns who watched Bill Belichick struggle and work through his team building theories with their team in his initial head coaching job only to go on to being one of the greatest coaches in NFL history in his second gig, by allowing Kelly two years to work out the kinks and then rebuilding with a clear plan for success in year three.
We must remember that the rebuild is not yet complete. The secondary has been impressively improved in one offseason, the ILB corps has been made a tremendous strength with the additions of Kiko and Hicks and the extension of Kendricks and Ryans. The Dline is already the strength of the team. This team has a promising group of WRs, a nice set of TEs, the best threesome of RBs in the league, some nice young talent in Kelce and Johnson along the offensive line and hopefully a franchise QB in Bradford.
Regardless of outcome, if we can prove that Bradford is a franchise QB this year, this team will go into year two of its rebuild with very few holes to address. This next offseason, Kelly can focus entirely on finishing off the rebuild by finding just 2 more competent Olinemen, a nickel CB (maybe), a pass rushing OLB (if one happens to be available), and he’ll have a tremendous young core of players, with no obvious holes and a good 4-5 year window for them to grow together and compete for a title.
Although the results haven’t been amazing so far, this could turn out to be the beginning of a great run in Eagles history.
Or Bradford will regress and suck completely, the large guaranteed contracts for RBs will keep us from making the needed improvements elsewhere, the WRs will fail to meet their potential, the Oline will continue to be a mess and our best defenders will continue to be injured every week and the whole thing will fall apart. Who knows. The ride should be interesting either way at least.
that 4-12 record was partially the result of really bad injury luck too. Chip didn’t just turn the team around, it also had great injury luck on the OL for him.
It isn’t weird to see Peters struggle given his age, considerable wear & tear he already has, his current injuries, and him trying to play through them.
I will not disagree with being able to make second half changes but if chip can not make in game changes to prevent being down two or more scores at half, this could be a moot point. in the NFL, having to come back against average teams weekly is a difficult thing to do, let alone with the turnover in personnel this team has. I would have been more encouraged to have seen more between tackles runs Murray than the spread runs. I am not savvy enough to tell if all those runs in the first four games were called but I am sure a few were and when Chip himself stated he wanted runners hitting the hole and taking what they can, it seemed like he was talking to just to hear himself speak.
I can not criticize the personnel changes because I am not the one running or coaching the team but I do know if you acquired personnel for their strengths, why not utilize those strengths. I do not recall seeing so many stretch runs from DeMarco last year. Are there more this year because of personnel or Chip isn’t using him correctly? Personally, I believe chip did a very good job his first two years “without his type of players”. I am saving criticism of him this year until the end of the season because I did believe it would take a few games to gel. Preseason against base defenses is not a good indicator. I do need to see more from the team like the second half of the Skins game and from the Saints game to be convinced he knows what to do throughout a complete game and not just make halftime adjustments.
According to some pundits (I’m too ignorant to really know for sure), Murray is not accustomed to running out of shotgun in the NFL – he did at Oklahoma though. Matthews, however, can read zone blocking out of the shotgun and his running here has shown his skill.
Whatever the issue, it does seem pretty obvious, even to the ley observers like us, that Murray is much more hesitant than Matthews. Maybe that’s because he’s not as comfortable reading the zone blocking scheme with its multiple options on every run. Maybe it’s because for the first 3 games he played there were consistently 2-3, basically unblocked, defenders hitting him as he took the hand off.
Either way, Murray is at his best when he can get a head of steam going, put his head down and bowl through the hole like a wrecking ball. Hopefully, the oline starts to settle down and starts opening some holes that he can hit full speed. I certainly don’t think we’ve seen the best Murray has to offer so far though.
All very true and well said. I agree it’d be much better to see adjustments happen sooner than half time. However, I do understand also that that’s nearly impossible for most coaches to do in real time, and even harder when you only have 2 or 3 drives that are all 3 and out to start the game. How much can you adjust when you only get to run so few plays.
Obviously, going into half time down 2-3 scores every week is not a recipe for success. And, more often than not, your team will end up on the losing end of that battle. But, I think a lot of the issues with our putrid starts in a few of these early games had a lot more to do with Kelly feeling out his new players schematically, realizing how defensive coordinators were trying to attack his schemes this year and individual player execution. Those issues seem to be, or at least I hope, ironed out and improving.
And, that is really the crux of my initial comment. There’s been some substantial issues, but the source of my faith in Chip comes from the fact that he never sits still and just waits for those issues to resolve or not on their own, he does actively make changes and the team steadily improves.
That’s great, however, I prefer that he puts together a winning gameplan and makes the other team adjust while down two touchdowns!
Well … yea. Given the choice I’m right with you on that one!
re: Sturges – Fipp is a top ST coach. What Fipp can do well is plan a defense against a returnable kickoff by Kai Forbath. What Fipp can’t do is give Sturges the eyes and make him accurate. There’s a chance Sturges can turn things around, and I can see the logic to taking the strong legged hot prospect out of college who wore out his welcome elsewhere, but the value of the accuracy Forbath can give you trumps that in my view.
Long dong the troll is dead
So is qq as well. Winning is a cure all for troll fever.
Pretty sure they are the same person.
Andy Reid being a loser in KC has helped in quieting down the qq troll.
i hate that Jamaal continued to be a stellar RB that reid fed the ball too, yet we barely had a run game when he was here lol….. and now Jamaal is done.
Reid relied on Jamaal and “checkdown” Alex Smith. Their offense was predictable. Just crowd the box and double Maclin. I wonder how much longer the fat man has in KC.
until he gets sick of BBQ
crazy how good j. charles is.
alex smith is going to be fun to watch without CHarles… Fantasy,football players better rush to pick up Danthony Thomas, since Alex smith is allergic to WRs. Once the game gets out of hand and their opponent is in Prevent, than Alex grows some hair on his balls and looks to Maclin
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I assume Losing CHarles will force Alex to throw to his WRs which could be entertaining…
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Feel bad for CHarles Tho, 28yr old RB, 2nd ACL surgery, high usage rate running and catching
yeah there the same person. wanted to go with the ding dong the witch is dead
Just have to laugh a bit at all of the armchair GMs and scouts….Rasheed Bailey just signed to a practice squad…..in the CFL. Some on here were mad that he didn’t make the 53..
we always argue over the 6th WR slot during camp, nothing surprising there. Its usually around potential vs Vet anyway so him being in CFL doesnt mean much in comparison. He did about all a guy in his position could do but sometimes thats not enough
I’m so glad Cary Williams and Bradley Fletcher are getting killed in their new spots. It’s validating to have them fail elsewhere to understand why we did so poorly last year. It would be incredibly frustrating to have Cary Williams become the best corner ever in Seattle.
