The Other Rookie
Posted: September 11th, 2016 | Author: Tommy Lawlor | Filed under: Philadelphia Eagles | 386 Comments »Carson Wentz wasn’t the only rookie that came up big on Sunday. Coach Doug Pederson did an excellent job in his first NFL game. One game doesn’t give us any definitive answers for either Wentz or Pederson, but there is reason to feel good about both. We actually have a bit more to judge Pederson on since the offseason is such a critical part of a coach’s job. Still, today was the first chance to see him tested on the field and Pederson passed with flying colors.
Pederson runs the Eagles offense as well as the overall team. I thought he did an excellent job with the offense. He was creative, but not gimmicky. The Eagles used different formations and personnel packages. 4 different RBs got carries. Zach Ertz and Jordan Matthews were the primary passing targets, but the ball was spread around as well. Pederson tried to get his young WRs going early. There was a good mixture of run and pass. The Eagles threw the ball 39 times and ran 34 times.
I thought Pederson did an excellent job of not holding back with Wentz. If you watched the Dallas game, you saw the Cowboys throw a lot of short passes. They also did a lot with rollouts. Those plays cut the field in half and make it easier for the QB to make reads. That was a drastically different gameplan than they would use for Tony Romo. I wondered if the Eagles might do some of that, but Pederson used Wentz like he would have any other QB.
Pederson is a big believer in giving the QB options at the line of scrimmage. Wentz ran a system like this so it made him a natural fit, even though he’s a rookie. Pederson allowed Wentz to choose which side a run went to and then some plays could be changed to a pass. We saw Wentz make adjustments throughout the game. This was by design. Wentz used a hard count to try to get the defense to tip off what they might be doing. Then he would adjust the play to what he thought was the best fit for that look by the defense.
Rather than making things simple for Wentz, Pederson challenged him. That brought out the best in Wentz and he delivered outstanding results.
I think the phrase “ready to play” is vastly overused to bash coaches on a bad day, but there is something to be said for a coach managing the emotions of his team. The Eagles came out excited, but not too high. If the team goes nuts early, they can run out of emotion and go flat as the game wears on. There waas a lull in the game when things weren’t going well today, but the team never got too down.
There was only one huge tactical decision. The Eagles were faced with 4th/4 at the CLE 40. The Eagles led 15-10. Pederson decided to go for it rather than punting the ball. Wentz hit Ertz over the middle for 5 yards and moved the chains. With some emotion and momentum, Pederson called for a deep ball on the next play. Wentz hit Agholor for a 35-yard TD. That made the game 22-10 and the Eagles were squarely in control.
There were no plays to challenge. The Eagles never trailed in the game. These kinds of situations will come up in the future and will present Pederson with some in-game obstacles that he’ll have to navigate carefully to help the team.
When it comes to big picture decisions, Pederson has been great so far. I love the coaching staff he put together. Hiring Jim Schwartz was an absolutely brilliant move. Pederson has done a good job of working with Howie Roseman and Joe Douglas to build a young roster, but one that is talented enough to win now as well as in the future. Pederson was patient with underachievers, giving them a chance to round into shape. Marcus Smith embraced that challenge. Eric Rowe didn’t. Pederson shuffled his O-line to be ready for the Lane Johnson suspension, but also adjusted when the NFL took longer than expected.
Time will tell just how good of a coach Doug Pederson truly is, but he has done more right than wrong so far and the Eagles are 1-0 with a rookie QB that looks like the real deal.
_
Today was beautiful, Wentz looked great and the Eagles won. Prescott looked pedestrian and the Cowboys lost. What more could you ask for, besides a Cowboys friend to share it all with?
Saw the lights on the Good Year Blimp and it said Howie is the Pimp…
Today i didnt even have to scream at my tv; have to say, today was a good day
[…] Tommy Lawlor Carson Wentz wasn’t the only rookie that came up big on Sunday. Coach Doug Pederson did an […]
Wentz had a great game and plenty of credit goes to Wentz himself for that, but I also think Pederson and the rest of the coaching staff have to be given credit as well. They clearly coached up Wentz successfully, especially given the fact that Wentz missed most of the preseason with the injury.
In terms of the key moments, the 4th down play was absolutely the right call by Pederson. I hate when coaches punt on 4th and reasonably short from around the opponents 40 yard line. I just doesn’t provide a huge benefit relative to the opportunity to continue a drive.
As for challenges, there was one moment that I believe he could have challenged. On the play were the Redskins snapped the ball a few seconds after the play clock went to 00, I am pretty sure that is a challengable play. I can’t remember the context entirely, but I do think I recall the Redskins had a nice gain on that play. If I am remembering the play correctly, you could make the argument that Pederson should have challenged that play since they had plenty of time to review it before the next play was run. That being said, this is certainly nitpicking. I thought Pederson had a fantastic debut as HC.
(Psssssst we played cleveland browns)
Sure… the Browns aren’t a great team, but deciding to go for it on 4th and 4 goes beyond just the fact we were playing the Browns. Making quality coaching decisions still happens when facing a bad team. Heck, you can still have players play well against bad teams. Does this mean we have all the data to call Wentz of Pederson great, of course not. But it also doesn’t mean we simply ignore it either simply because the Browns are bad.
(You called them the Redskins twice in your post…)
This.
Hahaha, wow, must be tired. Didn’t even notice.
On the play I think you are talking about, Vinny Curry was called for offsides
Could not have challenged thst.
I believe that was the play the refs missed a hold on Curry and called a questionable pass interference on Jenkins.
During his post-game PC, Pedersen basically said it was purely a statistical/math decision to go for it there vs kick a field goal, so I suspect he always will, unless he loses faith in Sturgis.
Hopefully Sturgis doesn’t keep missing kicks.
That play was the one the Eagles were called for offsides – after the play clock had expired for almost three seconds!
But I don’t know if you can challenge that call.
I loved that play. It was a huge Fuck You to the Browns. A quick release in a tight window with a defender right in his face on a 4th down play in a tight game. Slow release and not likely to be a top 20 QB my ass.
I wanted them to punt because the Eagles were leading and the Browns were doing little. Short field may have been bad.
But it worked.
It was good to see Jordan Matthews come back from his injury and show off his progress from last year. We all knew he was the best of the bunch, but that wasn’t saying much. He is a legitimate starting receiver.
Ditto Ertz, we’ve been waiting for him to break out, this finally looks like his year.
Lastly, it’s good too have the greatest fullback in the league, looking forward to a Beau Allen dive for a TD
Matthews had a quality game. I’d still like to see him reduce some of the easy drops, but overall, he had a good game.
If he dives for it, the Marianas Trench may no longer be the deepest spot on earth.
Matthews is our only quality receiver. As much of a fucking idiot Terrence Williams is, I wouldn’t hesitate to trade him for Algholor and Huff.
I think that Pederson still has more to prove than Wentz, but I agree that it was a good start.
I’m already completely sold on Wentz. We’ve found our QB for at least the next decade. I think that Pederson’s greatest selling point at this point is that he seems to have a great relationship with Wentz.
Agreed.
And it feels so weird.
Ever since Howie made that trade Carson Wentz has done basically everything and anything you could ask from a Franchise QB.
I think Wentz has “it” but so does Marcus Mariota and Tenn isn’t close.
My list of reasons I think Carson Wentz is going to be a good NFL starter is so long right now I wouldn’t even know where to start.
I do, actually: http://weapone.blogspot.com/2016/09/carson-wentz-just-proved-me-wrong.html
And I linked to an Iggles Blitz post on there, too 🙂 Keep being awesome, Tommy!
I’m pretty sure that Pederson’s greatest selling point should be that you’re already completely sold on the QB he wanted and whom he spent the last five months helping to transition from the FCS to the NFL.
That doesn’t just happen.
I think Howie and the scouting staff had a lot to do with that decision. But I will give Pederson full credit for the decision to sign Chase Daniel.
(I’m half kidding)
Howie also coached him and got him ready to make the transition from FCS to NFL? Howie’s a busy man!
