Be Accountable

I was very frustrated today watching an interview with Jeremiah Trotter on PE.com in which he discusses the upcoming BYE week. What killed me the most is when talking about losing the past 3 games he said: "The ball's just not bouncing our way."

I always have thought that Jeremiah is a good leader on this team, he takes more of an in your face approach than Brian Dawkins so they kind of work together well on the defense. Dawk is more so a guy that if you are on the ground hurting he will stand by and support you, he's often seen praying next to an injured player. Whereas Trotter is someone that if he sees another player laying on the ground injured, he'll walk right over to them and slap them in the back, yell at them to get up because they need him out there. They work together well, because different guys respond to different methods so it covers all of the bases.

I never like to take what a player says too seriously because a lot of times they are in the position that a microphone is shoved in their face and they might not know how to handle the media well. Donovan McNabb has shown that he is the king of all media, he will give just enough information to give writers their quotes but he's never going to call anyone out or create a bigger story just through a press conference. Than there are more inexperienced players that the media tend to take advantage of, they are tricked into giving nice quotes that will feed a story, even if the player doesn't truly feel that way.

My problem with Trot saying "The ball's just not bouncing our way" is it definitely seems like a cop out to me. The reason we lost to the Giants was that we broke down in the 4th quarter, yes the ball literally didn't bounce are way in that game and we probably could have won with a little bit of luck. But from that point on, breakdowns around the field, penalties, missed tackles, and dropped balls have all lead to our last 3 straight losses. It has nothing to do with luck, especially when you talk about the Jaguars game. Trotter needs to be accountable for the entire teams actions, there's no pointing fingers or using luck as an excuse for not winning. When you don't show up on game day, like what happened against the Jaguars, than you have to admit that.

I'm not saying that Trot doesn't have heart because we all know he does. He is deeply hurt by our losses and said how he was barely able to sleep for 30 minutes Sunday night. I'm not questioning his dedication to the team but I don't want him to think that the team isn't responsible for these losses.

Step up, be accountable for how you perform out on that field, don't blame it on anything else but yourself. Trot is disappointing me right now, I hope the attitude he displayed in that one quote isn't one that he actually has because our losing has nothing to do with luck at this point. As much as I love Trotter, even just based off of his own performance on Sunday, he has no room to say anything right now, this is a 4-4 team no matter how you spin it.

William James Officially Signs

Just a note: It was announced today that former Eagles CB Donald Strickland signed with the 49ers today.

We heard word on Sunday that former Giants CB William James (previously known as Will Peterson) was probably going to sign with the team. Today he officially was signed to a 1 year contract.

He brings a little bit more height to the secondary, being taller than Sheppard, Brown, and Hood. He should be a big special teams guy, other than that, don't know much about the role he will play. But it obviously doesn't hurt to have another good cover CB on the team. Now providing us with 4 high caliber guys, before I have full confidence in Sheppard, Brown, and Hood but Hanson is still learning the ropes. We now have a little more confidence in that 4th CB spot with James here.

With James being signed, Dexter Wynn was cut. I knew the day was coming, especially after that debacle against the Saints. This is the 2nd time Wynn has been cut this year, he was cut going into the season but was brought back after the secondary was ravaged with injuries. Now he is cut once again and I think this time it's permanent.

Drive The Ball

Even earlier this year when we were successful, going 3-1 in our first 4 games, our defense was still on the field way too long. Of course you can't argue with success so it wasn't much of an issue that our defense was on the field for more plays than any team's defense. But now that we are losing, this becomes an issue.

While the offense was putting points on the board pretty easily, the 1st offense in the league, we weren't putting together long sustained drives. The scoring would come through big plays of 20 or more yards, a bomb to Stallworth or Baskett, even a short pass to Westbrook that he turned into a 50 yard gain. But as teams have been eliminating Westbrook from the passing game, the Saints and Jaguars especially, the offense has become stagnant.

The question coming into this year that haunted the team last year, was whether we would run the ball more. In preseason we did see the run being used more effectively and it seemed during training camp that there was more of an emphasis on the run. Lately though we have gotten away from running the ball and Andy Reid acknowledged that that was one of the reasons for the loss to the Jaguars.

Running the football isn't going to work every time, but you can't stray away from the entire running game just because it isn't effective the first couple of times. After reviewing the game Andy just stated the obvious: we should have run the ball more, we got away from the running game too early, and he believes we do have the correct personnel the run the ball. None of these things are revelations, but he is at least acknowledging the fact that we need to commit to the run. But will it happen?

