Photo Credit: Ron Chenoy-USA TODAY Sports
The Eagles went on the road, hung 30 on the Broncos, and ripped off their best win of the season.
They’re now 4-6 on the year, which is probably where we expected them to be, right? Not amazing, but not horrendous either. We didn’t expect .500, but maybe slightly below it, that’s exactly what we’re watching. We’re watching a team with a dearth of talent play hard and show us some glimpses of what they might become in the future, and while it’s been a slog so far, Sunday evening was unexpectedly satisfying. They put it together in all three phases of the game and dispatched a 5-4 Broncos team that absolutely clobbered the Cowboys just one week ago.
The Birds are now 4-2 on the road this year and 0-4 at home. That’s such a head scratcher. I mentioned last week that the Eagles and Temple only have two combined wins at Lincoln Financial Field in 2021, so you have to feel pretty crappy if you’re the Memphis Tigers or Wagner Seahawks. For what it’s worth, the Eagle team that won the Super Bowl was 6-2 on the road, and Chip Kelly’s 10-6 teams finished 6-2 and 4-4 on the road. This 2021 team could possibly go 7-2 on the road.
Let’s enjoy this one. Enjoy the quality offensive play, defensive stops, and the blocked field goal. If last week was moral victory Monday, this is an well-earned victory Monday.
Coming into the game, my stance on Jalen Hurts was this:
“I don’t think Jalen Hurts is winning a game with his arm, but the Eagles can win with Jalen Hurts.”
Does that make any sense at all? It’s a Lamar Jackson-esque take. Hurts does a lot of things well, and has all of the intangibles, but you were left wondering if he could make enough NFL-level throws to solidify himself as a legitimate QB1 in this league. If the Birds run the ball and play with a lead, Hurts can probably be that guy.
He finished this game 16-23 for 178 yards, with two touchdowns, and a pick. Again, the volume isn’t large, but you can’t have it both ways. Either you want the Eagles to pound the ball and win, or have Hurts throw the ball 50 times, lose, and get a better “evaluation” of what he is. But you can’t evaluate in a pass/run vacuum; you have to evaluate within the framework of a full game, and Hurts was pretty darn good overall in this one. You see glimpses here and there of progress, like that 3rd and 11 completion where he stepped up into the pocket, shuffled to his left, and threw a dart for Dallas Goedert. He made a quick read and a correct read on the second DeVonta Smith touchdown, with an extra rusher coming. He also had another TD throw that Quez Watkins simply dropped.
Hurts was accurate early on, and that helped the Birds carry a lead into halftime, and go on to win the game.
Hey guess what?
The Eagles got a first round draft pick right.
Yeah, it’s a pretty safe bet to draft the Heisman winner, but sometimes you end up with Jason White or Johnny Manziel, so you never know.
Smith caught two touchdown passes in this game and the Eagles honestly haven’t had a receiver since 2017 Alshon who is able to go up and make a contested catch like this:
On the season, Smith now has 62 catches for 603 yards and four touchdowns. With seven games left, he’d have to average 56.7 yards to hit 1,000 as a rookie. He can definitely get there. The schedule is not too difficult.
The story of last week’s loss was that the defense just couldn’t get a needed stop. Couldn’t make a big play when necessary.
Enter Davion Taylor and Big Play Slay:
Massive momentum shift right there. You go from 20-13 an Denver driving to 27-13 in the blink of an eye. I also like how Teddy Bridgewater made no attempt at a tackle whatsoever. He made a “business decision,” as they like to say.
Not sure how much you remember this, but through the first couple of games, the Eagles were atrocious in the takeaways category. They were bottom three in the entire NFL. 10 games in, it’s not much better, just nine takeaways total, but the offense has only given the ball away eight times, and that’s actually a +1 differential, good for 16th in the NFL. Right in the middle of the pack.
It’ll go down as a 40 run/23 pass split on the box score, though that’s always a little misleading because of the option plays and QB runs the Eagles use.
REGARDLESS –
They are handing the ball to running backs and going downhill in a way that we didn’t see until a few weeks ago, so Nick Sirianni deserves a lot of credit for adjusting and doing what was necessary to add balance to the offense.
Here’s a great stat from Jeff Kerr at CBS:
The Eagles are averaging 208.7 rushing yards per game over the last 3 weeks (626 rushing yards). The previous 5? 493 rushing yards (total).
It is indeed very satisfying to watch Jordan Howard run DOWNHILL, BETWEEN THE TACKLES, and break contact for extra yardage. And Boston Scott hits the hole hard as a guy with a low center of gravity who is difficult to locate. It’s been enjoyable to witness.
We can laugh all you want, but these guys knew something back in the day:
I guess the Derek Barnett roughing the passer penalty was the officiating talking point from this game. Barnett is always good for at least one dumbass penalty per game. Like clockwork.
This one I originally thought was a borderline questionable call, but upon watching it back, he did lower the helmet, did make late contact, and then landed with his body weight on the QB, so it was the trifecta:
“It’s always him!” – Nick Sirianni.
This area is beginning to improve:
Mistakes:
Breaks:
Strong wins across the board:
They controlled the clock. Defense held on 3rd down and got off the field. A net zero turnover margin with the big fumble return touchdown to negate the Hurts interception. The only negative in the list is penalties, which had been brought under control in recent weeks, but if the Eagles keep performing like this in auxiliary areas, they’ll win more games. Good stuff.
From a macro level, probably Sirianni’s best game as Eagles coach. The play calling was balanced and worked as a continuation of what we first saw in the first quarter of the Raiders game. That’s what we’re looking for, right? Steady improvement across the board, in a linear fashion.
I’ll say that I like how he’s mixing and matching run looks right now. Howard and Scott are both able to run out of shotgun or under center sets, and so there’s a good blend. This isn’t Chip Kelly having DeMarco Murray run fucking sideways out of the shotgun.
Another thing I liked was the designed roll outs to Hurts’ right. He often scrambles over there, so why not scheme a few things up and work off of that? It’s what they did on the first Smith touchdown, with a pseudo-max protect look where Watkins stayed home to block:
I say “pseudo-max protect” because while there are only two receivers down field, the running back does release and embark on a dummy route there. It’s designed to roll Hurts to his right, with a tight end and receiver staying home to block, and it gives Smith enough time to run that out-and-up double move on the sideline.
There were a couple of these designed rollouts throughout the game. I counted three, but I may have missed one.
Maybe you could point to having to burn that timeout on the second drive when the play clock ran out. Stuff like that happens to every team though.
The only other thing I can think of relates to Sirianni’s facial hair. I personally believe he should grow out the beard a little bit more, and go for the grizzled veteran coach look. Not a neck beard, mind you, but just some extra length.
This week were were blessed with the trio of Greg Gumbel, Adam Archuleta, and AJ Ross (no relation to Cody Ross, that bastard).
Gumbel is fine. He’s a veteran. Not super exciting, but he doesn’t screw up much, if anything. Archuleta is a little bland and could be more assertive, but he’ll lean on his professional defensive back experience to give you the occasional in-depth breakdown of what’s going on out there.
One thing I did appreciate was the NBC Sports Philadelphia producer accidentally using a Flyers graphic on the Jalen Hurts post game lower third chyron:
Jalen Hurts is now the Flyers’ quarterback. Playing well, too.
Go Flyers!