Eh, there was stuff in early April saying that Pederson was all in on Wentz after the Senior Bowl and Combine, and had asked Howie to do pretty much anything it took to get him.
speaking of rookies, look who made it to the game:
https://twitter.com/Sixers/status/775076740884463617?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
Amazing duo who will be destroying that overrated stick figure of a loser Porzingas 5 times a year!
I still wish we took Prozingis over Okafor 🙁
We beat the browns in a game in which I don’t think we showcased how bad that team truly is. Wildcat? Fake Punts?
Dak vs Wentz. 2 drafts worth of high picks vs a 4th?
The Browns sucking is a legitimate point, but the Eagles dominated them with a new head coach with a new offense and a new D coordinator with a new defense and a rookie QB who played part of one preseason game against 3rd stringers. I don’t think we’ve seen the Eagle’s ceiling.
Also, RGIII looked pretty good I thought. His receivers did him no favors.
The Dak/Wentz thing is not really worth commenting on because its dumb from multiple angles.
Yeah Wentz could be a franchise QB, Dak will be a career back up. He lacks the throwing ability to be a quality starting NFL QB.
nor the Eagles floor. The Eagles dominated a bad team. That’s what we expect “seasoned” teams to do. The fact the Eagles did with those things you listed is pretty cool.
Maybe you should look at the trades too? “Two drafts of high choices” is slightly out of date. We have a #1 next year, etc. etc. And Brady was 6th round, so every other team should lay down and die? Sometimes lightning strikes. Here’s hoping Dak’s career equals Nick Foles’ (well, i hope Dak doesn’t get a jersey in the HOF)
Net/net the Eagles didn’t give up much at all for Wentz. Even teams with established QBs would, in hindsight, jump on that deal now themselves, knowing that Wentz is legit. As for Dak – pump the brakes. Look at his YPA and compare it to Wentz’s. That tells you all you need to know for now.
Checkdown specialist.
No, we traded him to the Vikings. You do understand the concept of West Coast Offense, right? Short manageable passes with YAC. He threw several deep balls. It’s his first game, give him a chance to understand the playbook and practice routes with his receivers some more.
I’m sure he’ll speak for himself, but I believe Mike was referring to Prescott, not Wentz.
Correct!
I was flaming modified RB Dak for being only capeble of check-down throws.
Eh. I’m far less impressed with Wentz’s game vs. a team that would struggle to beat the Nittany Lions, but I’m not going to say that Dak’s game was anywhere near as good as Wentz’s. Dak should look decent, because that offense is stacked; he doesn’t need to make plays, really, just be the point guard. Wentz was better and he was working with less. He had multiple A++ throws, even if he did struggle with his reads for the majority of the game. The reasons Dak went in the 4th were evident in that game. Dak’s numbers were far worse than Wentz’s, and it’s not like he was playing against a good, or even average, defense. The Giants are a slow motion train-wreck again this year, and they dared Dak to beat them by loading the box – he couldn’t.
So is J. Winston a baller?
Yes. He’s good.
It seems like just when the Eagles finally get a good QB everyone else has one too.
Seriously though, it seems like there are a lot of good QBs right now.
Yeah there was a drought for several years, it’s too bad we couldn’t strike while the iron is hot.
I’m just glad our guy is better than cousins.
What drought?
You mean the years where Brady, Brees, Manning etc. was in the play offs every year?
Tebow, Locker, Ponder, and etc.
Those are great quarterbacks. We are talking about good quarterbacks.
So you mean the years where Flacco, Ryan, Luck, Wilson, Tannenhill came?
One of these things doesn’t belong…
Any thoughts on deep ball defense? LOOOOOOVED watching the D today, but a couple of deep ball plays got me worried if that’s an issue.
I’m worried. This is what happened the last couple years: an occasional breakdown early in the season, then by the end it seemed like every other ball was an X-play against our incompetent corners…
That one play where the Eagles had THREE DB’s covering one Browns’ WR yet he still made the catch was just terrible.
I’m not going to worry too much about one screw up on an underthrown ball. Look at the bright side: they threw deep and we had three defenders on the target.
The first one Carrol had good coverage Pryor just made a heck of a catch. The underthrown pass was really obnoxious though.
Had Coleman made those catches, I’d be fine with it. Pryor is a low down treasonous dog of a human being with poor morals and zero ability to read a map. F him.
What deep balls? Really the one to Pryor was lucky – Carroll had him covered but it was just a great catch. And the one where the receiver was triple-covered, they won’t make that mistake again. They were probably just awestruck as to why in the world RGIII even decided to throw that ball, and while ruminating on, “What the heck was he thinking?!?” they got caught.
Also, just want to high five everyone here. Season started (finally)! We’re 1-0! Our QB looks pretty good all things considered and is healthy! No one injured! Dougy P looks like he knows what he’s doing!
Cowboys lost! It’s been a pretty good sunday.
http://i.imgur.com/B7Ojsl6.gif
The start of a beautiful relationship. At least I hope so..
That paper they’re throwing is Chip’s contract.
could have been chip’s playbook too.
Too big a piece of paper for that, they are tossing full A4 by the look of things… not post it notes.
Best part of the Cowboys loss: Ezekiel Elliot, 21 carries for 50 yards.
Still has 15 games to hit 2k
Matthews destroys a cameraman on his TD:
http://www.philadelphiaeagles.com/videos/videos/Highlight-Carson-Wentzs-First-Career-TD-Drive/39b65d34-329f-4ddf-867a-a5328408c369
Must see interview videos on the Eagles website: Jordan Matthews, Brandon Graham, Beau Allen
I’m looking at today like Bradford’s preseason 10 for 10 last year. Signs are good. I’m not going to get too excited.
I wouldn’t get too excited about the Eagles playoff potential this year, but there’s no reason not to be excited about Carson Wentz. He’s got the physical ability and he just played like a veteran in his first NFL game.
IIRC, it was Jeff Lurie, not Pederson, who hired Jim Schwartz.
The HC hires the DC, but the owner pays
While that is true normally, and i am sure Pederson signed off on every hire and was involved with the selection process, I suspect the Eagles front office had a big role in putting together this coaching staff.
Why? Nobody in the Eagles FO has any ties to Schwartz. I suspect the defenisve side of things have been getting Schwartz and let him get guys he wanted and on offense it was guys Doug wanted
The large number of coaches being retained, many of the new coach hires had no real link to Pederson and confirmed that during the interviews after their hiring.
Schwartz and the power he seems to have been given, and the fact that he said at his hiring he did not really know Pederson yet to me implied that this was a FO lead hiring.
Coaches does not need to have clear ties to be hired a HC.
Andy had no ties to Jim Johnson when he hired him.
Schwartz was just simply the best on the market, but do you think Howie or Lurie had forced him on Doug if he had said no?
What i am saying is this was a FO had a large role in the identifying and hiring of the coaching staff. Did Doug have a big input – absolutely, but lets be realistic Doug is not walking in and going I want Fipp, Stoutland and Undlin on my coaching staff and he did not bring a load of guys from KC.
Did he have a big role in hiring OC and QB coach – i would think those are his guys, but on the other side of the ball i think they identified Schwartz as a DC, went after him and offered him a large amount of independence to run the defense as he would like.
Is that so? Why don’t you explain to us the circumstances surrounding Schwartz’ hire, who he met with, the timing, how Pederson reached out to him, etc.
The toughest part for me right now is knowing the the offense and the whole team will most likely have a giant turd of a game and not overreacting to it the other way.
Yea. This team still has a going flaws that are going to be exposed against a mediocre team, let alone a good one . The Browns look inept.
Still kind of excited about Wentz’s potential.
They looked real good, which is sure better than looking bad, but competition matters. I think QBs averaged over 100 rating against the Saints last year.
lmfao. I don’t think many are overreacting to beating Cleveland. Cleveland. Keeping games in perspective. Keeping W’s and L’s, ups and downs with rookie QB. Outcomes of games don’t matter much this year. How they play is important. I don’t think the OL played great. I’m not sure if they played good. Then again, I’m no expert in that area. I know I saw Kelce snap a ball and let a blitzing guy run right to the QB.
…..
The team will play well at times and not play well at times. Its going to happen….
Happy Monday!
