Week 3: Wrap Up
After an embarrassing loss to
the Giants last week in which the Eagles saw a 17 point lead disappear in the
second half, the Eagles came back this week against the
Post Game Positives
The entire offense
Lets be honest here folks.
Can you remember the last time the Eagles offense looked this dominating? McNabb
had himself another great day, going 18-33 with 296 yards and 2 TDs and 0INTs. Westbrook showed why he is the ultimate
weapon yet again, racking up 154 yards of total offense with 3 TDs. The offensive line has looked great giving Donovan the
protection he needs to make plays. Most importantly, the Eagles showed what
their offense would have been like had they never gotten Stallworth.
Keep in mind, those NFL analysts had been chiding the Eagles all off-season for
their receiving unit. They looked pretty solid today with Reggie Brown having a
107 yard day, newcomer Matt Schobel catching an
important 60 yard pass, and with guys like Greg Lewis and Hank Baskett making plays. The offense racked up 416 total yards
and 16 first downs. The Eagles have
proven their offense has multiple dimensions and they are a very tough group to
stop.
Brian Dawkins
There is not enough room on
this page to write about how much Brian Dawkins means to this team both on the
field and off. In what is a very shaky and injury riddled secondary, Brian
Dawkins has been a bright spot. Before being taken out after getting hurt (it
looks as though he is okay now), Dawkins was making plays all over the place
and ended with 4 tackles on the day. It was also Dawkins that caused the fumble
that would be recovered by Patterson and turn into a touchdown. Not only is he
a great player, Brian Dawkins is an emotional leader on this team who does a phenomenal
job rallying the defense with Jeremiah Trotter. The Eagles are lucky to have a
guy like Brian Dawkins on their team.
Special Teams (defense)
Often overlooked, the special
teams for the Eagles this year have looked pretty good. Akers has missed a few
field goals, but it is not really a cause for concern because he is still a
great kicker. Not only that, but Dirk Johnson’s punts have looked great
averaging over 40 yards a kick. Let’s not forget the coverage. Jason
Short is a human wrecking
ball who is always mixing it up. He is a hardnosed
player who opposing teams absolutely despise. Short’s special teams play is no surprise. What is a surprise though, is the
great play of Ryan Moats. Moats is a small guy at 5’8’’,
but he has been constantly making tackles and getting downfield in a hurry. The
Eagles know that football is a game of field position and have so far been
doing a superb job at making sure the opposition doesn’t get good position on
the kicks. When receiving the ball, Dexter Wynn has been an upgrade over Bruce
Perry. Lets see if that trend continues in the future.
Post Game Negatives
Penalties
The Eagles had a rather
strange sequence in this game in which two straight personal fouls were called
against them. These added up to 30 free yards. If the Birds are going to win
football games, they can’t be committing dumb penalties like that. A catalyst
to Week 2’s defeat was a personal foul on Trent Cole (which he was fined for). The
Eagles had 9 penalties for 72 yards. For the most part, the team has done a
fine job avoiding things like holding, pass interference, and false starts, but
they
need to stop committing personal fouls.
Secondary
This is getting very
redundant, although there was some improvement. Once again, the Eagles
secondary with the exception of Brian Dawkins did not get the job done. The
49ers were dominated this entire game and still managed to get 392 yards of
offense. Roderick Hood looked ridiculous out there as he was beaten multiple
times by bigger and faster wide receivers. Michael Lewis who has had an awful
start to 2006 looked a lot better today as he got a sack on QB Alex Smith and
made a few plays. Sheldon Brown was also improved, though he made a few
mistakes. The Eagles secondary has got to stop giving up the big play which almost
always leads to points. It is hard to say what will happen with the injuries to
Hood, Dawkins, and Lewis, but lets hope that they will
be okay because this Eagles secondary needs help, especially if they are going
to handle the tandem of Terrell Owens and Terry Glenn on October 8th.
Missed tackles
Alex Smith is an elusive QB,
but the Eagles missed many opportunities to tackle him and other 49ers players
by being too aggressive and getting fooled too easily. This is not a huge area
of concern because Smith is a good playmaker, however you can expect that Andy Reid and Jim
Johnson will talk to the team about these missed tackles because there were
quite a few during the 3rd quarter that almost allowed the 49ers to
get back in the game. Missed tackles against the 49ers is one thing. Against a
better team or a division rival, it’s something completely different.
Closing Remarks
This was a very exciting win
for the Eagles and their fans to build on. In the NFL, it seems like whenever
your team loses, there is often a cloud of doubt that follows the team the
entire week. The Eagles had said all week they wanted to put the Week 2 loss
behind them with a dominating performance against the 49ers and they did just
that. What was once question marks for the Eagles (Linebackers and Wide
Receivers) have become exclamation points for this team.
Their off-season acquisitions of Darren Howard, Matt Schobel,
Shaun Barber, and the draft picks have continued to impress. Howard will be
especially important now that Kearse is gone and he
did a great job at LE today. All in all, a great win for the Eagles to take
back to Philadelphia as they prepare for a showdown with Brett Favre and the Green Bay Packers on Monday Night Football.