We understand that because we run a west coast offense the pass/run ratios are a little skewed. A lot of times our offense will substitute runs for short, high percentage completions. The problem that has arisen is that we aren't even completing those high percentage passes and then we don't try and run the ball again. To put together longer drives, Brian Westbrook needs to be more involved and just because he is taking out of the receiving game doesn't mean he should be eliminated from the entire game plan.

There needs to be a much more valiant effort to get Westbrook in the game, through running the ball. I think we ignore the fact that we have Correll Buckhalter and even Ryan Moats on the team, people blame Westbrook's durability as a reason that Andy doesn't run the ball more, well then use Buck or Moats instead.

It's great that we have a super star QB in Donovan McNabb but the team can't completely revolve around him. Of course with Donovan being the franchise QB it is his offense but if he is having a bad day the entire team can't go down with him. If Donovan starts off slow there needs to be a running game to resort to. 9 times out of 10 Donovan is going to do a good job for you throwing the ball but there still needs to be another option and it is extremely frustrating to have Brian Westbrook, a great running back, constantly just be used as a receiver.

I love Westbrook's versatility because that is what makes him such a unique player. But when teams eliminate him from being a receiving option it doesn't mean that he can't be used in the running game. There has to be much more of a balance on the offense if we want to put long drives together, which is exactly what we have to do if we want to make the playoffs.

It sounds simple to say have the offense put together longer drives and the defense needs to be off the field as soon as possible, of course that is a perfect game of football. No one is expecting that to be a flawless form of winning football games because it takes a lot of efficiency of both sides of the ball to produce results like that. But there at least needs to be an effort to sustain drives on offense, the main way to put forth that effort is to run the ball.

Crazy as it might seem, run the ball on consecutive downs. We didn't gain a first down on Sunday until during the 5th drive we handed the ball off to Westbrook twice in a row. Previous to that we would give it to him 0-1 times a drive and go 3 and out. In this instance we gave Westbrook the ball 3 times, first a reception than back to back runs, gaining a first down. The drive didn't end up to be successful, none of the drives ended in a touchdown on Sunday, but the production was at least increased.

That way if you keep running the ball, even if it isn't that successful, once you go to your play action pass the defense will actually bite on it. Unlike Sunday where we kept running the play action despite the fact that we weren't even using our running game. It was pretty pointless, it just gave Donovan less time to find an open receiver.

This is a frustrating process to try and dissect what is wrong especially knowing, we as fans, have no impact on what actually happens. At this point you just need to hope that Andy is going to do what is best for the team, I mean it is his job. He doesn't need us telling him he needs to run more, he obviously knows that, but we don't need to hear him talk about it anymore, just do it. Prove to us that we can run the ball and if you say we have the correct personnel to run the ball, show us, prove to everyone that you didn't screw up by not acquiring a running back this off season.

A Bitter 2 Weeks

Directly after Sunday's game Comcast Sportsnet's Derrick Gunn reported that the Eagles would be in practicing this week, that isn't true. I was happy that Reid took such a direct approach to get this team in line, but after having a team meeting on Monday the players were given the rest of the week off. This week gives them time to spend with their families and for many of them, it provides time to go back home.

If we had anything better than a 4-4 record I would be talking about the fact that these guys deserve a break. They have been working since late July, during training camp. They saw a little time off after practice at Lehigh was over and they came back to the Nova Care Complex, but not much. This year in particular it was talked about how much harder of a training camp Andy Reid ran, I praised the efforts because I felt after such a disappointing 2005 we needed to get these guys back in shape.

It seems to me that at this point in the year maybe a reason for the team constantly coming out so flat in the 1st half would be that they are just exhausted. The season is only half way over but yet they don't have the intensity to win games anymore, they have lost it ever since the Cowboys game. I'm just searching for answers, some of them logical, others illogical, so I really have no idea if the players starting training camp so early has anything to do with how worn out they seem right now.

Maybe they aren't even worn out, maybe they just don't care. After Sunday's performance against the Jaguars it's not hard for me to think that they could care less. To just stroll out on the field and make stupid mental mistakes over and over again shows that you aren't even focused. This team needs to get some direction and I thought having them practice this week would force them towards success, but apparently that is not the approach Andy is taking.

I understand that not giving the players time to rest this week just increases the chance that they are going to be burn out before the season is over, they look burnt out already. But I just know something needs to be done to get them to focus and maybe having increased discipline would do that. We need the team to start responding to the coaches, otherwise we're stuck in neutral for the rest of the season.

The team will join together once again on Monday to start preparing for the Washington Redskins in a critical divisional matchup. The Redskins are clearly the weakest team in the division but one loss, especially a divisional loss, will take us out of playoff contention.