The sky is a little bluer, the birds singing is cheerier, and the city of Philadelphia feels almost, but not quite, welcoming this morning. Eagles won. Cowboys lost. Hard to get any any better than that on opening Day.
I really would prefer the Giants losing to the Cowboys losing due to the more vile fan base of the former, but a scenario in which both of those teams lose isn’t plausible.
I only ask that it be a sloppy game where neither team looks good.
I love that the Cowboys lost it in heartbreaking fashion, struggling to get to the line to spike it as time ran out because their stupid receiver didn’t go out of bounds…
That was truly excellent. Now we need the Giants to lose to the Saints because Brees throws for 8 TDs and Eli does some type of foolishness with the clock to lose the game.
I would prefer they tie – almost as good as a loss for both!
Even as far away as Maine, the air is crisp (first time under 50 degrees in a long time), life looks brighter, and neighbors could care less about my Iggs, but I don’t give a fig.
Now if Miss Hawaii would just bring me my coffee this morning…
Odds are good that will happen as it appears she wasn’t really needed too deep into the event last night. I just looked up the results and she should be back in Hawaii right now to serve you.
My door is unlocked.
Really happy with Peterson from a coaching perspective. My only area of concern is that he hasn’t announced the public flogging of players who drop passes. That really needs to stop or I want an example made of somebody.
Passes get dropped, MM. Check around the league.
I can’t speak for the other 31 teams, but that has been a perpetual issue here that needs to end.
And anybody on one of my fantasy teams who drops passes can also line up for their flogging.
And wearing the hair shirt along with the stockade humiliation. I think Sproles, for one, was surprised by a couple zingers. My guess is that with more practice together, the receivers will get used to Wentz’s bullets.
That’ll certainly help.
http://www.sportingcharts.com/nfl/stats/team-receiver-drops-percentage/2015/
Led the league in it last year.
If Matthews goes 1800-16 he can drop 32 passes.
No doubt, but he’s far from the only guy on the roster. It just seems to be a very annoying trend with the whole group.
Sproles had a bad one, the other Sproles drop was probably mainly on Wentz, no need to rocket the ball there. Catchable, but a learning moment for the kid. The only other one that comes to mind was the Huff tip to Agholor and that 1. Should have been thrown away and 2. Was off target with too much pace. I can’t really blame Huff on that one.
I have trouble seeing “can’t blame” and “Huff” in the same sentence.
How about Kenjon Barner and 10.5 yards per carry?
Henry Josey would have run for 10.6 yards per carry.
Or possibly 106
Josey would still be running.
Smallwood would have averaged 21 yards per carry on those same blocking schemes. Also true for Mostert and Josey. No vacuums exist for Barner.
Only 21?
Yeah Barner looked great! Suck it Mike.
If he cuts those drops in half, he’d shatter receiving records.
My favorite part of the win yesterday was the fact that Eagles were the only double digit winner in the league. So nice to have our score at the top of the list.
I expected a win yesterday but I thought it would be ugly. Pleasantly surprised
My favorite part other then the golden child was Barner beasting.
Monday night in Chicago. Excitement abounds.
Especially when looking at the Bears roster.
Stuff gets real for week 3 and beyond, but I’d enjoy starting 2-0 and seeing how we can do after that. The Bears played the 2nd worst football of any team in the league this weekend.
http://www.ourlads.com/nfldepthcharts/depthchart/CHI
Honestly, this needs to be a win.
Do we ever beat those bastards, though?
http://www.espn.com/nfl/recap?gameId=331222021
“We’re from Philadelphia and we fight.”
Perhaps the high point of Kelly’s Philadelphia coaching career.
This is worth following up and reading if you’d like to see an amazing smack down of a strategy that never worked, but was glorified, in baseball being used foolishly in the NFL. I’d also still like to know how many WARs or ERA+ I need in the ninth inning to win a game.
https://twitter.com/PatKirwanCBS/status/775177265093156864
I disagree with the fact that analytics cannot be a useful tool to help form a part of the evaluation process, and the reckless glee some national media will take attacking the Browns for lacking football people is insane. Analytics can help in a range of ways people don’t even think of, help with scout evaluation, targetting of resources, cap and roster projection, pro scouting and to challenge preconceptions. It does not mean you put in a players name into the computer and it says yes or no. In fact listening to the Cleveland front office talk about Wentz it is pretty clear that their issue was confidence of projection from the eye test – not analytics (which Wentz actually scores really well on most publicly available models i know of).
They are going full process – they are stupidly inexperienced and will win 0-2 games all year…. that is their design. They will have a top 2 pick in 2017 (and that is not a no.1 pick lock only because the 49ers have the potential and division to be truely shockingly awful), loads of young blooded players where you can start to form a range of evaluations and a load of draft picks. They go out and spend big getting 1-2 OL next year, pick up a RB and QB and they should have a fun offense, and plenty of ammo to build a defence over the next 2-3 years.
Yeah, the article linked says analytics failed in Cleveland because Wentz had one good game? Against the Browns??
The triumphalism is… ah, fans!
Not that i agree with what Cleveland did with passing on Wentz. Cleveland has a lot of busted 1st round QB’s… but have only taken one top 20 since 99… in Tim Couch.
Draft QB’s as early and as often as you can until you find a solution, don’t get scared… look at what Dallas did in picking Aikman and Walsh in ’89. effectively spending 2 no.1 picks on QB’s back to back.
This is a dumb tweet and a worse article. If you think Moneyball failed than you are dumber than this writer. Who, again, is very very dumb.
Tommy, I’ll be interested to see how you grade out Lane Johnson after reviewing the game. Last week, when it became likely that he would start, I worried that he may not have prepared as well as he could have thinking he wouldn’t be playing for 10 weeks. Watching the game live, it seemed to me he was a weak link/turnstyle.
He seemed a tad “off” for sure.
Entire OL looked like it lacked a little chemistry. They have very limited snaps as a 6 man unit (including Wentz) and will take time to settle down into a new scheme and chemistry.
I thought the OL did a good enough job – when teams run a range of fancy blitzs bringing safeties and CB’s it tends to make the OL look worse to the initial eye test compared to a 4-3 unit that likes to just rush 4. Is there a lot of scope for improvement? Yep but i think if they stay healthy that should happen with time.
Kelce didn’t pick up the blitz at least once I can think of
4th and 4. Right up the gut.
In all fairness, LB had the snap timed.
This is a blown blocking assignment, the linebackers timing has nothing to do with it.
https://twitter.com/JoshPaunil/status/775180776317001728
Absolutely. I had only seen it at game speed, you’re right. My mind must have been giving the line the benefit of the doubt.
PFF thought he was the 2nd best OL after Barbre (for some reason PFF is never really a fan of Peters)
I’m becoming less of a fan of PFF.
After the Broncos-Panthers game, they had grades up 15 min after the game, claiming they had 15 guys grading live.
How on earth can you grade accurately live? Even Belichick cant grade live and from non-all 22 film and they claim they can do it live?
-0.3 for questioning subjective grading being passed off as some kind of bullshit math
+0.1 for fast content about Wentz! PFF claims he did poorly under pressure in college, and that continued in the Cleveland game. It would be better if they compared it to how typical QBs do under pressure.
https://www.profootballfocus.com/pro-carson-wentzs-accuracy-on-display-in-nfl-debut/
They have a decent college scouting staff
But my overall thoughts on PFF can be sumarized as thus:
https://cdn0.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/YPch04NR-yJvOzMwiPd6ZHXiAEg=/cdn0.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/2506098/kcjerk.0.gif
Ha! The only time I hear about PFF is from comments here, I don’t check it out.
But it’s data! It has to be good, Oakland won a world series fielding just 9 equations.
Seem to be a big fan of Journeymen Veterans that play between Peters and Kelce though
haha yea.
I’d be more OK with PFF if they didn’t plaster their player rankings below the pics of players on NBC. It’s so tacky.
2 Things that were really strange to me:
1) Long, sustained drives – I kept checking the game clock, because it felt really weird how long the Eagles had possession for. I just could not believe that Eagles still had the ball every time I’d turn back to the television.
2) Long passes – Also not used to seeing anyone heave the ball like that…and if it did happen, I used to just roll my eyes and mentally move on to the next play before the ball had even started to come back down. Now I can actually get excited again when I see our QB lean way back and wind up one of those bombs.