That was never going to happen. He was okay in Baltimore, and they had a good defense around him.
[…] gives its take on Sam Bradford’s pre-game speech […]
I’ve been a bit remiss on my Iggles Blitz reading so I don’t know if this has been covered before. It seems like the Offense in the Saints game hardly ran a hurry-up Kelly O. I wonder if Chip has recognized that Sam might not be able to run such an offense. Bradford isn’t fast or mobile, maybe the new scheme is built around Bradford and his skill set as a more traditional pocket qb.
He ran uptempo at Oklahoma. From fishduck (http://fishduck.com/2015/07/the-dawn-of-the-second-coming-the-oklahomafication-of-chip-kellys-offense/)
“To answer this question, Kelly looked back to the college game — beyond his own Oregon Ducks teams — and saw the future of his Philadelphia Eagles in the 2008 Oklahoma Sooners team that contended in the BCS National Championship Game. Under Sooners head coach Bob Stoops and offensive coordinator Kevin Wilson (now head coach of the Indiana Hoosiers), quarterback Sam Bradford and running back DeMarco Murray helped Oklahoma lead the NCAA in scoring and number of plays. The Sooners used a stunningly similar playbook and fast-tempo to the one the Eagles will use this season.”
Bradford is capable of running a fast tempo offense, I just wonder if he’s capable of running -Chip’s- tempo offense. I wonder if the additional options in package plays, read options, etc was a bit much for him to take on so quickly. I also wonder if the 2 new guards are capable of it at all. I like slowing things down and putting Sam under center more. I think it gives the offense more time to see what the defense is doing and it varies the snap count. Once the offense has been consistent they can speed it up.
yeah i think you gotta crawl before you can walk, especially with this o-line. If sanchez can run it at warp speed bradford should be able o.
He’s capable but it’ll just take time and reps before he’s comfortable enough that it’s so second nature that he can do it at warp speed.
For me and others, it was clear that the team could not execute at a fast tempo. Some players were still learning assignments and were overcome. That includes a rusty Bradford.
Also Chip’s schemes were terrible for an offense that had not gelled. He needed scheme changes. His answer, in part, were two TE sets and QB behind the center runs. This last point helped Murray immensely.
I thought Murray would be better from the gun since he was at oklahoma, i guess it’ll just take time. I’m interested to see why chip hasn’t used the shotgun + pistol formation that other teams have gone to.
Who are the players learning new assignments? Aggie and Bradford? Are there more?
Communication on the line prior to the ball hike helps determine the “intent” of the D and reinforce blocking assignments – there are 3 new starting OL (if you include Tobin who subs when injury hits.)
Bradford is new and rusty as you mention.
There are two new RBs, Murray and Matthews, who must understand the zone block scheme on the play and realize in real-time how the play unfolds, vis-a-vis the blocking. Murray, especially, needs to better understand the zone blocking intent as the play unfolds against a particular D scheme.
Bottomline – A whole lot of gelling needs to happen for this offense to execute efficiently. And Chip has to accommodate these growing pains with scheme design.
RBs also have to get to know lineman, how they block individually, who creates open lanes, does [x] player miss blocks and if so to what side, etc.
That I can agree on. Linemen will have tendencies on how they’ll block. Going on my point directly below – is Shady a smarter runner than Murray? While Shady was familiar with the linemen, the first season of CK, they had to learn new blocking.
On that line though, weren’t at least 2 off those guys around already? Mathews doesn’t seem to have issues. I guess my point is — CK came here and his first season he had his entire team doing something new on offense. All 5 linemen, TE’s backs etc. QB’s had to learn(just as Bradford is doing) and had better success. I can understand the thought of saying some of these guys really stink but I can’t point a figure at scheme. Are you saying Foles is smarter than Bradford?
that’s b/c in he beginning (a) no one knew what to expect and (b) we ran a lot of RO whereas now we have a much “safer” scheme.
D coordinators adapt. The opposition is not static year to year. Bradford has been out of the game almost 2 years. And by no means, in any universe or dimension, is Foles better than Bradford. (I won’t get in a stat debate on this point, what I am stating is consensus by analysts.)
I can agree with that!
They were around last year but they’re new to starting period. It’s not like they’re savvy vets who’ve played a bunch with guys next to them. Having to communicate with new guys next to you, while you learn their tendencies and get comfortable seeing different looks and how everyone adjusts together still takes some time I’d imagine to gel and rushing to the line isn’t gonna help if you’re heads already swimming because you haven’t had the reps to make it second nature.
A new starting QB, two running backs, a starting WR and two new guards (although they weren’t new to the team) is a good amount of new starters.
I knows it’s quibbling over little things…QB yes, 1 RB(Mathews has no problems), what new starting WR?(aggie doesn’t start). The two guards have been here for a long time. What I’m getting at, CK prides himself on getting smart players. It shouldn’t take this long for a linemen to learn how to block. At this point, you’re talking 5 weeks into the season + ALL preseason + ALL OTA’s (etc etc). Again — CK prides himself on being prepare where backups get as many reps as the starters. 1 – Either these guards are not good enough(lack talent) and/or 2 – CK doesn’t have them prepared(which I just can’t believe).
This is brutal. The bottom 5 passers through 5 weeks for the last five years. Sam Bradford appears on the list twice, 2010 and 2011. Other notables: Kevin Kolb 2011, Mark Sanchez 2012, Nick Foles 2015. Yeah, it’s hard to replace a franchise QB. Bradford to date in 2015 is only the 14th worst QB.
http://www.footballoutsiders.com/quick-reads/2015/week-5-quick-reads
No surprises there — think it’s more of an indictment on St. Louis than anything else.
Bingo.
