What more can you say about this game ... Well, below is what I can say.
The Redskins are just a total joke and the ESPN commentators encapsulated that nicely. My favorites were when Gruden responded to Antwan Randle-El’s muffed punt by saying, “Lightning continues to strike.” Later Mike Tirico reacted to the Redskins fumbled snap on 4th and goal: “And that summarizes the Washington Redskins”
With several quick drop plays early, Mcnabb looked crisp at first, although he did rush the throw on the Eagles’ first failed third down conversion. I really thought Andy Reid scripted some good plays early. He got Westbrook on the field a lot before he got concussed, and the Eagles had a lot of good scripted plays designed to get the ball in the hands of the playmakers: Westbrook, Maclin, Jackson, but after the first couple series, things broke down.
On the whole, Donovan rushed way too many throws. Really a weak game by McNabb after the first six or eight throws. Over a third of McNabb’s passing yards were on the one TD throw to Jackson, and even that ball was a bit underthrown. Mcnabb also underthrew McCoy on the 3rd quarter swing pass that went for a loss, but they got a facemask on London Fletcher anyway. McNabb really has struggled with accuracy and he seems to be jittery when there’s a strong pass rush, not giving himself a chance to set up his feet and deliver the ball accurately. Right now not throwing intereceptions just isn’t enough.
I did love Andy's call of FB dive for Weaver on the 3rd and one situation midway though the first quarter. Let’s do more of this.
On Vick’s designed run for first down on 3rd and 2 in the fourth quarter, Leonard Weaver also made a great block to take out a DE, which enabled Herremans to pull and block for Vick at the second level. That Weaver block just is not made by Josh Parry or Thomas Tapeh (and don’t even ask me about Tony Hunt)
On defense, I liked the blitz packages, and Mikell played a great game both blitzing and tackling and holding down his assignments in the run game.
Witherspoon was on the field a whole lot and looked quite good, doing a lot of different things, and he definitely showed that he can blitz. McDermott blitzed withersppoon quite a bit. On the Babin sack in the 3rd, Witherspoon attacked the same gap as Babin enabling Babin to release from his man.
Even more impressive was Witherspoon's heads up play to come down with the batted ball to score a TD. This play also really showed the creativity of McDermott. On that Witherspoon TD, Babin lined up in 2 point stance over Patterson who lined up at LDE. Then Babin, Trent Cole, and backup tackle Dixon (all 322 pounds of him) dropped back into coverage which took away any checkdown plays over the middle. With only four rushers, I suppose it’s not really a blitz, but it was impressive and in created major confusion for the blocers who failed to drive the rushers back enough to give Campbell a throwing lane. With Bunkley, Witherspoon, Mikell and Patterson coming in, Mikell did a great job to take advantage of the confused redskins protection to get a hand on a ball that ultimately became a pick-6 for Spoon Jr. (as Eagellectual reader Dan the Student has taken to calling him).
On Witherspoon’s strip of Campbell, it was just a great overload call by McDermott, Witherspoon followed Mikell and Gocong (who basically lined up as a DT) in and there was no one to block him. The announcers talked about the simplicity of the Eagles blitz packages, but what I saw was a lot of mixing and matching personnel in new and interesting places, and it all seemed to work.
All those sacks were certainly fun. Great coverage on Bunkley’s late 3rd quarter sack. Really a coverage sack. Good blitz design early in 4th quarter to get Cole one on one with a TE. Fred Davis cannot handle Cole, come on now.
The Eagles run defense really was stout and that played a big role in the win. Patterson and Bunkley both seemed to be around the ball carrier whenever he went down, but Clinton Portis is a far cry from where he was a couple years ago.
Also, a great play by blitzing Sean Jones to bat a Campbell pass in the late 3rd. Jones disengaged from FB Sellers to chase Campbell, and Trent Cole did a great job of covering up Sellers when he released from Jones and went into a checkdown route. McDermott’s comfort, and success, using Trent Cole in coverage situations just further opens up the pass rush playbook.
Still you’d like to see the Defense hold a little better in the Red Zone (not counting the botched snap the Eagles had little to do with). Devin Thomas’s TD was inexcusable. I’m not sure whether it was Samuel’s or Mikell’s responsibility to hold down the back of the end zone, but one of them definitely needs to stay back there and not bite on the pump fake (a possible theory is that it was Mikell’s responsibility but he came up on the short throw pump fake b/c he didn’t trust Samuel to make a goal line tackle, but that’s just a theory).