I’m still in kinda of a haze because it was just so different from the past 3 years. It didn’t feel like the Eagles football I’ve gotten used to in the past 3 years, but I like where its going a lot better than where it was, purely from an entertainment perspective.
Long passes: not just that, there were plays where Wentz threw downfield when the checkdown was open. What’s up with that?
Hey Guys dont get too excited, we are talking about the Browns here. I saw some things that I liked and others that worry me but I do like Pederson’s demeanor, he looks calm, cool and collected
I think this is important to remember. This win was only slightly more informative than preseason. The Browns start more rookies than most teams roster.
On the other hand, Wentz looks like the real deal. The stage was not too big and he wasn’t making bad decisions bailed out by worse opponents. Pederson managed the game and the clock well. If you win all the games you are supposed to win, you will be successful in this league.
I was looking at CBS power rankings. They just dropped the Eagles 4 ranks.
Dropped as in lowered their expectation or dropped as in a lower number, closer to #1?
From 25 to 29
Wow.
The good thing is that this isn’t college football and these stupid rankings don’t mean anything.
I don’t give them the “page views”
I wonder how badly the 25th ranked team starting a new QB was supposed to beat the Browns to break even.
It might be because the teams around us also happened to play well, and against better competition. The Eagles have a rookie HC, a rookie QB, and are coming off of 2 very disappointing seasons. It might take more than one game to restore their credibility in the league.
2 seasons?
True. That is fair. We exceeded my expectations though.
The first disappointing season was 10-6. It was only disappointing after the 9-3 start.
But yes, the unknown coach and unknown rookie QB makes us difficult to rank.
That is the stupidity of power rankings. The Eagles aren’t trendy so we have to fall so these trendy picks can rise.
I friggin despise that line of thinking
..
think it’s perfectly fair for fans to get as excited as they want to be over an Eagles win, as long as we don’t take the game results and project them on our expectations for the rest of the season
.
Fans should be excited about how Wentz and the team played yesterday. The coaches also deserved a ton of praise for yesterday. We can ONLY play against who the NFL puts in front of us, and the Eagles playërs and coaches shouldnt be penalized because the Browns haven’t gotten their shit together
..
Get as excited as you want over any win… This is supposed to be entertainment… Just don’t take what you saw yesterday and assume that it will be that way every week this year
Wait. I extrapolated the results of this game, and my numbers show us going undefeated. I shouldn’t do this?
The audible out of a bad play by Wentz
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SbKpD84IQbM
This new “audible” concept is interesting. I haven’t seen anything like that in years.
About 3.5 years, to be precise? Well maybe the last game last season…
Looked like he checked out of an inside run when the browns showed blitz to the A gap. Would have been a 4 yard loss last year.
Got to love it. Not to put Wentz on some higher plane, but we could never get a veteran in Vick to come close to making those kinds of calls.
I honestly gonna feel sorry for Joe Thomas. He might go a whole HoF Career with only 1 winning season.
It was fun to see Connor Barwin get around him.
Defense question for Tommy or D3 or anyone else – at 11:54 in the 2nd it looks like we had a two man front. was this just a nickel or something weirder?
Remind me tomorrow I won’t have time to watch the replay until then and I must have missed it live trying to write a liveblog and watch is hard.
Was that the weird play that the browns only had three men on the line?
not sure. i can’t get the video to play now that i want to recheck. i don’t recall the oline looking weird but i was focusing on our DL. http://www.cleveland.com/browns/index.ssf/2016/09/carson_wentz_cleveland_browns.html#share=true&playerID=ba3c9fd24b7869889d339af2eb.aku1u7oix7o91rcozzak4hjc9&time=0&vid=1ahagu8f5z3us1w123a25y9u07
Marcus Smith looked solid, I thought
He played all of 6 snaps… although he looked solid when i saw in on specials teams.
Having said that no one on defence played much outside the starters.
Defence only having to defend 52 plays, meant that they really did not have to go deep with their rotation at all, Outside of Curry the 2nd string DLine got a total of 19 snaps combined.
Or not McLane seems incapable of tweeting out right list which missed 17 Beau snaps on D. Point still stands however – they really did not get deep into their rotation.
Did Tulloch play at all?
1 snap
I wonder what the Rams are thinking? As Jared Goff doesn’t even dress for his first game..
“WHY THE F WOULD WE INVEST SO MUCH IN A QB AND GIVE HIM TO JEFF FISHER?!”
I don’t think I can sum up the differences in coaching philsophy any more clearly:
The Rams spent all camp whining and bitching about how Goff can’t recite 9000 words in a row and college offenses.
Doug said oh cool well let’s bridge the gap, we can tag these plays with one word, it all means the same thing anyways, and we can incorporate some of these concepts you ran in college into the scheme and gameplan to help you.
Heh, your Goff > Wentz call is gonna haunt you homie.
It’s unfortunate he’s in LA with Jeff Fisher, but let’s not absolve Goff from blame for being a total douchebag either.
I’m holding out hope Fisher gets fired midseason and they hire Mike Leach. Goff would be the first QB to throw for 8000 yards in a season.
Todd Gurley would also be the first NFL player to actively smoke weed on the sidelines since he wasn’t going to get in the game.
To be fair no one really could project Wentz would come in and be this ready and successful week 1 and i fell in love at first youtube back in January.
Goff has a lot of things to like about his game – but he is with a crap coach and scheme to help him transition early. I hope for the kid Fisher gets fired and then he can actually start his career anew with a team that actually wants to develop a young QB.
If QB evaluation was such a predictable science then everyone who didn’t draft Tom Brady or Russell Wilson needs to be fired.
Good stuff man, didn’t know that about the play. Every coach talks about coaching to their players strengths. Very rarely actually happens. Year 1 Chip had us all fooled that he would put players in the best position to win. Instead he puts Billy Davis in a 3-4 2gap box with 4-3 1 gap guys.
I really don’t get comparing the two guys at this point. Goff had the better college career, Wentz has better measurables. Guys who prove it in college tend to do better than workout warriors. It’s always nice when a freak also develops into a real player, of course, because then you have the bonus of physical superiority.
The Rams are where QBs go to die. I don’t see any evidence Fisher can coach offense. Buddy-esque. Philly’s been a fairly good place for a QB for the past decade and a half.
Anyway, Vick and Foles and even Sammy (in preseason) played superlatively at times and made many of us think we had our QB situation figured out. I’m not hopping aboard just yet.
I suppose you mean in Chip’s time but that history of guys who looked great in PS sure does go back through AR era.
Well, two weeks ago we were thinking Wentz wouldn’t see the field all year.
Conventional wisdom was that Wentz played in a lower level league and had many fewer reps than Goff, so he would need more work to be ready — but it does seem as though he played in more of a NFL-style offense, doing many of the things he needed to do in the NFL, so in that sense he may have been more prepared. Many good NFL QBs have sat on the bench for a while — so I’d withhold judgement until we actually see Goff on the field. Just like it wouldn’t have been much to crow about if Goff got on the field in week 5 while Wentz was still behind Bradford.
I’m just happy with what we saw from Wentz.
Pederson gets an A from me for his first game, borderline A+. I thought the game plan was great – he committed to a balanced attack, mixed up plays and formations to keep the Browns guessing, and knew when to go for the jugular and when to play conservatively. His clock management was really good – the team executed the two minute drill well at the end of the first half, and did a great job grinding clock late. They were getting the plays in on time on those last few drives, but consistently snapping the ball with only two or three second left on the play clock, and chewed up tons of time. This was old school NFL football and such a joy to watch after suffering through Chip’s tunnel vision bungling last year – his 100% pedal-to-the-metal approach works in college where the rosters are huge and the defenses aren’t as talented or sophisticated but in the NFL you need to mix up tempos to control the flow of the game and give your defense a rest once in awhile. Kelly never consistently got that; it appears Pederson does.
Nolan Carroll got exposed on the deep ball and Leodis McKelvin got injured. Ron Brooks has a pretty big injury history since 2012. Mills is a rookie. CJ Smith is a rookie on the practice squad.
