What happened?
Kevin Kolb didn't look bad in his first NFL start, but the defense and special teams of the Eagles doomed Philadelphia in their home opener.
The Good:
DeSean Jackson had four catches for 101 yards and a touchdown, as well as three runs for 15 yards.
Brent Celek had eight catches for 104 yards.
Jason Avant had seven catches for 79 yards and a score.
The Bad:
Kevin Kolb wasn't horrible in his first start, but he wasn't great. He completed 31/51 passes for 391 yards and two touchdowns.
Brian Westbrook had 52 yards on 13 carries before the game got out of hand.
The Ugly:
The defense was the exact opposite of what it was last week. This week, the Eagles allowed Drew Brees to pass at will against them, and allowed 421 total yards.
How many wildcat formation plays is Andy Reid going to run?
Special teams weren't much better than the defense, with DeSean Jackson fielding a punt inside the five yard line, and Ellis Hobbs fumbling the opening kickoff of the second half back to the Saints. Way to kill all the momentum, guys.
Kolb also had some bad moments, including three interceptions in the second half, though the last one was due to a dumbass timeout before the last play of the game. Andy, it's 48-22 with seven seconds to play. One last snap isn't going to make a difference.
Both Brian Westbrook and Asante Samuel left the game with injuries.
The Breakdown:
Oh good lord, what a mess this game was. I can't blame Kevin Kolb for the way he played, in fact, he didn't look half bad. The problem was with the other two units on the field, namely, the defense and special teams. After a great week last week, this looked like the exact opposite. While nothing went wrong last week on defense, this week, the Eagles couldn't stop Drew Brees from carving up the secondary, or Mike Bell and Reggie Bush from beating them up on the ground. It was just a horrible day all around for the Eagles, who were outplayed and outcoached by the Saints.
I'm still trying to figure out what the gameplan was going into this game. Kevin Kolb is making his first ever start, so what does Andy Reid do? Rather than make the gameplan simple, with short passes and lots and lots of running, he slips in about ten wildcat plays and has Kolb pass the ball 51 times. Yes, a lot of the throws came after the game was out of reach, but the plan was flawed even while the game was close. Where the hell was LeSean McCoy for most of this game? He looked solid last week against Carolina, and this week, he only touched the ball nine times. DeSean Jackson looked good on offense anyway, and Brent Celek was a damn good target out there for Kolb, but it wasn't enough, not with the mistakes the Eagles made.
Last week, the special teams looked, well special. This week, they looked special again, but not in a good way. It was more like a riding the short bus kind of special. DeSean Jackson decided to field a punt inside his own five yard line for reasons that are lost to everyone but him. The Eagles went three and out, and two plays later, Drew Brees hit Marques Colston for a touchdown right before the half. Then, Ellis Hobbs managed to fumble the opening kickoff of the third quarter over to the Saints after the Eagles had ended the first half with a good drive and a field goal. The Saints would score quickly, and it was all downhill from there. These are issues that have to be resolved, because I don't care if you have Joe freaking Montana back at quarterback, no team can win with those mental mistakes and a defense that forgets how to tackle. It just didn't look good today.
I have to give Kolb credit, at least he didn't look that bad. He showed he can at least play quarterback in the NFL in a pinch, and though he had three interceptions, I'd only really put the blame for one of them solidly on his shoulders. The first one he threw was a bad read by him and never should have been thrown. The other two happened after the game got out of reach, so I can't hold him responsible for those, no matter how much I may want to. He did manage the game well when it was close, and was able to move around in the pocket and get rid of the ball when he had to. You could see the full week of practice really helped him get ready for the game, but in the end, the Eagles just didn't have enough this week. I don't think Kolb played well enough to start any sort of quarterback controversy, though I do think that he should start next week if McNabb isn't ready to go. Jeff Garcia can back him up for another week, and Michael Vick can...well, I just don't know what Vick is going to do, but I bet Andy has some really cute crap in the playbook for him.
Oh yeah, Vick comes back next week, and Brian Westbrook and Asante Samuel left the game. The next six days leading up to next Sunday are going to be fun.
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