This team’s inability to close out a game is a real concern. This was a real problem for last year’s team and seems likely to become one for this year’s team when. You’d like to see the defense just shut these guys down, but again, these problems must be pinned (like the tale on a DONkey) on the offense.
The second half made clear what the two big Jackson plays masked in the first half—the complete stagnation of our offense once Westbrook went out. The team had a ton of trouble establishing the run in the second half. McCoy looked like he was running OK, but the blocks just weren’t there. McCoy did, however, struggle in pass protection a couple times.
Overall, the pass blocking was not the disaster it was against the Raiders, but it still needs real work. Peters seemed to get beaten multiple times by athletic DE Andre Carter. Herremans seemed to have even more problems. He had a penalty in the pass game that almost gave Washington a safety, struggled to keep Hayneworth from collapsing the pocket (a tall order though), and on at least one running play—which went for a McCoy two-yard gain—Herremans failed to push his man out of the hole. Also, though, Jamaal Jackson needs to help Herremans out against a guy like Haynesworth when there’s no A-gap blitz. Would like to see better awareness from the veteran center.
The only real offensive bright spot that half was Maclin working to extend the play on the 3rd quarter third-down catch to move the sticks. Maclin did a nice job breaking off his route to come back away from the coverage when Mcnabb scrambled to his left. Maclin is definitely showing flashes of why he will, soon I hope, be a very nice NFL starter … and perhaps much more.
The offense will have a tough challenge next week against the New York Football Giants, who desperately want to avoid a three-game losing streak. On top of all that, it seems almost definite that Westbrook will miss this game (the signing of Saints practice squad rookie PJ Hill pretty much advertises this). It’s hard to see our offense sans B-West keeping the Giants D off-balance (or on the field), but maybe, just maybe, our D can keep us in this by making Eli Manning (is he the most overpaid American there is?—watch out former AIG execs!) throw three interceptions. He did it last week! All this is so much less frustrating thanks to the Phightins, though! Thank you Clifford Lee.
Thursday, October 29, 2009
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
Almost too disgusted to blog--Or the day the Eagles scored less than the Phillies
I can’t bear spending too much time on this blog entry, but as promised, here’s at least a weekly look-see at some of what went so dreadfully wrong.
I think it’s hard to get too upset with the defense. After all, they only gave up 13 points, but the inconsistency of the run defense was a bit disconcerting and our inability to cover tight ends is a real problem. On the, ultimately game-deciding, TD catch and run from Russell to Zach Miller, Trotter has taken a lot of heat for biting on the play fake and letting Miller get behind him. This criticism is fair, but I blame that TD on Samuels. Asante whiffed worse than Manny Ramsteroidirez on an inside fastball. Samuel had a chance to make the tackle and didn’t even get a piece of Miller. If Samuels even knocks him back a bit, Trotter makes that tackle.
As for the offense, I think you’ve got to put this game on the shoulders of the line. The pass protection was abysmal. That said, let’s give some blame to Mandy Reidinwheg and McNabb. The run-pass balance was unfathomable. It reminded me of the backyard games I played as a little kid in which the offense was allowed one run play for every possession. As for McNabb, well the best you can say is that he was inconsistent, looking a lot like the McNabb of a couple years ago when he came off that ACL injury. In the face of consistently bad protection he still held the ball too long into late in the game, and it does seem like we very rarely beat the blitz with our hot reads the way good teams sometimes do to us. On the whole, McNabb made a few real nice throws, but several were just too far off in important sistuatons. I tend to be a McNabb defender, but he does seem to usually fail when given the chance to muster up the leadership and clutchness that the great ones all seem to have. I’ve long believed you could win a super bowl with McNabb, but it does seem that he rarely puts the team on his back to eke out a close one. Great teams and great leaders always seem to come through at the end even when they’ve been outplayed for most of the game—see Brady, Tom; Manning, Peyton; Roethlisberger, Ben; Rollins, Jimmy!