Corner makes me very nervous. They must really have thought Rowe was a liability.
He was getting beat by WRs during the 4th quarter of the 4th preseason game.
He was only 23 with limited experience. Carroll has been getting torched for years. McKelvin and Brooks have been consistently injured for years.
Actually last year was the first time in Nolans career where he was given extensive playing time as an outside corner, so it’s reasonable to expect him to build on last year and be a little more comfortable than he was last year
Huh? He was a starter in Miami before signing with the Eagles.
He was a ST playër and slot corner for most of his Dolphins career. His first season was 2010, and he only was elevated to starter for most of the 2012 season after Richard Marshall got hurt and placed on IR with a back injury early in the 2012 season. The Eagles signed him March of 2013 with less than a full season of starting outside CB experience.. And he was only our Dime corner the first yeàr chip signed him. He was a real good special team player under coach Fipp in Miami, not just as a gunner but he also returned Kicks for the Dolphins,.,he didnt even get a chance to show what he could do on the outside in his first year in Philly even tho Cary and Bradley were horrible on the outside all year. 2014 was the first time he went into an NFL Season as a starting outside corner and the only time he has started outside all 16 games In a season…
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He played like 12 or 13 games outside CB in 2012 (his 3rd year in Miami)
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only played dime in 2013,’
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2014 was the first time he played 16 games at outside corner
.y
Played like 10 or 11 games in 2015 before breaking his ankle
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We signed him as a Quality ST player, with less than a full season of starting outside CB experience
We did not sign him as a quality ST player. He was signed to compete at CB due to his “length”. Brayman and Maragos were signed as quality ST players.
Ok
The first deep ball was good coverage – he got pushed off on and did not get his head around soon enough, but that is hardly a sign of him getting ‘torched’ or ‘exposed’.
As for the pass into triple coverage – the Eagles DB’s couldn’t pick up the ball in flight obviously – since they had their heads around looking for it and were in perfect position to get a pick – they just could not execute.
Neither play is really a significant concern to me, both had sound coverage and neither pass should have been thrown by a better QB since both had huge pick potential. This is not the most talented CB group out there – their low $$ amount tells you that, and will struggle to make the plays they should at times, but they are generally consistent and reliable which should leave our Safeties and DL to be the play makers for this team.
What? On the triple coverage, NONE of the DB’s were looking for the ball OR in perfect position. They were all staring at the receiver who was in front of them and pulling away.
I don’t think anyone would defend that tripple coverage blooper… We are talking about the no call on offensive pass interference that put the Browns in the Redzone before they called the PIT on Jenkins, essentially gifting the Browns their only TD
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Score could have easily been 29-6, avtually 29-3 because they wouldn’t have been in FG range had they called offensive pass interference
Watch the back-to-back game tape of Ryan Tannehill and Jameis Winston last year as they lit him up. He had good coverage last year too but continuously gave up big passes in those games. This will be a reoccurring theme with Carroll this year, he had good form and played the ball well but still gave up the big play.
first real game
Exposed? I thought it was blatant offensive pass interference, and of course our corners are going to get beat from time to time.. Our CB’s DIDNT get beat as bad as what Agholar and our rookie QB did to joe Haden, roasting his ass with the Bomb to Agholar
I don’t think the particular plays where the Browns found success were reason for concern, they were best described as lucky breaks.
I do think there is reason for concern that the Browns clearly had a concerted effort to target Carroll. RGIII spent a lot of time looking his way and threw there often. If the Browns saw a weakness, other teams will too. And other teams might be better equipped to actually exploit it.
Hopefully Nolan holds up as well as he did much of yesterday.
Going into the game it was well known that the Browns wouldnt be able to sustain long drives, so their success would have to come on taking shots down field…. I don’t thnk RG3 was trying to pick on Nolan. I view it as if RG3 is going to throw deep, he would be most likely to throw it to Pryor or Coleman. Nolan happened to be matched up against one of the Browns best WR. Is it not more reasonable to expect a talented long ball thrower like Rg3 to look for Prior and Coleman downfield instead of a TE like Barndge or a slot like Hawkins?
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i doubt that RG3 feared RON Brooks in the slot defending Hawkins more than he fears Nolan Carroll. If a team is going to pick on our DBs my guess would be they target Brook or Mills when the rookie is in the game. I thought RG3 looked for Coleman and Pryor yesterday, I didn’t notice blatantly Targetting one over the other. Maybe I’ll feel different when I go back and watch the TV footage (I was at the game)…Nolan Carroll was Probably our best corner last year and he had a really solid preseason… Im not sure that the Browns have enough weapons to shy away from Targetting Coleman or Pryor because of who is defending them, especially in a game where they mostly had to play from behind
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When the Browns face better cormers than nolan Carroll, I would still expect RG3 to try and get the ball down field to the two outside WRs, especially while Josh Gordon is suspended.
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I expect to see the Browns targeting the two Outside WRs often every week regardless of the defense, but maybe I feel different when I watch the game again
Nah, they were not targeing Carrol. He was on their best receiver and bob avoided passing up the middle…
Agreed 100%. He was in great position. I made a comment on the thread last night that Pryor was getting away with murder. There were at least 2 other examples of him getting away with stuff. He basically hooked the safety on a screen and I can’t recall the other.
Yeah we can’t put that on Nolan,,,,there is no way Pryor makes that catch without cheating to create seperation at the last minute.. Disgraceful no call, that was much worse than what Malcolm Jenkins did that got him flagged for PIT
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Imagine how much worse RG3’s stats would look had the refs called offensive pass interference on that, and if our 3 DBs didn’t have that big blooper giving up that long catch when our guys were in position to have a good chance of intercepting that ball, or at least batted the pass down…. Those two plays damn near accounted for 100 yards. subtract those two plays and RG3 performance would be horrendous
Hey man, thats football.
Wasn’t exposed at all, got interfered with, and furthermore Carroll probably runs faster than almost anyone he has to cover.
Doesn’t matter how fast he runs, it matters if he actually prevents the receiver from catching the ball.
Way way way oversimplifying….
Care to explain how preventing the receiver from catching the ball vs how fast a corner runs is way way way oversimplifying?
Saying he got beat on the deep ball was.
I really like the way Mills set himself up along the sideline on the RGIII scramble. It forced RGIII to go out much sooner if he wanted to avoid the hit and it positioned him where getting called for a hit out of bounds wasn’t a concern.
and he smashed rgiii on the way out
Well, there was that too. RGIII limped off after trying one more throw on the next play. I wonder if that factored into them running on their last possession?
Actually, I thought the execution of the hit was the least successful part of the plan. He stuck him pretty good, but a QB that weighs more than I did in high school would have run him over.
Yea. The reality was RGIII was the one who did the “hittimg” on that play. Mills was just better positioned to absorb the impact than RGIII was.
I didn’t get a great view of how Mills got there. I thought watching the replay that he didn’t expect the contact to come from RGIII. It did look like Robert had time to see him if he was looking where he was going. Maybe that is a lot of his problem. Perhaps he isn’t really looking at his path. Not our problem so IDC.
I told ALL of you! Told ya so.
Tom bringing up a great point about How the Cowboys babied Prescott. Dak may have had success, but he didn’t look even close to as advanced as Wentz.
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Beating the Browns ISNT a big deal, but how wentz beat them was HUGE!
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It’s rare that we see a talented mobile QB not feel the need to run in his debut. I was Shocked at how good Wentz looked from the pocket.
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Wentz didn’t have to run to be successfull
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We didn’t have to I roll out Wentz and get him outside the pocket like the Cowboys had to do with Dak all game long
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And Wentz used our much maligned WRs pretty well, where as most of Daks passes were to RB and TE, traditional safety blankets for young underdeveloped QBs… Dak Couldnt have half of the success Wentz had throwing to our WRs even tho DEz is better than any WR we have.
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Best of all, Wentz took some hard hits, and we never saw a hint of him getting rattked, we didn’t see any happy feet, we didn’t see him start taking off and no longer trust the pocket.