Perhaps. Foles had an absolutely awful game against the Pack and it dragged him down to this spot. Before that he was just mediocre. The previous week, he was #6, not too shabby.
Sam’s ranks by week: 16, 26, 24, 16, 18.
The actual surprise is in the link. Peyton Manning is the worst-ranked QB through 5 games this year. 32nd. Something that the “he just wins”-type crowd might not notice. Another huge and rather annoying stat is that Eli got the top spot for this week!
Denver’s defense is crazy, I think they’ve scored every week. If not for those scores Denver would be 0-5. Really and indictment of Kubiak in my mind.
I give more credit to McNair than Fischer. I don’t see him as any kind of offensive guru.
The big issue I see time and time again with kicker evaluation is what’s referred to as the Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy. Kicking is hard, and no one appreciates it. You take successful attempts for granted, and only remember missed kicks.
Then, when missed kicks seem to come in a pattern (the Fallacy mentioned above), you tend to take a marker and draw a circle around them, and say that this is a bad kicker or this is a good kicker. It’s kind of a crapshoot.
The primary thing that good kickers do consistently is get their team touchbacks, not make field goals beyond 35 yards.
think that’s why we have Sturgis, not a better FG kicker. That said FGs are points on the board.
So are hail marys, pick sixes, and fumble scoop n scores. It’s not something you want to rely on.
Thats implying that you can get chances at hail marys, etc with the same frequency as kicks. It isnt true. You should be able to rely on your kicker for kicks with 35 yards with reasonable conditions. That is a situation that happens often.
Well, you could get chances at hail marys at the same rate as kicks, just throw it up on 4th down instead of kicking it.
kickers get fired if they aren’t ice from 40–45 range. BAL wins SO many games because their kicker can hit anything within 50 yds, see also Gostkowski in NE, money kicker.
amazing how Belicheat has had two awesome kickers. It’s almost like he isn’t the terrible GM everyone says he is.
We’ll never know. HE seems to think his teams can’t win without skirting the rules so…
Another thing. The Patriots spent 10 years NOT winning Super Bowls, so are they the greatest team to ever walk the face of the earth anyway?
There were years were he literally viewed Vinatieiri as his best player and he would rather have Vinatieri kicking with the game on the line, than giving it to Brady with the game on the line…
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That kicker was amazing when you think about it.. Akers was a great kicker that we were lucky to have, but Vinatieri was on another level
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How does Goskowski compare to Vinatieri?
I think he’s as good but it will be hard for anyone to be seen as clutch as Vinatieri. I don’t even really believe in clutchiness, and I still think Vinatieri was the best. Looking back that kick in the snow against Oakland is insane, and his winner in the first SB was over 50. It’s kind of forgotten, but Brady didn’t get them into chip shot FG territory.
I agree that you want a kicker who is money at 40 yards or lower. Beyond that, I’d rather have someone with a better touchback %
You don’t want to rely on it, but against good teams and especially in tight games in the playoffs you don’t have much of a choice. You have to have a kicker that can consistently hit the closer FGs. 35 yards is nothing. That’s essentially an extra point. Kickers are 96% from 35 yards out these days. The benefit of having a kicker that can consistently connect from 45 yards or less is huge. I don’t need a guy that can hit 50+ yarders but I definitely want a kicker that’s more than 80% from inside 45 yards.
This year, kickers not named Caleb are 59/65 from 30-39 yards (91%), and 68/82 from 40-49 yards (83%). When I’m in a tight game and there’s 3 seconds on the clock and we’ve only gotten to the opposing teams 30 yard line, I want the guy that consistently drills those 45 yarders 85% of the time.
I agree with you though on the sharp shooter fallacy. Ultimately though I think it’s more of an issue with small sample size. Every kickers gonna miss some kicks, if it happens to be when it matters or if they’re grouped together with a couple other recent misses people start to make strong conclusions that the guy is a lot worse than he probably is.
In an alternative universe, no one has heard of Buddy Ryan as a head coach, because he wasn’t lucky enough to have the natural talents of Randall Cunningham. In the same universe, #12 was a first ballot HOF after a successful career working under an offensive guru rather than endless OCs and under a coach who loved nothing more than his defensive players ripping his own offensive players heads off in training.
Since we’re talking hypotheticals. In that same universe, somehow Chip Kelly was the head coach with Randall at QB and Buddy was the d-coordinator. How much fun is that to think of.
We’ve had some pretty good def coordinators over the years. JJ, Bud Carson, Buddy. Who knows, maybe we can put Davis on that list too.
You got most of them there, but there seems to be Juan missing…
That would have been great, right up until Buddy punched Chip on the sidelines because Chip’s tempo wasn’t giving Buddy’s defense enough time to rest.
Imagine Chip telling buddy that they cannot tackle to the ground during training camp! Buddy would have cold cocked him right there.
So, is Buddy sort of revered because he was a good defensive coach or because he was bad-tempered?
Maybe the Eagles should have hired the Steelers DC instead.
“The team flicked a switch over the final nine weeks of the (then 14-game) season. The Steelers pitched five shutouts and allowed an amazing total of just 28 points (3.1 PPG) in those final nine games. It was the greatest stretch of defensive dominance in the history of the NFL.” from steelers uk website.
Ah the good old days when the defense won more games than the offense. ;~D
again with the Steelers’ worshiping?
I rooted for a great team that WON 35 years ago. According to some current Steelers, they look up to and admire those guys today. I see no reason why you should be bothered when someone mentions events of 30 to 35 years ago anyway? Buddy Ryan basically ruined the Eagles 30 years ago too, yet folks still mention him from time to time. I believe it’s called reminiscing, by folks who may be past their first youth.
You constantly steeler worship on another team’s blog.
In that universe the 85 bears does not exist bc they was the reason we hired him
Fewer arguments against the ’91 team having the greatest defense of all time.
How about the Eagles not hiring Kotite and therefore not hiring Carson. That same argument might exist
If I have the ability to bend and change time, I’m going bigger (and likely lots more selfishly) than simply not having Buddy as our head coach. I would own the team at this point.
Even in an alternate universe on an Eagles blog, we can’t catch a break?