Still the biggest goats of the game (if these guys gave milk, you could stock Le Bec Fin with chevre for the year) are our o-linemen. The worst of the lot in pass protection was Max Jean-Gilles. I know he looked awesome on the screen to Westbrook, but he got destroyed by the Raider rush again and again. It was embarrassing. MJG was wholly responsible for the second sack of McNabb when MJG was way late responding to a twist as Ellis slid out to engage Justice. He was beat bad again on the first play of the second quarter and on a first half incompletion to Avant, on which McNabb rushed his throw because of the pressure. I’m foreseeing an increase in Stacey Andrews’s reps in the near future. By the second half, I stopped taking notes on the blunders of the offensive line, but everyone really had a poor game. I blame Andy a bit for not giving Dunlap more help, but still Dunlap, Justice, Cole, and of course, MJG all looked atrocious on specific plays during that game. Celek and McCoy also bear some responsibility for the pressure that often overwhelmed McNabb.
All I can say after a game like that is ... Go Phillies!
I think it’s hard to get too upset with the defense. After all, they only gave up 13 points, but the inconsistency of the run defense was a bit disconcerting and our inability to cover tight ends is a real problem. On the, ultimately game-deciding, TD catch and run from Russell to Zach Miller, Trotter has taken a lot of heat for biting on the play fake and letting Miller get behind him. This criticism is fair, but I blame that TD on Samuels. Asante whiffed worse than Manny Ramsteroidirez on an inside fastball. Samuel had a chance to make the tackle and didn’t even get a piece of Miller. If Samuels even knocks him back a bit, Trotter makes that tackle.
As for the offense, I think you’ve got to put this game on the shoulders of the line. The pass protection was abysmal. That said, let’s give some blame to Mandy Reidinwheg and McNabb. The run-pass balance was unfathomable. It reminded me of the backyard games I played as a little kid in which the offense was allowed one run play for every possession. As for McNabb, well the best you can say is that he was inconsistent, looking a lot like the McNabb of a couple years ago when he came off that ACL injury. In the face of consistently bad protection he still held the ball too long into late in the game, and it does seem like we very rarely beat the blitz with our hot reads the way good teams sometimes do to us. On the whole, McNabb made a few real nice throws, but several were just too far off in important sistuatons. I tend to be a McNabb defender, but he does seem to usually fail when given the chance to muster up the leadership and clutchness that the great ones all seem to have. I’ve long believed you could win a super bowl with McNabb, but it does seem that he rarely puts the team on his back to eke out a close one. Great teams and great leaders always seem to come through at the end even when they’ve been outplayed for most of the game—see Brady, Tom; Manning, Peyton; Roethlisberger, Ben; Rollins, Jimmy!
Still the biggest goats of the game (if these guys gave milk, you could stock Le Bec Fin with chevre for the year) are our o-linemen. The worst of the lot in pass protection was Max Jean-Gilles. I know he looked awesome on the screen to Westbrook, but he got destroyed by the Raider rush again and again. It was embarrassing. MJG was wholly responsible for the second sack of McNabb when MJG was way late responding to a twist as Ellis slid out to engage Justice. He was beat bad again on the first play of the second quarter and on a first half incompletion to Avant, on which McNabb rushed his throw because of the pressure. I’m foreseeing an increase in Stacey Andrews’s reps in the near future. By the second half, I stopped taking notes on the blunders of the offensive line, but everyone really had a poor game. I blame Andy a bit for not giving Dunlap more help, but still Dunlap, Justice, Cole, and of course, MJG all looked atrocious on specific plays during that game. Celek and McCoy also bear some responsibility for the pressure that often overwhelmed McNabb.
All I can say after a game like that is ... Go Phillies!
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
I think there was a football game last sunday?
Well this was a solid win against a bad football team. We saw some nice things from both sides of the ball and some things that would be a problem, especially on defense, against a team that actually plays like they belong in the NFL. The truth is that we won’t know how good our team is until the Giants game on November 1, and we may not even know until much later than that, since that is, after all, only one game. So here’s my best attempt (or best attempt I’m able to give in the midst of the exhilarating, exhausting Phillies playoff run) to glean some valuable insights from this past Sunday’s debacling (Oh, Emmitt).
The Eagles defense definitely had a weaker performance than the score suggests, although some of it may simply have been a case of playing down to their competition. It’s hard to get that intensity up game in and game out, especially when you can win without it. Still, I guess the defense bears a further look this week, keeping in mind that it is hard to complain too much about a 33 to 14 win.