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if Wentz can already do THAT from the pocket, how much more dangerous will he be, when he keeps a zone read and gashes a defense for a big gain on the ground, which will free up our RBs a little more, Wentz can also make some plays rolling out
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What Wentz showed yesterday was way more impressive and advanced than anything Dak has shown during his hype train
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Shocked at how Capable Wentz looked at the line of scrimmage pre snap, and playing almost an entire game from inside the pocket.,, extremely promising debut, not because of his results against the Browns, but because of how advanced he looked in terms of a rookie playing from the pocket… Not to mention everyone trashed our weapons that Wentz has at his disposal
I wouldn’t trivialize beating the Browns. Still an NFL team. For Carson to look that ready with thst little “experience” … I am truly looking forward to when he does have experience.
I hear you but if I dontt qualify every post with “it’s only the browns” I’ll get 10 responses pointing out that it was “only” the Browns,.. So it’s my preemptive strike to captain Obvious
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I don’t care who we beat, I dont take any wins for granted in the NFL, especially now that we are a brand new team with a yoûng QB, so no matter how the Eagles were going to perform yesterday, it’s reasonable to expect that this team will improve and grow over the course of the season.
our time of possession yesterday was better than in any game of the past 3 seasons under chip
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Can’t wait TIL chips post game press Confrence tonight when he has the audacity to tell Niners fans that time of possession doesnt mean anything
Can’t wait until his run plays get slanted against time after time and he blames it on execution.
Not surprising considering when the trade went down, but Eric Rowe was inactive last night.
Who said Jalen Mills was soft? Sure, RGIII is more fragile than the Amazon boxes that the UPS guys toss from truck to truck, but you can only punish the QB that lines up across from you…
https://twitter.com/MaryKayCabot/status/775077138600833024
Wasn’t he just giving Wentz advice via the media last week about how the rookie will need to learn to protect himself? Lol
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In the words of the great Barry White, RG3 needs to “Practice what you preach)
Woah woah, give the Amazon box a bit of credit
Is Pryor a pick up in fantasy?
No the Browns suck, and he will loose touches once Gordon returns. Gordon is an interesting option against bad defences once he is back but there should be no scenario where you think Pryor is a good option to start.
Mike Wallace is only owned 25% and a worthwhile pick up, Phillip Dorset and Tajae Sharp are interesting options as well.
I play in deep very tough leagues. Pryor is on my radar he really did look like our DBs dad at times. I would still leave him out there even in these deep leagues right now.
I will certainly have claims in on Wallace (if he is there…Baltimore so people probably knew about him). Tajae was drafted in all my leagues (I have a few shares).
yeah i have wallace on the bench, problem is leage is deep in 15pt WRs, not deep with 15 pt. running backs.
What I meant to say is that it is really hard to pick anyone good up. Lots of unknowns on most rosters.
I had Barnridge for a solid zero points yesterday per Gronk being out. Hes supposed to be a decent TE so unless its a deep bench pu in a 12 team league, no way
yeah me too. But RGIII on IR so i think McCown will toss to Barnage, he did last year.
No
Does McCown throw deep?
This is a great throw, but you’ll notice the wobble on the spiral that the beats were noting in training camp. Just something to keep an eye on (not like it didnt work in this case).
http://www.nfl.com/videos/nfl-game-highlights/0ap3000000699291/Carson-Wentz-throws-to-Nelson-Agholor-for-35-yard-TD
Meh. Does anyone think that a “perfect spiral” makes for a better quarterback? So many greats were much more wobbly than that.
Helps in wind and cold weather I think? Always seemed like Brady, who never had a cannon, operates in New England in the late season and post season on mechanics alone
I plead total ignorance about whether that perfect spiral matters beyond aesthetics, but thought it was useful to point out (and his TD throw to Matthews didn’t look like this).
I think he can throw harder, he wanted to drop it in the right spot.
So do deflated balls
Peyton Manning had a wobble in his throw and he turned out alright. Not that I’m comparing Wentz to Manning, just pointing out that someone with a wobble in their throw can be successful.
Talking Cowboys for a minute, watching the game I came away very happy not just because the Cowboys lost, but also because their 2 rookies who started looked fairly pedestrian. Ezekiel Elliot did nothing that explains why he deserved to be the 4th overall pick, and Dak Prescott looked pedestrian as well. A huge % of his passes were short to intermediate throws to Cole Beasley and Witten, and that let them move down the field a bunch and get first downs, but the gameplan seemed to be to give him shorter, less risky throws to guys who know how to get open quickly. They didn’t really give him shots down the field aside from the one that Dez dropped in the end zone.
Prescott might end up being good but he was really babied in his opener. It was a sort of Alex Smith performance, everything short and trying to be efficient in getting first downs but ultimately struggling to get it in the end zone.
Soooooo… Lots to be happy about there, because I’d be pissed if they lucked into Romo’s successor in the 4th round. Not scared by Zeke or Prescott.
it’s tough to sell a running game when your QB can’t throw deep
Maybe they were calling it safe for his first game? He seemed to throw the deep ball well during the preseason.
I wonder if our reaction to the Prescott preseason hype is how the other NFC East teams felt about 27-2 in 2013. They must have been elated when Foles backpedaled back to Earth.
We’ll see. Hard to say if it was just a conservative game plan (which but for a couple drops probably would have been enough), or a permanent limitation with Prescott. He certainly seems very elusive in the pocket, and not easy to bring down, and can get the ball out pretty quick. It wasn’t dominating, but it wasn’t inept either.
He did seem to make bad decisions with guys in his face — though he may have just been throwing the ball away. I don’t remember him hitting guys in the face of getting tackled, especially in the second half — he seemed less accurate then.
We can hope, but he sure looks better than last year’s backup QBs, that’s for sure.
I assume the Giants were loading the box (which could explain Zeke’s numbers) and daring Dak to beat them deep, which they didn’t try much. We’ll see how long it takes to let Prescott throw deep — if he’s successful, that could open up a lot more for them. But as long as the Dak to Dez deep threat isn’t really there, I’m sure they will be easier to play.
Dammit:
https://twitter.com/Tim_McManus/status/775381081415675904
From the article:
Eagles tight end Zach Ertz suffered a first-rib displacement near his left shoulder against the Cleveland Browns on Sunday and is week-to-week, coach Doug Pederson said Monday.
“The rib has displaced itself underneath the collarbone, but it’s not a fracture or a broken bone,” Pederson said.
Pederson said Ertz will probably have to be cleared medically before he plays again.
Could be worse, Burton coming back will help a lot.
i think Burton might be a better pass catcher, probably isn’t a good a blocker,
Yeah, but I want to see them lined up together.
Pederson listed both Ertz and Leodis as week to week
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Hope this trend doesmt continue where Everytime we trade away a corner, a CB we are counting on gets hurt right away
Ertz hurts!
Yeah, I know. Hard to believe, but my mother’s maiden name is Ertz. We don’t know if we are related to Zack, but my cousin is a QB for K State:
http://www.kstatesports.com/sport/m-footbl/2015/roster/5589bfc7e4b09d6fde8f3a62
And Pryor clearly pushed off on the sick catch he made.. they wudve flagged all his hand checking if our DB did a fraction of that .. trying to see whom our db was on ghat but his covrrage was spot on
It was Nolan I believe.
Playërs talk Wentz
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Jason Peters: “I knew he was a good QB, a starter. When Bradford got traded, I knew Carson could step up and make plays for us ”
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Joe Thomas: “im no good on evaluating QBs (neither is anyone working for the browns) all I can say is that it didn’t seem like he played like a rookie QB. He was standing back there even when he had pressure in his face, getting hit and throwing the ball on target and moving the ball all over the field. I can tell you he was pretty Impressive”
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Terrelle Pryor: “That kid is going to be a baller”
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Joe Haden: “he did a really good job. He was more advanced than I expected him to be. he is a good QB… He stands in the pocket and is able to make all the throws, very patient and does not take off running all the time. I was expecting When his first read WASNT there he would be taking off running.but he did a really good job when his first read WASNT there, looking for the second read. He is really elusive back there and he did a good job of being patient and reading coverage.
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Hugh jackson was stingy with his Wentz praise, to no surprise.