(Stick with it, it is worth it)
http://youtu.be/0-Lvv1f5Qu4
In that universe, he doesn’t exist therefore, Rex and Rob do not either. Wow, I just blew my own mind with the extrapolations…
The 85 bears can exist, it takes nothing from his abilities as a d coordinator
But Cunningham has nothing to do with Ryan getting hired as a HC
[…] gives its take on Sam Bradford’s pre-game speech […]
These last few years I have felt that we match up really favorably with the Giants. In case you haven’t noticed, shutting out our division rivals ISNT some easy common occurence.. Going into last season the Giants added 27 new players which meant that they were going to most likely have to take a step back last year, and be significantly tougher in year two (NOW) than they were last year trying to gel a roster that changed half its players. And for the most part they have stuck to the script, early last year they struggled, we saw them gel a little more and ultimately show some flashes late in the season, but they took the “STEP BACK” you would expect a team that made so many changes would have to take, and now, in year two they look more like a team than they did last year, The Giants hAvent looked like world beaters, but they are much better than the team we saw the first half of last season, and They are a few plays away from a 5-0 start.. Of course they also have had some luck, and got some breaks from the refs since they can just as easily be 1-4 right now… And while they look to be in the best shape out of the teams in our mess of a division, for years I been feeling we are a bad matchup for the Giants..
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Going into this game, Im probably the most curious about the Giants Defense, and how chip will elect to attack them. the Giant Offense is just building on the west coast system they started to implement last year, but the Giants defense changed their Coordinator again, going back to familiar face of Spags… Chip said that it seems like Spags is running what he knows, a similar system that what he has always shown, and similar to what he had the Rams running a few years back..I have to imagine we have a solid advantage going into this game because of how familiar Pat Shurmur must be with Spags defense, since they spent time together on the Rams staff…. Shurmur should have a much better idea of what Spags wants to do, yet Spags shouldnt have as much of an advantage since we don’t run a Pat,Shurmur offense, Pat doesn’t even call the plays so it’s not like Spags can tap into his knowledge of Shurmers play calling tendancies,,
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I think a BIG POSITIVE for us going into tbis game is that the Giants defense Severly lacks pass rushers with JPP maiming himself. thete is NO pass rusher on the Giants that need to be double teamed all game like we have King Cox.. With Big Jonathon Hankins the Giants DL is better suited to stop the run than they are at rushiñg the passer.. They,actually went into this past Niners game as a top Rated run defense which I found to be pretty absurd and laughable, and it seems like Boone, Joe Staley and Carlos Hyde showed how over rated that run defense was by gashing it repeatedly in the 2nd half, and while Staley and boone have ability the rest of the Niners line is nothing special.. Let’s just say that for an eagle team that is struggling tp get the run going, I gladly welcome the big bad Giants run defense,,..
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We,didn’t even use our temoo as much against the saints, yet Bradford talked about how he could see the Saints defense getting completely worn down. If we can move the ball in the first half, a guy like Big Jonathon Hankins is going to get worn down and it becomes a much more manageable task for Kelce in the second half…. When our OL has a decent outing and we move the ball in the first half, we sure become a very tough team to beat especially when.Sammy Boy is spreading the ball around to like 10 different recievers
IMHO, the Giants, or Midgets if you prefer, are a perfect setup for Chip’s Blur Offense. Pass on a few series to tire the DL. Then run, run, run; pass deep; pass, pass, run; then, run, run, run, run, run, until the DL dies on the field.
Cullen Jenkins is like 52 yrs old.
Old man Jenkins
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Is Ayers healthy, when he is probably your best pass rusher, you have big problems… Damontre Moore doesn’t scare anyone,.. Hankins has turned into a quality run defender, but he isn’t going to provide a pass rush… Their LBs are banged up, counting on rookies, and they don’t have LBs or Safeties who are good in coverage, our Offensive Coordinator was on the same Rams staff as their Defensive coordinator which should be a nice advantage for us, although Spags has the advantage of seeing Bradford up close when SAM, Spags, amd Shurmur were all at the Rams together.. Doubt Spags has the pass rushing horses for it to matter…
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Can’t believe how close this Giants team was to being 5-0
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Hopefully we finally win two in a row and this will be an impressive Monday night beat down that gets the entire season turned around
Should be a good week to gash them up the middle and get premium matchups for our RBs in the passing game.
Yes sir,. We should be able to throw to our RBs all day… But throwing to Vereen is probably going,to be a big part of their game plan, so we need “Baby Simba” and our LBs to do a better job covering Vereen, than those mediocre, banged up RBs do trying to defend our backs in the passing game… Think we throw a lot to our RBs in the first half, keep the chains moving and wear down their fat run defendwrs, go into halftime with a lead, and in the second, see our run game take over like the old days where shady would break on and dominate the Giants in the 4th quarter. Hoping we see the run game really come together in the second half and see Murray end with like 150 total yards, with Sproles and Ryan combining for 150 total yards..
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This defense has been better than they got credit for all year, and this past Sunday they,finally really came together and started to click on all cylnders. It’s not getting much praise, but I think the best thing we saw sunday besides the OL start to click was we saw our corners take on the challenge of facing a Great QB who is as good as any QB at getting the ball out so quick, and our secondary, stepped up, pressed his Wrs, took away first reads from Brees to where practically the entire second half we saw Brees have to hitch, and hold on to balls longer than he wanted to and Ifo made him uncomfortable, until Cox turned up the heat and really took the game over, but your DTs will NEVER get to Tee off on Brees like that unless your Cornerbacks step up and force him to hold onto the ball..
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I think the saints game was the moment we stopped being a talemted defensive team that was improving, to a team that has taken the next step and arrived as a top defense.. I’m really curious to see how we look after such a great,game that im sure will build a ton of confidence, and hopefully we see this defense get Greedy and continue to try and improve iin all aspects… That defense raćked up some crazy stats for a unit that was Only on the field for 25 minutes, 15 minutes less than they had been on the field which is mind mogglingl.,.
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I really love how we have matched up with both the Giants and Panthers these next few years, I so desperately want to see us build on the saints game, and make statements these next two weeks beating two division leaders in Giants and Panthers in games where we really look good and play to our potential…. handle our business and just keep improving these next two weeks and bet we shut up all the fools that were laughing, and get to enjoy a quiet bye week in Philly
Hicks / Meco will be beat, need safety help on top to my eye.