Facing a quarterback whose head coach called him his “Jason Garrett” (by which Coach Morris meant his “career backup”— not his future disappointing offensive coordinator prematurely deemed the heir apparent by an obnoxious billionaire oilman owner whose team can’t win a playoff game [and can barely beat the lowly CHEFS—what a great snickers commercial that was back in the early 90s]), the Eagles’ D gave up a lot of passing yards, and that was with some real help from the Tampa offense, starting with Johnson’s 4th down fumble. The Gocong sack on the last play of the first quarter was completely a mental mistake on the part of the Tampa TEs. Johnson made a bunch of bad decisions when the pressure got there too. And on Trent Cole’s sack, that was a rookie mistake by Josh Johnson to not unload the ball out of bounds—although I guess it worked out for Johnson with the unnecessary roughness call on Macho Harris (an idiotic play) negating the stop. The Eagles also were blessed by boatload of Tampa drops (rumor is that Na Brown coaches the wideouts there—I kid).
At times the pressure seemed to be not as effective with the Eagles facing such a mobile qb . Nice pressure by Gaither on a couple passing downs though.
On the whole the line play was decent. Trent Cole looked great as usual. Bunkley looked great getting pressure up the middle as a run-stopper and then also doing a nice job breaking up a screen play to Cadillac Williams early in the first. Also a nice 4th quarter sack by Abiamiri, using a spin move from the tackle position on first down as the Eagles lined up a lot in the nickel once it became clear that it would be passing situations for the rest of the quarter.
Very aggressive blitzing DBs this week, teneded to work well on some plays, but the Eagles were burnt bad on a few plays too many.
As for the LBs against the run, Akeem Jordan looked better against the run than lately I thought, although he still got taken out of some plays. Trotter seemed to play ok against the run—rarely far out of position but not really making any great plays either.
The defense especially struggled to cover Winslow. Good fast TEs seem to give us trouble. Shockey partied all over the middle of our defense in the first half of the saints game, and Winslow did so much more, dominating nearly everyone we threw at him. None of our LBs could handle Winslow and we had some issues with their other TEs at times as well. Winslow beat Gocong to pick up a PI penalty and for a catch on another play. Even double covered by Hanson and Parker, Winslow caught a ball for a first down. Mikell seemed to handle Winslow the best, although he too got beat by Winslow on the Bucs’ second touchdown, but it was a pretty damn impressive catch on a ball only Winslow could reach.
On offense, McNabb looked real good, and the protection was pretty impressive on most plays, although I thought Justice had one of his shakier games of the season—giving up two sacks, although on the second half sack, it was partly the fault of D-Mac for holding it so long.
Maclin really looked great, even beyond his numbers, although some of the credit really should go to DeSean Jackson, whose statistically-quiet day masked some crucial contributions. A lot more double coverage for D-Jax then we’ve seen so far, but that meant a whole lot of open man on man looks for Maclin. This was why the Eagles drafted him. With him and Jackson and Westbrook/McCoy there’s just so much speed for which opposing defenses have to account. He showed great hands on the sixteen yard curl he ran on the first play of the 4th quarter too.
Maclin’s first two catches (long play action TD on the team’s second offensive snap and then a play off the middle) are both great routes and good catches. The third one (the second TD) was pretty nice too, although Will Allen might very well have picked that ball if he ever turned on it (although I guess one could say the same think about Macho Harris and Kellen Winslow’s TD).
Great route by Celek on his 38 yard 2nd quarter catch and love the hurdle move over Barber (a lot more than I liked watching Dexter Fowler reprise it the next night over Chase Utley). Celek is looking better and better every week. HE also did a nice job sealing off the edge a couple times as a blocker, including on the first Maclin TD which doesn’t happen if Celek doesn’t hold up as a blocker.
B-West has a way to go but he made some real nice plays, esp the catch and then the run on the TD drive in the 3rd qtr.
Clearly the jury is still out on the wildcat, but so far it seems to look best when McCoy takes the snap and carries it himself, with the end around action from Vick or Jackson serving simply as a decoy.
And the penalties were ridiculous!
Go Phillies, (oh yeah and Eagles, against the raiders [lower case intentional]).
The Eagles defense definitely had a weaker performance than the score suggests, although some of it may simply have been a case of playing down to their competition. It’s hard to get that intensity up game in and game out, especially when you can win without it. Still, I guess the defense bears a further look this week, keeping in mind that it is hard to complain too much about a 33 to 14 win.