This is troubling, because it isn’t like we are so deep we can’t find enough spots to use guys…
https://twitter.com/GeoffMosherNFL/status/775380600467447812
not neccessarily… You have to take a LB off the field when you go to nickel, so as long as Bradham and Hicks play well in Nickel, what does it matter if Kendricks isn’t in our Nickel package?
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If Kendricks plays well. And Bradham struggles, im sure they will make the switch if need be..
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As long as our nickel LB play well, who cares which of the 3 comes off the field? If you have three solid starting LBs, this is something everyone deals with
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Not to mention the fact that it’s a very long season, and not many would confidently assume that both Bradham and Hicks will be available for all 16 games.,
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Bradham is no scub, and Jordan is a special yoûng playmaker, so I don’t see this as a Grand indictment of Kemdricks. Now if Schwartz decides to play Najee Goode in Nickel while Kendricks sits on the bench, that would be pretty DAMNING, but we aren’t there yet
The fact that coaches only put Kendricks on the field when they are forced by the situation is troubling, at least to me.
Kendricks has been downgraded from a potential super star, to a playmaker, to a key cog, to an effective option, to better than the guys whose contract ink is still wet on obvious run downs.
once again we got the wrong brother.
One of the Phillies core operating principles.
“Forced by the situation” is how you define a base defense? Really?
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You do realize we could easily start Tulloch at MLB in our base, move Hicks into Kendricks spot, and leave Bradham at SAM?
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Najee Goode had a nice summer, schwartz trust tulloch for running downs.
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Chip extended Kendricks, he is coming off a down year, we have a regime change, a new DC and Kendricks sat out most of the preseason, we have 5 experienced LB’ers so NO, we aren’t Forced to play Kendricks. No secret that last year was not good for Kendricks, and this was only the first game of the season..not to mention starters all have durability concerns
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I don’t really dont give a shit about the names on the back of the jersey as long as we have 3 LB playing well in our base package, and 2 LB playing well in our Nickel, and so far it looks like we should easily have the best group of LB in the division…. Kemdricks will have plenty of Chances to sink or swim, but feel free to pretend the Sky is falling at LB
“This is troubling” equals “the [s]ky is falling” might be a little hyperbolic, you think? I appreciate your permission to express my concern, however.
There are plenty of warning signs that Kendricks is in the same boat from which Rowe recently was cast. The past two seasons, preseason, comments from coaches. This is just the latest.
I am sharing a tweet that I found interesting. If you “really don’t give a shit about the names on the back of the jersey[s]” feel free to scroll past it. No offense will be taken.
I thought I saw Bradham missing some tackles out there, but I wasn’t sure who it was so I’ll wait for Tommy’s detailed thread for confirmation (or not)
RG3 on IR w/ broken scapula
Damn. Guy can’t catch a break. I hate to see an interesting player go down.
just sucks we already traded all our crappy qbs
Actually, I think we have one left.
Actually I think he did catch a break.
Ba Dum Tish.
RG3 is out for the season.
See, Cleveland, I told you, analytics SUX!
Probably recallable IR
I think they changed the rule so that you don’t have to designate them as possible to return, you just can return one player who has been placed on IR.
They have a legitimate chance to tie the Lions 0-16 record. They better pray that a franchise QB is available in the draft next year.
Not that I’m wishing injury on anybody, but wouldn’t it be cool if the Eagles sent 16 QBs to the IR this season?
I can imagine that is Schwartzie’s gameplan every week
Pretty tough guy, staying in those few series with a broken shoulder.
Assuming McCown is the better QB, maybe the Browns will actually play better against the other NFC East teams this season…
How the hell do you break your scapula?!?! Any details as to 2which part?
Apparently by running out of bounds and not looking to see if a defender was in your path, and running your chest right into his helmet or shoulder.
Coracoid
Thanks, literally the only place I could think of it possibly breaking.
Bloody impressive:
@fduffy3: Shot 4 – Ridiculous for QB’s 1st start. Reads blitz, resets protection, attacks man coverage, 1st down. #Eagles https://t.co/uH3Kq5EE7t
Also the block by Kelce!
This brings up something I was wondering about: When did the Browns shift their team color from orange to peach?
They noticed the Bucks had stopped using the worst team kit color in the NFL and decided they wanted to corner that market as well as being the worst team in the NFL?
They “updated” their orange color last year, I do believe.
3-13 doesn’t get you on TV much so we probably just didn’t notice.
What do you do if you have an erection lasting more than 24 hours? Asking for a friend.
All board the Wentz wagon. There is room for all.
I bought these train tickets even before he was shooting that ‘can’t miss the garbage bin’ video!!!
so is the debate over as to who is more important, Brady or Belicheat?
Yes, it’s been conclusively proved by this one game. In other news, we have a franchise QB and Pederson is a better coach than both Chip and AR.
it was a pretty huge experiment. On the road, without Brady and Gronk.
I can’t run 5,000 scenarios, so I can only comment on the short life spans/playing careers they have which are themselves SSS, so what I can’t comment or draw conclusions? that’s no fun.
But yes I agree with your last sentence. Well said.
It’s all good. I was being too sarcastic there.
Surely that has only been a serious question in your backyard. Brady has been very good, but so has Brees, Rodgers, Roethlisberger and Wilson. Newton and Palmer have been very good of late. All of those guys are serious contenders for SB rings, most of them have played in the SB, but only one has had a string of success that is the envy of the league. Only a handful of neutral observers will argue that Brady is the difference, that he is the greatest ever, that he shits golden turds, etc. There really is no debate.
oh you should visit because all of those things are said. I really think my neighbors think it’s 100% that Brady is the GOAT. They just think both Brady and Belicheck are GOAT.
I do get that my neighbors are not neutral.
They went 11-5 with Matt Cassel. They were not going to win the SB without Brady, but they can still win games.
Teams can with the SB with an incredible defense and a steady unspectacular QB, but Belichick hasn’t been building all that incredible defenses since he doesn’t need to. They just need to be good. So a Brady injury may still sink them — just not in the regular season.
‘Tis like asking what makes the local garbage dump most foul – the rotting food and mob-disposed corpses or the fecal sludge secreted in a dark corner for off the books payments.
It depends on the given day but, really, it is an academic question because they work in unison.
There is no debate. It’s Brady. Best overall QB ever and doing stuff at an age that is staggering.
Maybe age finally catches up with him but he is supposedly been monastic yet again in his training reignmen. Plus he is a guy who has always internalized external perceived slights and mistreatment to drive & motivate him.
I’d be stunned if Brady doesn’t come out of the gate very strong. Only question to me is how does he hold us into Jan and in cold weather.
I think you spelled Belicheck wrong.
Brady’s arm is shot. He had several games last year with a noodle arm. Their offense at this point is mostly dink and dunk with some seam throws to Groom.
I’m not saying Brady is done, he is just not nearly the same player he was 2 or 3 years ago.
Dougie:
” I think the hard thing for any play caller is to stay patient with the run game. You maybe abandon it too soon when things aren’t going so well. If you keep throwing mud against the wall, eventually something’s going to stick. You’ve got to keep hammering away, chiseling away.”
Is this heaven?
it is when you have ryan mathews, not when you have DM29
I love Dougie. He gets it!! Andy, he gets it!!!
Dallas sucks.
Most overlooked but awesome play of the game yesterday: Connor Barwin beating Joe Thomas 1 on 1 for the sack. Not a play that changed the game, but was pretty awesome anyhow.
It was a beautiful play. On another note it is amazing how many FF BG creates.
Anyone noticing how the media is trying its best to pump up Prescott? I thought he played OK but really nothing worth writing about. No real deep throws, just short passes to Beasley and Witten.
yeah I find that to be an interesting top story for a while at NFL.com. something about great poise or some such. But I guess you have to cater to that market. Cowboys fans are like this huge market, and you know they will all jump ship on this season the moment they think they won’t make the playoffs. So it’s in the NFL’s best interest to fluff the hell out of that team every single year.
Yeah, in general the league is going to try to prop up/develop young stars. It’s in their interest to have these stories. And, honestly, as a fan I appreciate the idea of this guy coming in and maybe stealing Romo’s job. It’s compelling. Not as fun as him sucking and sending the Cowboys to 2-14, but still…
There seems to be a contingent that misses the old “America’s Team”. I am not a Prescott fan, but his team should have beaten a NY team that looked to have a better defense than Dallas. Cowboy fans all over are dying to find the next Roger Staubach.