I have felt that we are a terrible matchup for them the last few years in so many different areas.. Returning Giant OL havent had much success against the Eagles front 7, we always pressure eli into throwing INTs, we are capable of shutting down Everyones run game…. This is a bad week for the Giants to have 3 banged up WRs because I like our defense to not allow eli to throw to Vereen and Larry Donnell all game… If we can slow them down and make sure ERTZ and Sproles produce more than Donnell and Vereen, they won’t have enough other playmakers to compensate for us getting the best of the TE and RB match ups…. Everyone knows ODB will get a ton of attention, I doubt Beckham and Rueban Randle can put the Giants on their backs and carry them to a win Monday… Sounds like the WRs won’t be at full strength
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Giants have basically consistently had their asses kicked by chip Kelly. Since he came to the NFL only times Giamts beat us was when Barkley had to play as a rookie
yeah we don’t play in the first half unfortunately.
can’t wait for the 2nd half though!
The one matchup that really isn’t very favorable is the most important one–QB. Despite the Eli hate on most Eagles’ boards, he’s the best healthy QB in the division when he’s playing well, and he is playing well right now. A good QB outing by the opponent can beat any team that’s not tremendous, and we’re not tremendous.
We do really well against Eli, because you don’t want to sack him, you want to pressure him and force him to rush his throws which we always do well and he coughs up INT, our front 7 has been owning OL
For the past two seasons.
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I trust us to beat the Giants more than I trust us to beat the skins, even if I think the gIants are better than skins, we match up really favorable against Giants all over the place
anyone have a status on Agholor?
I read that he is dealing with a muscle strain in his shin. Nelson himself has stated that the injury isn’t serious and he plans on playing this week.
I don’t even notice when he’s or out, kind of like Taylor Hart. Completely invisible in terms of impact.
except when he’s getting penalties in the RZ. Would have liked to see him have a big game in WAS since they had no CBs, but our WR corp is generally TERRIBLE, hard to believe sammy b is throwing up numbers the way he is.
I think this is the game that the offense really Explodes and the night that Demarco Murray Truley arrives as an eagle. What’s the silly little MVP award Gruden gives out for Monday night football called? Whatevet it’s called, I see Murrays stellar play to be the story of the game because I watched him finally get it going and have a solid game against the Saints, but I have no doubt he won’t be happy with his play when he watches the tape and sees how many opportunities and yards he left on the table. So many plays where the OL blocked well, but Murray didn’t trust them so it ended up costing us a ton of yards.. A problem Wasnt with his speed, or athleticism everything was there, but a clear lack of trust in the OL blatantly held him back from what could have been a much bigger game., Murray is a smart guy, I think this will be a wake up call for him and we will see a BIGTIME 150 total yards, two TD Monday night performance because I think the OL is ready to play as a cohesive unit and Murray will give it a chance, trust it and we should see the perfect storm of Offensive explosion we have been waiting for since the preseason, especially since Sproles and Mathews should also combine for at least 100 total yards on top of a monster game by Murray…
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The Giants run defense is their strength, and I expect to see and eagle team straight up disrespect them and punk that run defense for 60 minutes.
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And what really should kill the Giants is that Sammy boy should have a monster game on 3rd down.. The best cover players of the Giamts, are the two outside Corners, which doesn’t match up well against the Eagles because our most dangerous weapons in the passing game are usually Jordan, Sproles, Ertz, Celek emerging, throwing to the 2 RBs, and That’s a pretty Terrible matchup for the Giants defense,, just look at their roster and it should be no surprise that they are a better run defense than they are against the pass qhen you can easily see that their RBs and Safeties are all run stopping types that can struggle In coverage,. And when their front 4 is one of the worst at generating a pass rush, I expect that Bradford will get all the time he needs to hit Jordan, sproles, Ertz, ryan, Murray on whatever LB or Safety chip wants to isolate and expose, there are so many to pick from… Old man Beason is a great LB, but the guys body has been falling apart for years, even if he plays, he is someone we can throw at all day.. It’s No secret that Landon Collins is much better run defender than he is in coverage. And forcing him to play thru fatigue, get lined up quick and correctly match up with Ertz, Sproles or whoever chip wants to pick on him with, is probably going to be a big advantage for us… if Beason doesn’t play, they have the rookie LB with the samoan name that has played well, again, much better against the run, than he is in coverage..
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For a defense that has so many players that are better against the run than coverage, generating no pass rush from the front 4 should be a Kiss of death, which has been pretty maddening to me to see teams not expose them more so far this season.. Pass rushers are Damontre Moore, Ayers (is he even healthy?)…. I just watched an really banged up Lane Johnson HANDLE Jordan Cameron who is a pretty darn good player, better than anytning the Giants have.. If the Eagles start the game well, and the offense moves the ball in the first quarter, this game becomes ours, fatigue will start to take the wind out of the sail of Big Boy Hankins, mental fatigue and forcing rookies like Landon Collins to hurry up and get properly lineup up to than try and cover someone like ERTZ or Sproles should pay big dividends for us…. I just think on so many diffrent levels we are a bad matchup for this Giants roster… Expect our RBs to have the biggest game of this short season, amd Bradford to have a big day on 3rd down keeping drives alive for us, offense move the ball in the first half, go into half time with a lead, and then our RBs take over the 2nd half and,run all over a fatigued Overrated Giamts defense,,
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Eli has played well, but he has still had his flashes of bonehead eli mistakes but so far the refs have bailed him out and defenses haven’t capitalized on his boneheaded error… Now he has to play our opportunistic ballhawing defense, our Front 7 has terrorized these Giants lineman for years, only Linean we haven’t picked on is Eric Flowers because he is a rookie we haven’t played against yet… But even when we don’t get sacks, we almost always pressure and hit the QB and our guys have had a lot of success against PUGH and the Giants OL.. eli is the type of QB you don’t want to sack, you want to pressure him force him too rush his throws and odds are he will throw one up and hand over an INT on a silver platter… The way this defense is playing, and starting to click, after building some serious confidemce in last weeks game, I will be surprised if we don’t come away with at least 3’tufnovers against Eli
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And with Maragos, Huff, AjiraTutu all healthy, Id like to see the ST put on a show under the MOnday night lights and see our ST make some of the monster game Changing plays we saw last year, whether it’s huff or Sproles returning It to the house, Burton blocking kicks that we run back, Maragos force fumbles that Braman returns for TDs…. Whatever, but ITS TIME this ST to stand up on prime time and remind the league that they are the kings of the ST jungle… And MOST importantly, hope to see Sturgis settle down and have a clean game where he does his job and doesn’t hurt the team
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This game is BIG… Win this game, and ALL our hopes and dreams going into this season are just as attainable as they were the day after the GB preseason game….. Win these next two games, get healthy during the bye week and it will get awefully quiet, when all the laughing at the Eagles will dissapear..
