Game Preview – SF at PHI

For the third week in a row, the Eagles are playing in the Game of the Year. This time it is a rematch of last year’s NFC title game. As Nick Sirianni loves to point out, these are the 2023 teams, not the 2022 versions. So this game shouldn’t really have anything to do with last year’s playoff showdown.

I’m not sure the Niners buy that. They spent the whole offseason talking about the game. It sure feels like they are desperate to show the world they can beat the Eagles. That could help them to play with urgency. Or it could put extra pressure on them and lead to a sloppy performance.

The Eagles want to win this game in a big way as well. They want to show SF that last year wasn’t a fluke. Still, no matter what happens, it won’t change last year’s beatdown. That’s in the history books.

When we talk about this year’s teams, both have outstanding offenses. SF has an outstanding defense. The Eagles defense is erratic. That’s probably why the Niners are favored in this game. They don’t really have any obvious weaknesses. They did have a 3-game losing streak, but injuries were a key part of that. SF is healthy now and coming off three straight wins by 13 or more points.

They’re legit.

The one area where the Niners are vulnerable is pass protection. Trent Williams is a stud LT. The rest of the OL is middle of the pack. They do a good job in Kyle Shanahan’s system. The Eagles pour a ton of resources into the OL and then find a solution at RB. SF has an elite RB and finds solutions on the OL. It will be interesting to see which of those strategies prevails on Sunday.

Brock Purdy has been sacked 21 times this year. He is nothing like Allen/Mahomes when it comes to escaping pressure.

Let's talk about why the #Eagles pass rush can't finish plays with sacks.

Last week against the Chiefs, they pressured Patrick Mahomes on 44% of his drop backs, but only recorded 1 sack.

This week against Buffalo, they pressured Josh Allen on 35% of his drop backs and only… pic.twitter.com/LxDprKV7fw

— Shane Haff (@ShaneHaffNFL) November 30, 2023

The Eagles pass rush got into the backfield the past two weeks, but couldn’t finish plays. This week should be different. Purdy has good pocket mobility, but he’ll seem like a statue after the previous two games. The Eagles need to pressure him, hit him and sack him. SF is a team you want getting off schedule. You want them in known passing situations. They are much more effective when they run play-action passes and you have to honor the run.

The player who does scare me is Christian McCaffrey. Buffalo RBs were 9-75 as receivers last week and they dropped a long TD pass or those numbers could have been worse. They did a great job of having RBs run out wide with a WR coming inside. That provided a natural pick and the Eagles LBs failed to keep up on those plays. The Eagles don’t have a LB who matches up well with CMC. Sydney Brown or Reed Blankenship would probably make the most sense, but you don’t want a safety focusing on a RB all game long.

Christian Elliss will take the place of Zach Cunningham as a starting LB. Elliss will be better prepared this week, but this doesn’t seem like a good matchup for him. Shanahan is one of the most creative play-callers in the league. He’ll do all kinds of crazy things to get Elliss off-balance and confused.

Sean Desai did a great job of getting his back seven ready for Miami back in Week 7. Mike McDaniel runs a similar system to Shanahan so that game should boost the confidence of the Eagles defense. The flip side is that Shanahan can study what they did and figure out how to counter it.

The Eagles offense needs a complete game from Jalen Hurts. He started slow the last two games and that’s a key reason they trailed by 10 at halftime in both. You don’t want to fall behind the Niners by 10. Brian Johnson needs to figure out how to get his QB off to a good start. This might be a good week to run D’Andre Swift early. He’s gotten the offense going in the second half. Try that earlier.

Lane Johnson will play. Having him back vs Nick Bosa is huge. Dallas Goedert wants to play, but it sounds like the team may wait one more week. Fletcher Cox is going to try to play. We’ll see how he feels on Sunday. The biggest loss for this game is Zach Cunningham.

I would love to see an Eagles blowout, but this sure feels like another game that will be a back and forth affair. The Eagles have played in those games all year and are comfortable with pressure situations. SF hasn’t won a close game all year. They have either blown people out or lost. They had multiple 10-point leads vs the Rams before a last second FG cut the final score to 30-23. Don’t be fooled by that score.

If the Eagles DL comes up big, they’ll win this game. If the Niners neutralize them via scheme and block well, SF could end up happy.

_