The “should have beat” story is a media creation. They would have been at a 65-yard FG with 8 seconds and no TOs if he steps out of bounds. Odds of getting another completion for 10+ and out of bounds then hitting a 55 yard FG in 8 seconds is still slim.
Staying in was a boneheaded move that moved them from slim chance to none.
My conclusion was not simply based on that final drive. The Giants have a SB QB and two exceptional receivers, and they were going against a so-so defense. They have the better defense, or I should amend that to I expected to see a stronger defense. I didn’t check w/ any media insiders or analysts or “experts”. My opinion after watching most of that game, was that if Romo had started, Dallas would have won by a wider margin than the Eagles did. I am not a Cowboy lover and I was not defending Prescott! That game was close, I thought, because of a putrid performance by NY.
This is from ESPN.
“Prescott managed to finish without taking a sack or giving the ball away and was impacted by several drops, but his overall performance was nothing spectacular.”
So, no.
I saw it a few different places.
http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap3000000700943/article/cowboys-qb-dak-prescott-exemplifies-poise-in-nfl-debut
http://walterfootball.com/nflreview.php
Seems kinda silly. What was he, 1/4 in the red zone?
Beau Allen is awesome.
That is all.
Bears open as 3 point favorites
Sweet, more easy money from Vegas. I made a killing yesterday.
Doug Kyed
@DougKyed
12m12 minutes ago
Former Patriots WR Aaron Dobson recently worked out for the Eagles, per source.
Interesting news. Wonder who’ll get cut if they sign him.
Likely just updating ready list. If they were going to cut someone and add him, I’d guess it would be Treggs or one of the 11 OL on the roster.
Completely forgot about him.
Lane suspension? we are super heavy at OL currently, but i guess the Eagles want it that way until they get some Lane confirmation.
Maybe? The situation with Lane is getting out of hand at this point. Ridiculous.
I would hope Huff, but it won’t happen and there are more then likely some more logical cuts to make.
Only way that happens is if they feel as though he is a significant upgrade over Huff in which he isnt.
Interesting cause I figured they would be looking for a TE with the Ertz news…
I didn’t watch any of the Bears game but apparently Cutler was abused behind a terrible O-Line. Hopefully the second half DLine comes to play Monday. Bears do not really scare me and I am surprised as they start out as the favorites.
Their WRs going deep scare me, especially if Mckelvin is out and Mills is in his place.
Honestly, I wish we had Rowe. This feels like the Boykin trade after Shepherd got hurt.
Wish we had him as well. With that said we can’t fully judge it until we see what the 4th or 3rd round pick nets.
The spread is -3, which is home field standard. Basically, it’s even money.
I’m insulted by that line.
My best guess is that Eagles hope to find out about Lane’s suspension this week in order to promote CJ Smith to the roster. Rather than cutting someone else in order to do so!
The NFL is such a joke.
Chip Kelly’s back to using his “Expanded” playbook — compared to the “skinny” playbook he used in 2015 (below):
http://cdn.phillymag.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/USATSI_9523307_168380503_lowres-e1473717537313.jpg
http://www.crossingbroad.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/Voila_Capture-2015-09-15_09-11-30_AM.jpg
Skins Pitt game worth watching, division rival and week 3 opponent.
Edit: oooo and chip kelly in the late game, beautiful.
Yeah, I don’t think I’ll make it all the way through the late one.
It will go fast.
I might not even make it to the kickoff of the late one.
Nice to see the guy we cut continue to be a huge weapon.
Contract year, he will be hell bent on getting one last big contract.
I thought you were going to say we have a chance to get him back next year.
Only if we are the highest bidder. DeSean seems to be all about the $.
We all are
Well we won’t have to outbid SF, so down to 30 competitors.
If Chip still works there, that is…
You can also remove any team with a #1 receiver playing under a big contract. DeSean couldn’t stand being a #2 in money or depth chart.
Honestly, I don’t think we will be at a point where we will be looking for an expensive WR in the home stretch of his career, even if he has a few good years left.
I’d imagine we wouldn’t have the salary cap space anyway.
Shame we never saw them both play for CK
Foles was unbelievable with his deep ball that first year without Maclin. If Cooper was relegated to the bench, Foles would have broke every Eagle QB record with Maclin and Jackson.
I wonder what would have happened if Maclin did not get injured that year. That offence with a healthy OL playing at an elite level could have been dominant with Maclin and Jackson working together.
……
wonder how many good years he has left, he’s already 29 and is heavily reliant on speed. He’s always had good hands though.
This division will have to go through Washington I’m afraid.
no way
Yes. They’re D is underrated and their offense is better than ours.
I don’t agree with that. We’re better at RB and on the OL. They’re better at WR. TE is a wash. Cousins is more established but I think Wentz is ultimately better.
Reed is the best TE in the game. Behind Gronk that is.
There’s a very large gap between Gronk and the next guy, and a very small gap between 2, 3, etc.
Very good receiving TE. Can’t block worth a damn. While he hasn’t missed an inordinate total number of games, has a concerning history of concussions.
Wentz can be ultimately better, but Cousins is right now.
It’s hard to make a definitive comparison between our offenses. Our defense is better than theirs. Our ST is much much better. Who was the last team with a winning record they’ve beaten?
You have to go back two years ago. I agree with you, the Redskins don’t impress me at all.
Watching the game now, second quarter is almost over and WAS still doesn’t have a TD. What offense?
Oops, thought they had scored 60 points. My eyesight is not great today. 😉
You are correct that their D is underrated and that their I is currently better then ours.
Edit: I know it’s against the Steelers and only one game, but maybe their D isn’t really that underrated.
I’m curious to see if that can change as Wentz and DGB grow week to week. This I had a lot of room to grow, and you cannot deny Wentz is a remarkably fast learner.
I think our D is better then theirs.
Keep in mind this is a team that didn’t best a winning team once last season.
Eh, Pittsburgh is way overrated.
No, Pitt. Is one of the elite teams in this league. If Big Ben plays every game this year they have the ability to make it to the big one.
It lightens my heart, to see a division rival’s coach be even more stubbornly stupid about challenges and timeouts than AR. Thank you, Jay Gruden, thank you.
Roethlisbugger doing a Wentz impression there.
IF, big IF, but if Wentz and Dak do pan out with Cousins progressing the NFCE could possibly be a tough division in a few years.
I’m not buying Cousins as a good QB.
LOL at Cousins “progressing”. Did you see that terrible INT he just floated right into Shazier’s hands? The guy doesn’t have the tools to be a top starter and still makes questionable decisions as well. I was very happy when Washington gave him that huge extension. They basically made the mistake the Eagles would have made if they’d extended Foles.
I thought they just franchised him
Right you are. For some reason I thought the deal got done. Too bad as he’s not a very good QB and I think that will be revealed this year before they can tie up their cap by extending him.
He hasn’t beaten a team with a winning record in well over a year.
Lol, I said this before I got to really tune into the game.
Somewhere Nolan Carroll is having nightmares of #84…
Big Ben reminds me so much of Wentz..
So does Antonio Brown of Nelson Agholor.
Big Ben will be lucky if he has a career as good as Wentz’s.
In all seriousness, I think it’s a very apt comparison. Though hopefully Wentz proves to be a better person than Roethlisberger.
My god cousins sucks
He’s a classic example of a dead end QB – not good enough to win big with, but not bad enough to justify getting rid of. If you can’t have division opponents who are flat out incompetent at getting a QB a la the Browns, Cousins is exactly the kind of QB you want them to settle on.
like a Sam Bradford type guy.
New thread
http://www.philadelphiaeagles.com/videos/videos/Highlights_Every_Carson_Wentz_Throw_From_Week_1/e17fa21e-73c0-42f7-aec1-81e22cf81ad5
[…] to the corner. Jackpot! In some ways, that’s how Sunday felt. Rookie QB looks like a stud. Rookie coach has a good game. OL blocks well. WRs make plays. Defense plays lights out. No major injuries. Quite a way to start […]