Just curious what this looks like.
Edit: My god.
GEAGLE • an hour ago
These last few years I have felt that we match up really favorably with the Giants. In case you haven’t noticed, shutting out our division rivals ISNT some easy common occurence.. Going into last season the Giants added 27 new players which meant that they were going to most likely have to take a step back last year, and be significantly tougher in year two (NOW) than they were last year trying to gel a roster that changed half its players. And for the most part they have stuck to the script, early last year they struggled, we saw them gel a little more and ultimately show some flashes late in the season, but they took the “STEP BACK” you would expect a team that made so many changes would have to take, and now, in year two they look more like a team than they did last year, The Giants hAvent looked like world beaters, but they are much better than the team we saw the first half of last season, and They are a few plays away from a 5-0 start.. Of course they also have had some luck, and got some breaks from the refs since they can just as easily be 1-4 right now… And while they look to be in the best shape out of the teams in our mess of a division, for years I been feeling we are a bad matchup for the Giants..
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Going into this game, Im probably the most curious about the Giants Defense, and how chip will elect to attack them. the Giant Offense is just building on the west coast system they started to implement last year, but the Giants defense changed their Coordinator again, going back to familiar face of Spags… Chip said that it seems like Spags is running what he knows, a similar system that what he has always shown, and similar to what he had the Rams running a few years back..I have to imagine we have a solid advantage going into this game because of how familiar Pat Shurmur must be with Spags defense, since they spent time together on the Rams staff…. Shurmur should have a much better idea of what Spags wants to do, yet Spags shouldnt have as much of an advantage since we don’t run a Pat,Shurmur offense, Pat doesn’t even call the plays so it’s not like Spags can tap into his knowledge of Shurmers play calling tendancies,,
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I think a BIG POSITIVE for us going into tbis game is that the Giants defense Severly lacks pass rushers with JPP maiming himself. thete is NO pass rusher on the Giants that need to be double teamed all game like we have King Cox.. With Big Jonathon Hankins the Giants DL is better suited to stop the run than they are at rushiñg the passer.. They,actually went into this past Niners game as a top Rated run defense which I found to be pretty absurd and laughable, and it seems like Boone, Joe Staley and Carlos Hyde showed how over rated that run defense was by gashing it repeatedly in the 2nd half, and while Staley and boone have ability the rest of the Niners line is nothing special.. Let’s just say that for an eagle team that is struggling tp get the run going, I gladly welcome the big bad Giants run defense,,..
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We,didn’t even use our temoo as much against the saints, yet Bradford talked about how he could see the Saints defense getting completely worn down. If we can move the ball in the first half, a guy like Big Jonathon Hankins is going to get worn down and it becomes a much more manageable task for Kelce in the second half…. When our OL has a decent outing and we move the ball in the first half, we sure become a very tough team to beat especially when.Sammy Boy is spreading the ball around to like 10 different recievers
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“Gruden’s Grinders”.
Well we know what his chain of delis will be named in the near future
looks like he’s pretty happy repping hooters.
I don’t think their run defense is as good as advertised. They’ve been playing with a lead too much that their opponents have had to go to the air on them, which has worked quite well against them.
I don’t either.. It was like the top rated run defense going into the last game and I don’t even think they are close to THAT good… But I think their run defense is much better than their pass defense… Basicallly their pass defense is DRC, Amakamakmakamakura and… No one else… Pass rushers Ayers and Moore DONT strike fear into the hearts of many Tackles
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Fletcher Cox Embarressed the rookie Tackle of the Saints, let’s see how the Giants rookie Tackle holds up…
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My favorite Giant is Nakita Whitlock,who was like a 260lb beast Of a NT at wake Forrest, extremely undersized, but Nasty
I’d be stunned if Murray does that. I’d be happy if he were productive again and ran with more authority including making contact when necessary.
Gruden should give out a Chucky doll for the Child’s Play -Knifing Through the Competition award.
Eagles signed OL Tanner Hawkinson off 9ers practice squad and release Julian Vandervelde.
D3fb, I know nothing about him. What say you?
Heh, came here for same reason.
I wonder if they let Vandervelde just keep his jersey and number since he might be resigned another 10 times.
wonder how it feels to be just barely not good enough.
I’m sure he is used to that already.
Crazy how we exposed him to all the other GMs like 5 times and no one ever took a Flier on him… The state of the OL around the league are piss poor, it’s almost as bad as the kicking. Colleges are getting accused of not adequately preparing Offensive lineman for the NFL game… All them times we waived Vandervelde, no one took a flier on him? You would think at least BiG Red would have brought him to KC at some point?
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We probably kept Julian on speed dial for the first half of the season, assuming that by the second half of the season Josh Andrews would be ready to be a primary backup, and right now we have 2 games to go and then hopefully we get a little healthier at the bye week, and by then Josh Andrews should out grow the need for us to keep Vandervelde on speed dail…. It would be nice if from here on out, we remain healthy enough to where we won’t have to bring Julian back in again, and if we enjoy some good OL health, it’s easier to use a roster spot or Two to keep taking fliers on guys until we find a gem which is what I assume we are doing with this signing
Kimpski made a gif of his reactions to being signed/cut 17times (originally in this article: http://www.phillyvoice.com/julian-vandervelde-17–facial-expressions/)
http://bloggingthebeast.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/Vandervelde.gif
I feel like Vandervelde has been a fringe olineman for the Eagles since the beginning of time.