Facing a quarterback whose head coach called him his “Jason Garrett” (by which Coach Morris meant his “career backup”— not his future disappointing offensive coordinator prematurely deemed the heir apparent by an obnoxious billionaire oilman owner whose team can’t win a playoff game [and can barely beat the lowly CHEFS—what a great snickers commercial that was back in the early 90s]), the Eagles’ D gave up a lot of passing yards, and that was with some real help from the Tampa offense, starting with Johnson’s 4th down fumble. The Gocong sack on the last play of the first quarter was completely a mental mistake on the part of the Tampa TEs. Johnson made a bunch of bad decisions when the pressure got there too. And on Trent Cole’s sack, that was a rookie mistake by Josh Johnson to not unload the ball out of bounds—although I guess it worked out for Johnson with the unnecessary roughness call on Macho Harris (an idiotic play) negating the stop. The Eagles also were blessed by boatload of Tampa drops (rumor is that Na Brown coaches the wideouts there—I kid).
At times the pressure seemed to be not as effective with the Eagles facing such a mobile qb . Nice pressure by Gaither on a couple passing downs though.
On the whole the line play was decent. Trent Cole looked great as usual. Bunkley looked great getting pressure up the middle as a run-stopper and then also doing a nice job breaking up a screen play to Cadillac Williams early in the first. Also a nice 4th quarter sack by Abiamiri, using a spin move from the tackle position on first down as the Eagles lined up a lot in the nickel once it became clear that it would be passing situations for the rest of the quarter.
Very aggressive blitzing DBs this week, teneded to work well on some plays, but the Eagles were burnt bad on a few plays too many.
As for the LBs against the run, Akeem Jordan looked better against the run than lately I thought, although he still got taken out of some plays. Trotter seemed to play ok against the run—rarely far out of position but not really making any great plays either.
The defense especially struggled to cover Winslow. Good fast TEs seem to give us trouble. Shockey partied all over the middle of our defense in the first half of the saints game, and Winslow did so much more, dominating nearly everyone we threw at him. None of our LBs could handle Winslow and we had some issues with their other TEs at times as well. Winslow beat Gocong to pick up a PI penalty and for a catch on another play. Even double covered by Hanson and Parker, Winslow caught a ball for a first down. Mikell seemed to handle Winslow the best, although he too got beat by Winslow on the Bucs’ second touchdown, but it was a pretty damn impressive catch on a ball only Winslow could reach.
On offense, McNabb looked real good, and the protection was pretty impressive on most plays, although I thought Justice had one of his shakier games of the season—giving up two sacks, although on the second half sack, it was partly the fault of D-Mac for holding it so long.
Maclin really looked great, even beyond his numbers, although some of the credit really should go to DeSean Jackson, whose statistically-quiet day masked some crucial contributions. A lot more double coverage for D-Jax then we’ve seen so far, but that meant a whole lot of open man on man looks for Maclin. This was why the Eagles drafted him. With him and Jackson and Westbrook/McCoy there’s just so much speed for which opposing defenses have to account. He showed great hands on the sixteen yard curl he ran on the first play of the 4th quarter too.
Maclin’s first two catches (long play action TD on the team’s second offensive snap and then a play off the middle) are both great routes and good catches. The third one (the second TD) was pretty nice too, although Will Allen might very well have picked that ball if he ever turned on it (although I guess one could say the same think about Macho Harris and Kellen Winslow’s TD).
Great route by Celek on his 38 yard 2nd quarter catch and love the hurdle move over Barber (a lot more than I liked watching Dexter Fowler reprise it the next night over Chase Utley). Celek is looking better and better every week. HE also did a nice job sealing off the edge a couple times as a blocker, including on the first Maclin TD which doesn’t happen if Celek doesn’t hold up as a blocker.
B-West has a way to go but he made some real nice plays, esp the catch and then the run on the TD drive in the 3rd qtr.
Clearly the jury is still out on the wildcat, but so far it seems to look best when McCoy takes the snap and carries it himself, with the end around action from Vick or Jackson serving simply as a decoy.
And the penalties were ridiculous!
Go Phillies, (oh yeah and Eagles, against the raiders [lower case intentional]).
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