Completely Undressed On The National Stage
As I have said in many of my articles before, I had to let some time pass before I wrote for this site, because I would emotion get the best of me. I would go of, ranting, like a crazed fan, and it wouldn’t sound as if I had spent some time putting together my thoughts. So, after some pensive periods over the weekend, I have decided on what to say.
Thursday afternoon, as much of the nation was either sitting down to a turkey dinner, or putting up Christmas decorations, the Eagles were in the process of being completely dismantled by a team that, earlier in the year, was the poster team for being dysfunctional. The Lions were simply awful. And, on paper, this looked like a win for the Eagles. But, as it turned out, Mark Sanchez was forced to play, an opening drive FG hit the right upright, completely dead-center, and the Lions went on their way to a 45-14 win.
It was, in a word, ugly. The secondary, which the team spent so much money on this past off-season, looked lost. The middle of the defense, which looked as if it was staying in a Cover-2 formation all day, kept getting smoked, right down the middle, more than the turkeys we were all enjoying on our plates.
I’ve seen teams that play with no drive before. I’ve even seen teams come out, and just be flat. If the Eagles were just flat on Thursday, I could forgive it, in a way, because of it being so close to their last game. But, for a team to come out, and play with no heart? To me, that’s just simply unforgivable. Once they fell behind a couple of scores, it was, for all intents and purposes, over. We all saw how the game took place.
It would be so very easy for me to place this defeat squarely at the feet of Chip Kelly. With all the NCAA coaching vacancies, and Kelly’s name being mentioned, one could say he was a bit distracted. But, this was more than that. This was just a case of unprepared, out-classed, and out-coached by Jim Caldwell. But, more so, this was also a case of some of the players just going through the motions. That’s practically unforgivable. Jeffrey Lurie should be livid at what transpired on Thursday. He watched a lot of money in motion, and got little to no return on his investment.
Center Jason Kelce said of the game, that the team “would find out what the locker room was made of” after the loss. He also went on to say that “it took a collective effort to get your ass beat like this”. And, that comes from a starter on the team. When the starters say that, the coach has either lost the locker room for the year, or, the locker room is about to implode.
Next week, the schedule does no favors for the Eagles. They have to travel to Foxborough, to play a very angry Patriots team that lost to Denver, in overtime. And, not just any Denver team. A Denver team quarterbacked by Brock Osweiler. I’ll pause a moment to let that sink in fully. Brock Osweiller beat Tom Brady. And, next week, he’s going to be plenty sore about it. ANd since the Eagles’ secondary has already shown it can’t cover, Brady has to be excited. Yes, come at me with the fact that Brady won’t have Gronk, and he might not have Amendola. With that team, it doesn’t matter. They just plug and play; a trait this Eagles team sorely needs to develop.
It’s only one game out of the division lead, so I can’t quite yet bring myself to push the panic button. But, one more game like Thanksgiving, and I’m going to seriously consider starting my countdown to the draft clock.
Fly, Eagles……Fly!!!!!!
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Categorized:Eagles