Something Is Off

Tough. Detailed. Together. Normally that would be the core values for Nick Sirianni’s Eagles. This year I would switch that to three things the Eagles are not. Not tough. Not detailed. Not together.

One of the obvious ways you judge toughness is the run game. The Eagles are 25th in rushing and 21st in run defense. The rushing would be even worse if not boosted by Jalen Hurts running. Running and stopping the run is about winning the LOS. That means the OL blocks well and the DL blows up blocks. You need skill players to do their part with blocking. You need LBs and DBs to come down and play in traffic, clogging lanes and making tackles. The Eagles just aren’t good enough at running or stopping the run right now.

Details. This is a word used by coaches in every sport. They want players to pay attention to details. Focus on the little things and some of the big things will take care of themselves. Get lined up correctly. Don’t jump offside on fourth down. Don’t false start. Run the correct route. Block the correct defender. Take a good angle to the ball. Use proper form when tackling. From the opening spit of the season, this team has made way too many dumb mistakes. Winning in the NFL is hard. It is even harder when you constantly shoot yourself in the foot.

This team had a special togetherness last year. This year feels different. Maybe it is just the odd start on offense over the first month. Maybe this is a result of winning the Super Bowl. Who is getting commercials and who isn’t? Who finished higher in the Top 100? And on and on. I don’t think there are any crazy issues, but there can still be a huge difference in a team where everyone is working together and one where some guys are thinking more about Me than We. It doesn’t take much to lose an edge.

Let’s remember the Eagles are 4-1, despite having played a very tough schedule. The team is frustrating to us because they aren’t playing up to their talent level. This isn’t some crappy team treading in mediocrity. The Eagles are a talented, but flawed team. If they can fix the flaws, they can be a title contender. The talent is still there.

But only if the flaws get fixed.

I have faith in Nick Sirianni for a couple of reasons. First, he’s a good teacher. He and his staff have done a good job with focusing on details over the years. The players have generally responded well and played smart. Sirianni has the potential to get this fixed. Second, Sirianni has had a good feel for pushing the right buttons with his teams. He usually has a good mixture of patience and urgency. You don’t want to panic any time something goes wrong. Still, you do need to have a sense of urgency when you do address problems.

As for the players, they had something special last year. There are a lot of new faces, but plenty of key guys remain.

I’m told Jalen Hurts, A.J. Brown, and Saquon Barkley had a long, positive conversation today. Lasted a couple hours.

— Jimmy Kempski (@JimmyKempski) October 6, 2025

If these three guys can all get on the same page and figure out the right messaging for the rest of the offense/team, that would be great. It always makes you a bit nervous when players need special meetings, but maybe this was needed. When these guys are at their best, the Eagles are a special team. I’m for anything that can get them back to playing like stars on a consistent basis.

We have seen hints. The Eagles outscored Dallas 24-13 after falling behind early. They led KC 20-10 before allowing a late TD. They dominated the second half of the Rams game, finishing on a 26-0 run. The Eagles led Tampa 24-3 at one point. They led Denver 17-3 in the fourth quarter on Sunday. This team has flashed. They lack consistency and don’t finish the way they need to.

I can’t stress enough that the odd start has been under some tough circumstances.

Do people realize how impressive it is to be 4-1 with the #1 hardest schedule in football?

According to ESPN’s Football Power Index, the Eagles have faced the toughest schedule in the NFL through 5 weeks and yet have only lost once.

For context:
– No other team in the top 7… pic.twitter.com/n5qBxFVvZF

— Fly Eagles Fly Bets (@Fly_EaglesBets) October 6, 2025

The Eagles schedule gets easier in the next three weeks.

at Giants
at Vikings
Giants

Then comes the bye. If the Eagles can win the games they should and get to the bye, they could be 7-1 and could get time to rest and heal up. That would help them be ready for the stretch run. We could be watching a very different Eagles team at that point.

That only happens if the team lives up to the core values that Sirianni has preached about over and over.

Tough. Detailed. Together.

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Bad Ending

The Eagles led 10-3 at halftime. They led 17-3 after three quarters. They lost 21-17. Ugh. What a frustrating loss. The Eagles aren’t a team that generally blows leads. They let Tampa come back part of the way last week, but the Eagles made the critical plays and won. On Sunday the Eagles made critical mistakes and lost.

Ugh.

Let’s start with a big picture view for a minute. The Eagles just went through a really challenging start to the season. I hoped they would come out at least 3-2. The Eagles get out with a record of 4-1. That’s good and keeps them atop the NFC East and at the top of the NFC. The glass half-empty take is that the Eagles are lucky to be 4-1 and have yet to play a complete game.

There is no question that the Eagles are not playing to the level anyone expected (fans, media, or themselves). Everyone is frustrated. The talent is there, the execution is not. There are certainly times when the coaching needs to be better. You are foolish if you think Kevin Patullo is the reason for the inconsistent start. There are a lot of people to blame. It is convenient to choose the new OC to focus on, but if you are watching the games closely you can see a variety of mistakes.

An illegal shift penalty wiped out a big gain that could have set up the Eagles to re-take the lead. Zack Baun was called for unnecessary roughness when he dove on a player who had just gone down. That came on third down and moved the sticks. There was RPO confusion and Tyler Steen went downfield on a pass and that drew a flag. Quinyon Mitchell gave up several completions to Courtland Sutton, many coming in the fourth quarter. Jalen Hurts and AJ Brown failed to connect on what should have been a long TD. That would have put the Eagles up 21. STs failed to help with field position for most of the game.

Some fans will say to forget all that and focus on Saquon Barkley only having six carries. The Eagles led the NFL in percentage of rushing plays coming in. They tried to be more aggressive with passing today. Clearly Barkley needs more carries. But you aren’t going to have perfect balance very often. Penalties put the offense in some passing situations. When the coaches run the ball in those situations people complain that’s too conservative.

If the Eagles got a PI call on the next-to-last play, this could be a very different story. Dallas Goedert was interfered with inside the 5-yard line. No call. The Eagles almost completed the final pass, but it fell to the ground. It would have been very different if the final play was a closer situation where you could run an actualy play. The Eagles didn’t get the call and did get the loss.

Denver is a good team. They have a really good defense. You have to keep that in mind when evaluating this game. That doesn’t excuse the Eagles mistakes, but it helps to understand some of what happened.

Nick Sirianni said after the game that pre-snap penalties are on him. He’s not doing a good enough job preparing his players and getting them to focus on details. I totally agree. Something is off with the Eagles. Maybe there is a Super Bowl hangover. Maybe they are struggling with having every opponent live and die against them. Whatever it is, Sirianni needs to figure out the problem and find a solution.

Losing is going to happen. The NFL has too much talent for teams to go undefeated. It is concerning that this team has played five games and continues to make sloppy mistakes. That will cost them long term if not fixed.

This is a short week, with a game against the Giants on Thursday night. I like this scenario. You need to learn from a loss like this, but dwelling on it wouldn’t be good. And it would be tough to get past the loss in a town like Philly with so much Eagles coverage.

The last undefeated team has not won the Super Bowl since Peyton Manning and the 2006 Colts. https://t.co/WR4MHQZzaS

— Football Perspective (@fbgchase) October 5, 2025

You never want to lose, but that stat is interesting. The Eagles goals are still right in front of them. They need to learn from this game. Then it is onto the Giants.

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