What happened?
The Eagles looked flatter than month old beer as they dropped a pathetic game to the Oakland Raiders.
The Good:
Nope, nothing to see here.
The Bad:
David Akers missed two field goals that could have made the difference in the game.
Donovan McNabb passed the ball way too much. He went 22/46 for 269 yards.
The Eagles only had one shot in the red zone for the entire game.
The Ugly:
The Eagles only rushed the ball 14 times for 67 yards. Brian Westbrook only had six carries.
The defense couldn't tackle anyone on key plays, and allowed Zach Miller to score on an 86 yard pass late in the first quarter.
The Eagles went 2-13 on third downs.
Donovan McNabb was sacked six times.
Jason Peters left the game in the first quarter with a knee injury.
The Eagles lost to the Oakland Raiders. Let me say that again. They lost...to the Oakland Raiders.
The Breakdown:
There is so much I want to say about this game, but I'm not going to. I could talk about Donovan McNabb trying to call a timeout late in the second quarter when the Eagles were out, but I won't. I could talk about the fact that the Eagles let JaMarcus Russell actually look like an NFL quarterback yesterday, but I won't. I could talk about how the Eagles only converted two third downs during the entire game and only scored nine points on a team that allowed 44 just last week, but I won't even do that.
What I do want to talk about are two main parts of this disaster yesterday, and how they always seem to come up when the Eagles lose to teams like the Raiders. The first is the attitude that the Eagles carry with them into games like this. Are the Raiders a bad team? Yes, they are. Fans are allowed to think like that, but the fact of the matter is that there are 53 guys on that team that are still NFL players. They can still play football with the best on the planet, and, any given Sunday, they can win a game. What the Eagles do in situations like the one they had yesterday is carry a superiority complex with them into the game. They think that just because they're the Philadelphia Eagles that the other team is going to roll over for them. Then, if that other team comes out and hits them in the mouth, like the Raiders did yesterday, they don't know how to respond. The Raiders came out yesterday and blitzed Donovan McNabb over and over again. Once Jason Peters left the game with a knee injury, McNabb was done on that side of the field. King Dunlap is not Jason Peters, I don't care how good he thinks he is. There is no excuse for how the Eagles played yesterday, but I'd be willing to bet money that a lot of it is because of the way they saw the Raiders coming into that game. NFL teams should never buy into the hype that they hear about from people around them. This is what happens.
The other thing that really got to me yesterday was the fact that Andy Reid only called 14 running plays for the game. The Raiders are horrible at run defense, so what does Andy do? He has Donovan McNabb pass the ball 46 times, while Brian Westbrook only carried it six times. How many yards did Westbrook get on those six carries? He picked up 50 yards on six carries. Why the hell didn't Westbrook get the ball more? Even in the fourth quarter, the Raiders only led by seven points at the most. There was still time on the clock. The Raiders basically know that the Eagles had given up on the running game, and were rushing McNabb every single time. The Eagles needed to run the ball more, and this is something that was happened to Andy time and time again while he's been in Philly. He gives up on the run too early, and never looks back. This is what can happen if he does that. All I know is that Westbrook is not going to happy if he only gets six carries a game, so that is going to have to change soon. This team needs to be balanced, I don't care what Andy thinks.
This was a total team loss yesterday. The Eagles came out looking flat on offense and average at best on defense. They abandoned the run far too quickly, and only called two running plays during the fourth quarter. The defense couldn't make stops when they needed to, and the entire team thought that the Raiders would just roll over. Guess what...that didn't even come close to happening. On a day where most people thought they the Eagles would get within a game of the Giants in the NFC East, they took a huge step back. This team needs to get their act together, now. Next Sunday, they play the Redskins, and Washington always plays the Eagles tight. If they come out and play like this again, they'll be staring a .500 record in the face.
No comments:
Post a Comment