I wonder how many frequent flyer miles Vandervelde has. We’re just a sprain away from having him back.
Music to my ears… happy to see us stop settling for Vandervelde who BY now it’s clear he isn’t GOOD ENOUGH, and let our personell department do their job and try to uncover some better talent, As long as our expectations aren’t out of Wack…. After all, we are talking about Practiice squad player on a team with its own OL issues..
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I could understand if injuries forced Vandervelde into our backüp Center role, in which case his knowledge of our offense becomes more important,,. But if a Guard gets injured during the Giants game, Vandervekde wasn’t going to be the next Guard up, he would never go in before DENNIS Kelly. And if god forbid Kelce got hurt, Josh Andrews was next in line at center, so Julian’s knowledge of this offense doesn’t carry much value as if it would if he was next in line on the bench.. Who knows if this Practice squad player will ever grow into a solid NFL player? But we Do Know exactly WHAT Vandervelde is, and if you don’t need him to be a primary backup, I would so much prefer to see our personnel department go “minning for Gems” and keep bringing new guys in TIL we find someone we see something special in that has a chance to be developed into a player… Julian is a guy we have already exposed to the other 31 Gms like 5 times, and he continues to go unclaimed..rather see Marynowitz go hunting for potential instead of continue to waste a spot on a player we know ISNT good enough
So, is this “better” than spending draft picks on OL that may/may not work out? At least this way, we get to see how a dude looks/plays at this level before we pick him?
But we are stuck bringing in less talented players, which are bigger longshots.. Curious to see how long this kid sticks on this roster. He played 3 games for the Bengals last year. I don’t know if that means he actually had to play, or If it just means he was active and dressed for 3 games? They most likely have tape on him from the preseason the past two years…
Curious to know which of the promising defensive players/WRs should not have been drafted? At least 1 would have had to be bypassed in order to get an offensive lineman.
I do think chip prefers to get vets instead of rookies, less projection.
Vandervelde goes to safe to retrieve the blackmail he has on the Eagles
Eagles re-sign Vandervelde
That would certainly explain some things…
I know nothing about this new lineman but I do know that if a guy that’s a practice squad player on a team with its own issues at his position is going to work out it’ll be when his skill set doesn’t work as well in the previous teams system but works very well in our system. So the good news is that the 49ers, if I’m correct, run a power running scheme with big strong slow maulers at guard. Perhaps he’s a better fit physically for a zone scheme that relies on speed and athleticism rather than brute strength that they were stashing on their PS because he’s got talent but they were hoping he’d develop the necessary strength.
That’s all just rampant speculation since, like I said, I know nothing about this guy, but it’s definitely better than signing a PS player from a team that runs an identical scheme.
http://www.phillyvoice.com/eagles-sign-offensive-tackle-tanner-hawkinson/
Just as I suspected. Athletic, but undersized, not a great fit for their scheme but talented enough despite not being a fit that they still wanted to stash him on the PS.
Total long shot. But, if a long shot is going to work, this is the type of player that will do so.
Let’s see. He played at least 3 different positions before coming onto an O Line. He’s been cut a couple of times. Give him a couple of weeks to grow some more beard and wild unkempt reddish hair and he’ll fit right in!
Also, 24/7 has his spider chart and scout opinions from his combine, a couple of years ago.
Well, I am not D3FB (or any division fullback; that position is dead), but he is a journeyman, career backup offensive lineman who just can’t seem to hold down a spot on the roster… Oh, you meant the other guy. Carry on.
D3FB praised the signing on Twitter after it was announced
I’m a fan.
https://twitter.com/Astonia67/status/638000165010341889
https://twitter.com/Astonia67/status/654027803969605633
https://twitter.com/Astonia67/status/654029859115679745
https://twitter.com/Astonia67/status/654029998018400257
With the state of the NFL being so wide open, it would be a damn shame to not take advantage of this great opportunity, win the next two games and more importantly Improve enough to put ourselves in the hunt… So many teams are underwhelming and dealing with a ton of issues.. GB is really the ONLY team in the NFC that I wouldn’t want to have to face in the playoffs, the next best team is Probably the Cardinals and Palmer and ARYIANS DONT scare me at all… The Falcons are hot, but we are capable of so much more than what we showed in week 1.. Panthers I expect to outclass since I believe we are a bad matchup for Carolina,.
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Seattle is a mess, their OL is a much bigger mess than ours was. BEASTMODE is banged up, Bobby Wagner is going to be sidelined with a sprain Pectoral, and Russell Wilson is on pace to join Derreck Carr and randall Cunningham as the only QBs to be sacked 70 times..without a quality OL and Elite run game, Wilson is showing his warts and Limitations,,
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Julio is dealing with a muscle stran think his hammy.
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Kuechly has yet to play since week 1 (concussion)
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cowboys might go on an epic losing streak.
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We haven’t beaten the skins since they got rid of RG3, THATS a concern. We haven’t matched up well with them so hopefully they loss to everyone else and we have to beat them and stop this madness of losing to the skins.
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T-Mobile seems to have jacked up his MCL and he will join shady and Karlos Williams on the bench. Let the EJ Manuel WRa era begin..
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Need to see the Eagles destroy the Giants, and then see the Giants turn around and Beat the Cowboys next week. While the skins lose @ Jeta with Revis, Marshall and Gang green coming off a bye… Not only is Culliver and Hall out, but saw report that claims their only other corner Braushaun Breeland is dealing with a messed up Shoûlder and he can’t put his arms over his head.. decker and Marshall shold dominate the skins secondry
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Right now the ONLY teams in the NFL that we can assume will make the playoffs are the bengals who are Probably the #1 team today, GB even tho they have some small OL issues and the Patriots. Denver has a great defense, but PeYTON is a question mark and their run game is a joke..
Disagree about Peete. Argue pretty strongly the Eagles won in spite of him and not because of him in ’95. Undersized, couldn’t read a defense & made ill-advised decisions, and wasn’t even that much of a running threat in the open field by the time he got to the Eagles.
When the Eagles went to Dallas in ’95, I fully expected them to get their asses kicked because Peete was the QB and the Eagles capable (not very good/great) defense would have real problems stopping the Boys. Played out that way to a T with the Boys whipping the Eagles almost from the Opening Kickoff until late in the 4th quarter when the rout was well under way.
