Posted October 25th, 2024 | 2 Comments »The Eagles have won 3 of 4 games. The last two victories came over the Browns and Giants, two of the worst teams in the league. The Eagles are 4-2 and seem to be headed in the right direction, but it would help to see them tested. We’ll get that on Sunday.
The Bengals:
- Have won 3 of their past 4 games
- They have a 2-game win streak (also NYG and CLE)
- Have an elite QB who is playing at a high level
- Have a strong group of receivers, including one special player (Ja’Marr Chase)
- Have scored 21 or more points in 5 of 7 games this season
- Have a defense that has only allowed 21 total points over the past 2 weeks
Cincy isn’t a great team. They started 1-4, but that includes losses to the Chiefs and Ravens, two of the best teams in the league. They do have some star players and they have been good in recent years. Their last year with a losing record is 2020.
The Eagles need to be challenged. The Packers were the best test of the year. There were close games against the Falcons, Saints and Browns, but those had more to do with sloppy play by the Eagles than strong competition. Green Bay is 5-2. They have a good coach and star QB. They have talented players. The Eagles out-played them and won 34-29 in the opener.
A lot has changed since the opener so it will be good to see how the Eagles do in another good test, especially for the defense. Vic Fangio’s group has played well in 3 of the past 4 games and seems to be on the rise. They stumbled against Tampa. Baker Mayfield torched them with quick throws that negated the pass rush and kept the chains moving.
Fangio has been around a long time. He knows how to adjust and find solutions. But those solutions are a lot easier to come up with when going against broken QBs like Deshaun Watson and Daniel Jones. Joe Burrow is a whole other story.
It will be interesting to see if the revamped secondary can slow down Burrow and Chase. It will be interesting to see if the pass rush can get to Burrow and/or pressure him on a regular basis. I don’t expect the Eagles to shut down the Bengals the way they did the Browns or Giants. The defense needs to come up with some key stops. It would be great if the defense could come up with some takeaways. Cincy has turnovers in 5 of 7 games so they are vulnerable in that area.
The Eagles offense has to score TDs. This isn’t a game where you are likely to kick FGs and win. The Eagles scored 2 TDs in against the Saints, Bucs and Browns. They scored 4 last week. They are going to need more of that to beat the Bengals.
*****
Tyler Steen will be starting at RG. He played well last week and has looked good this season. Becton is more erratic, but has more dominant moments.
No Goedert isn’t ideal, but also not surprising. The Eagles have enough weapons to win without him. Still, life is a lot less easy when you go from an above average starter who can catch and block to a pair of young TEs, one who can catch and one who can block.
Overall the Eagles are pretty healthy. They will win or lose this game on performance, not the injured list. A win wouldn’t mean anything definitively, but would sure make everyone feel even better about this Eagles team.
Keep stacking those wins.
Dallas is all over the place. The Niners are beat up and struggling. The Vikings have lost two in a row. The Lions are the best team in the NFC, but things are wide open after that.
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Posted October 24th, 2024 | 1 Comment »If Will Shipley almost has the same number of carries as Jalen Hurts does completions, the game has either gone very right or very wrong. Luckily for Nick Sirianni and his Eagles, this game went very right.
The Eagles ran for 269 yards. The defense had 8 sacks and only allowed 119 total yards. This was the kind of game we’ve been waiting to see from the Eagles for a while. They haven’t won a game by 25 points since beating the Giants 38-7 in the playoffs following the 2022 season. It wasn’t a perfect performance of course, but this is the best game the Eagles have played in a long time. Some might argue that the Giants are a bad team, but good teams are supposed to dominate bad teams. And the Eagles did have a dominant performance.
COACHING
Nick Sirianni pushed the right buttons before and during the game. The Eagles didn’t score early, but they always had control of the game. There was a lot of negative talk about the team during the week. Sirianni kept his players focused and had them locked in for the game itself. There weren’t a lot of key strategic decisions during the game. The Eagles were 3 for 3 on 4th downs. All of them made sense.
Kellen Moore did some interesting things with the offense. Hurts only attempted 14 passes. The Eagles ran 45 times. This wasn’t just a case of handing the ball off and running simple plays. Moore got creative. The Eagles ran to the outside with Cam Jurgens as the lead blocker. They ran to the outside on a counter play. They ran from 11, 12 and even 22 personnel. 22 means a RB and a FB. The Eagles used under center runs very effectively.
The passing game was erratic and still leaves a bit to be desired. Luckily it wasn’t needed as the Eagles ran up and down the field.
Vic Fangio had a terrific gameplan. He played a lot of zone and forced the Giants to try to play small-ball. The front got good pressure. The back seven covered well and tackled well. Fangio used some creative blitzes. I never saw more than four rushers on a play. Fangio just kept them guessing as to which four rushers. He also used his front creatively. Seeing Brandon Graham covering a slot receiver made for a funny image. But the strategy worked. Playing base personnel confused Daniel Jones at times and helped the Eagles shut down the Giants offense.