Completely different from how I felt in ’92 when the Eagles went into Dallas and got whipped anyways with Gang Green getting abused & Cunningham stinking it up.
I like that chip starts showing some runs from under center… Another successful run or two from under center, and the next step is whipping out a play action pass on a defense and catch them slipping Deep.
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Also loved seeing Chip send guys in motion and ghost motion all game against the Saints…want to see us continue with all the Presnap motion…
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It would be a HUGE boost for this team If Josh Huff is ready to turn the corner and start stackng one good game on top of another, on top of another and go into the bye week with some newfound swag…most Important thing for Josh is stop suffering these injiry setbacks…,stay healthy, get continuity and game experience and at some point we wIll see it click for the kid and see the weapon chip thinks so highly of..
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Kinda feel like too much was given to Nelson too soon.. He didn’t realy have to earn anything as a rook. We want to keep jordan in the slot, huff was in and out of the line up from the begginning of the year and Nelson was needed to be thrust into playing all game on the outside immediately, instead of him really Earning all that playing time… Like Jordan Mathews last year, im sure it will click for Agholar at some point this season,and we will see him start to do damage.. But it would be great if RIGHT NOW Huff and Riley step up, have some good games on the outside, start taking some reps from Agholar and force him to start producing in reps he gets before he goes back to playing every snap on the outside all game… Im more concerned with getting Huff going in year two, than I am with trying to rush Agholar along.
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First and foremost we need to see Huff stay healthy these next two games, make some big plays and go into the bye week Healthy and with some extra confidence… Line him up all over the place including the backfield…
Dolphins waived RB Raheem Mostert.
The preseason star had been active just once since signing
in Week 2. He’ll reportedly be stashed back on the practice squad if he
clears waivers.
It is a shame we don’t have Vandervelt on the roster, so that we could cut him and sign Mostert.
CBS’ Jason La Canfora reports Tyrod Taylor could miss “multiple games” with a sprained MCL, and that the Bills are preparing for E.J. Manuel to start against the Bengals. Bet Bills wish they could get Cassel back.
Well the bills were a nice Cinderella story for a few weeks. That was fun while it lasted.
Every year it is oh look at the aFCE contenders. And every year they fail. I don’t even listen to it anymore. Someone here went on and on. Until I see someone take the division from the Pats I won’t believe it can happen.
Rex Ryan is part Carnaval Barker and part Charlatan.,, the NFL needs to put an end to his head coaching career and he needs to Spend the rest of his days as a Dc who is only allowed to talk to the media like once a month
Lol dude threw for 100 yards in a game..
I love how Tomlins incredibly stupid play call at the end of the game is being called “gutsy” and “brilliant” simply because it worked (barely). If that play got blown up and they wasted the last few seconds with that slow developing run, everyone would be calling it “foolish” and “stupid”.
Was not impressed w/ their play calling for Vick (or generally) last night, it was barely better than it was last week. I’m surprised, but not surprised, that they haven’t tried to tailor the offense to what Vick is good at. The fact that they’re running wildcat out there makes no sense to me.
I don’t think Tomlin is that great.
Tomlin doesn’t call any plays
thanks good to know.
If he didn’t get in the endzone the sky would be falling in steeler land… He is so damn lucky Laveon got that TD
Matthews can’t get out of his own way let alone Mathews’ way.
All this talk about how much time Jordan Matthews spends on the Jugs machine, and he has this many drops? It’s clearly not working…
Your right, he should just stop working towards improving and accept his limitations
A BGN poster had close-ups of Jordan’s hands as he tried to catch the ball. He holds his hands in an L formation instead of the customary diamond shape. This results in deflections off one or both hands.
Why this has not been addressed by coaches is beyond me. Maybe they think this is OK.
As far as I’m concerned he can spend 24/7 on the jugs machine and it will make no difference.
Might be wrong kinda jugs.
Anyone know what’s up with Earl Wolff? Does he even want to try and come back and have an NFL career at some point?
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It’s Dawkins birthday and I saw on Twitter that Wolff
Was wishing Dawk a happy birthday, so i clicked on wolfs name
To see if maybe his profile said the what he was up to or if he was working towards a comeback, but it wouldn’t let me see his profile so I was did Earl Wolff block me? I never talk to the guy, and it’s not like I was bashing him on Twitter when he was dealing with his injury, but then I asked a few people to check his profile and they could see it either so he didn’t block
Me, he just made private…
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I have never heard him speak on his intentions, media never asked chip if we would be interested to take a look at him next year if he gets healthy..
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For a kid that never had serious injuries before going to the NFL it be a real shame to wast all that talent and athleticim if his career is completely over. He is a young kid, I hope he isn’t completely
Demoralized and giving up on her dream,. If Jakqwan Jarrett can turn it around so can anyone…
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Walt and Jenkins are both godsends so I don’t really care if Wolff ever plays for the Eagles, but I do hope he finds his way back on an NFL field somewhere at some point., be a real share if his career is over,
Especially when he really never tore his acl, or Achilles or patella.. Feel bad for the kid
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PFF released its safety rankings:
1) HARRISON Smith
2) Devin McCourty
3) Eric Berry
4) Malcolm Jenkins
5) Thurmond
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We went from years of safety being our biggest weakness to having two top 5 ranked safeties lol sucks that it’s only a shifty Pff ranking but still nice to see
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How about this stat, in Walter thurmonds 5 yr NFL career at cornerback, he has only 1 INT total In 5 years, yet we moved him to safety and he already has 3 in five games.,.watching him play centerfield is beautiful, basically he looks like what I always Daydreamed about Jarius Byrd looking like at centerfield for us,,,
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I’d try to extend Thurmond now, the longer he plays the more he will cost, I’m comfortable rolling the dice on his injury history. Extend the kid NOW before je has a 10 INT season lol
Re: Earl Wolff. He is recovering from surgery and is fairly early in the rehab process. Pretty sure his goal is to get invited to a training camp next year, but to be perfectly honest, I think his career is over. His knee will probably always be messed up. It’s a shame because he seemed so promising back in the 2013.
He’s got some nice burst.