OFFENSE
Jalen Hurts had a couple of key runs. He had a blitzer come free up the middle. I’m still shocked that Hurts got away from him and ran for a gain of 16. CB Deonte Banks had a chance to make the tackle down the field, but was loafing on the play and seemed to really tick off the Giants coaches. Hurts had a good run near the goal line. He got hit so hard that it stopped him dead in his tracks. Watching live I thought he fumbled the ball. Nope. He just took the hit and stopped.
Hurts was up and down as a passer. The highlight play was his 41-yard TD to AJ Brown on 4th and 3. Hurts stayed in the pocket and made a great throw down the field for the TD. Hurts failed to see open receivers on some other plays. This wasn’t his best decision-making.
Saquon Barkley was the star of the game, going 17-176-1 on the ground and 2-11 as a receiver. Barkley used his speed to break off long runs. He used his strength and power to move the chains. He had good runs outside and inside. He set the tone for the game on an early 3rd down when he caught a short pass and ran over a DB. Barkley didn’t get the 1st down, but he let the Giants know it was going to be a long, hard day.
Barkley had runs of 38, 41 and 55 yards. You could see what a truly special player he is. The Giants had no answer for him. Barkley sat out most of the 4th quarter or he could have posted some gaudy numbers. Kenny Gainwell had a good game, going 13-56. He had runs of 12 and 14 yards. Will Shipley was 8-15 on the ground. The Giants loaded the box and the Eagles had some backup OL in so there wasn’t much room to run.
AJ Brown went 5-89-1. He was outstanding. The Giants struggled to tackle him. The long TD was impressive. He ran by the CB and then had a subtle push-off to create more separation. DeVonta Smith had a quiet day, going 1 for -2 yards. He was open other times, but Hurts wasn’t seeing him or getting the ball out quickly enough. No other WR caught a pass. The receivers did block well.
The TEs were mainly blockers in this one. Jack Stoll had a good down block that sprung a RB. Grant Calcaterra did better than ususal, but still missed his block on the WR screen where Smitty was tackled for the loss.
The OL had a really good day. Fred Robinson had some terrific run blocks.
Fred can be quite the bully when he gets the chance. His pass blocking was up and down. There were some plays where he was outstanding. There were some plays when he got driven back to Hurts. The Giants have good edge rushers, but hopefully Fred can improve on this for the next few games.
Landon Dickerson had some terrific down blocks. He opened a couple of massive holes. Cam Jurgens had a good day as well. He lost some battles to Dexter Lawrence, but there is no shame in that.
Mekhi Becton left with a concussion and Tyler Steen replaced him. I thought Steen had a really good showing. He was outstanding on combo blocks. Lane Johnson had an excellent game as well.
DEFENSE
Just about everyone on the DL played well. Jordan Davis only got a handful of snaps because the Giants went into passing mode, but Davis was good against the run early on. Jalen Carter had 2 sacks and was regularly disruptive. Milton Williams got into the backfield a few times. Moro Ojomo just missed a sack. Thomas Booker had 3 tackles and played with relentless effort, as usual.
The edge rushers were even better. Josh Sweat had a sack and deflected a pass. The sack came when he beat a TE and OT to get to the QB. Bryce Huff played his best game as an Eagle. He had 2 tackles, a sack and 2 QB hits. He also blew up a running play. Nolan Smith was really good. He had a sack and 2 TFLs. Huff and Smith both created sacks for other players as well. Rookie Jalyx Hunt had his first NFL sack. He also knocked the ball out, but the Eagles couldn’t recover it.
The best part of the pass rush was watching them collapse the pocket. Jones was sacked 8 times. He was pressured a lot more than that. This was a really impressive perfomance by the whole group.
Nakobe Dean played his best game as a pro. He led the team with 11 tackles. He had 2 sacks and 4 QB hits. Dean tackled well. He also had a good game in coverage. Zack Baun had 6 tackles. He was solid in coverage. No big plays.
Cooper DeJean has made a real impact on the defense. He covers well and tackles well. DeJean plays fast and aggressive. He covers a lot of ground. His speed and athleticism has helped the middle of the defense.
Quinyon Mitchell had a good game. He had 3 tackles, closing to the ball quickly and making physical tackles. He almost picked off a downfield throw. It would have been a tough over-the-shoulder catch. Darius Slay played his best game of the year. He had 4 tackles, 2 TFL and a PD. That was the version of Slay this defense needs. He was fast and aggressive.
The safeties were somewhat quiet. Reed Blankenship had 4 tackles, including a couple of nice plays against the run. CJGJ played deep a lot and only had 1 tackle.
ST
Braden Mann averaged 52 yards per punt.
Cooper DeJean averaged 15 yards per punt return. His long PR went for 28. He has good speed and runs hard. He isn’t overly elusive, but will break tackles and doesn’t go down on his own.
Sydney Brown had a tackle in coverage. He knocked the crap out of a player on the way downfield. It was fun to watch him out there running around and hitting people.
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