Lets just hope that the team can't even sleep well this week, knowing how much they embarrassed themselves against the Jaguars. Maybe sitting at home feeling the bitter effects of a loss for a week will force this team to wake up. They need to feel the impact of a 3 game losing streak, not keep saying "we should be 7-0" because we definitely do not look like it. Stop the talking, stop the "we are better than this" just show people you are better.

Will Peterson Signs

Peterson came in for a physical on Monday no official word yet on if he is signing or not. PE.com is expecting to hear by the end of Tuesday if he does or does not sign.

The Eagles haven't officially announced it yet but it is being reported that they have signed DB Will Peterson. He used to play for the Giants, that's how I know his name, but I don't know much about him.

He was cut this offseason as the team was revamping their secondary by bringing in guys like Sam Madison and R.W. McQuarters. After being selected in the 3rd round of the 2001 draft he never lived up to the pick they spent on him. His career in New York was marked by injuries, mainly back problems.

I have no idea why he was brought in, I'm guessing they are going to cut Dexter Wynn. I'm not sure if this is a sign that Rod Hood isn't fully healthy yet or if they just needed a replacement after cutting Wynn free.

A pretty meaningless signing, it just becomes a little more significant because since we play the Giants twice a year some people might recognize his name. Nothing to get excited about.

Manhandled Up Front

I made a big mistake when I thought our defensive line was going to be unstoppable. Prior to the season the combination of Kearse, Howard, Cole, McDougle, Bunkley, Walker, Rayburn, Thomas, Ramsey, and Patterson looked amazing. As the season has gone on though we have realized that this line has definitely not lived up to the hype.

Ridiculously enough, before that line even stepped on the field I was comparing them to the D-line of our early 90's defense, I'm ashamed.

We have come to learn that Kearse was great, started off the year playing better than I had ever seen, until he got bit by the injury bug. I still thought though, only one down, we can handle it. I was wrong.

I have been, my word of the week, extremely disappointed in 2 guys in particular: Jerome McDougle and Broderick Bunkley. The only thing I picture when I hear the name McDougle is him kicking the flag last week to draw a 30 yard penalty, because really that is the only noteworthy thing he has done this year. I was so excited by how great he physically looked, in the best shape I'd ever seen him in, and how mentally he was a completely changed person. Though I have put it off for more than 2 years now, I think it's time for me to finally say it, McDougle is a complete bust. Yea I know that was determined awhile ago but I wasn't ready to give up yet which shouldn't be surprising considering I held onto Billy McMullen until the very end.

Broderick Bunkley actually makes me really angry because we all know the reason he is so behind is because he held out during most of training camp, what a stupid move. I was so happy when we drafted him because I had determined that the DT position was what needed the most improvement on the team, but he has yet to do anything to help our interior line.

Now along with the above disappointments are a very surprises. I never expected Darwin Walker to play as well as he is right now. He had the huge game against Dallas but even that aside he has been consistent in his production. I thought Bunkley was going to come in and bump Walker out of his starting job, but that hasn't been the case.

Trent Cole's production was tremendous at the beginning of the season, but as expected, once Kearse went down than Cole's numbers went down. He has done better than I thought he would starting but he still has shown that he isn't an every down player, his motor can only run on "high speed" for so long.

Two guys that have switched back and forth a little bit have been Sam Rayburn and LaJuan Ramsey. Rayburn didn't suit up for the first time until 2 weeks ago and prior to that Ramsey was in his role. I don't think it was a direct shot at Ramsey to start activating Rayburn instead of him it was just that Jim Johnson wanted to get Sam Rayburn more involved in the defense again because in 2004 he had a break out year.

In the beginning of the season we were getting to QBs with ease but recently we have let Drew Brees, Bruce Gradkowski, and now even David Garrard just sit back in the pocket and throw. I thought that was going to be the strength of our D-line, pass rush, because that is what we are built for. We don't have big huge D-linemen like some other teams, we have invested in smaller speedier guys at hopes of collapsing the pocket from the outside, that hasn't worked.

The problem we are at now is that our pass rush has been completely ineffective and now our smaller D-line has been getting manhandled at the line of scrimmage. Statistically we are right in the middle of the pack at allowing about 104 rush yards per game but recently those numbers have increased. Teams have been running all over us, the Jaguars had 209 rushing yards today and it starts up front with that line. Huge holes are emerging and with the O-linemen being able to get so up field, it is even harder for our linebackers to make plays as they are constantly having to shed blocks.

McNabb: More Frustrated Than Ever

Donovan McNabb can't remember the last time that he was this frustrated. We only get a small glimpse of players after a game, mostly through the press conferences. McNabb looked and sounded defeated, obviously. He knows he had a horrible game, though he didn't have any turnovers he was unable to get the ball rolling.

I put the success on Donovan's shoulders and the blame on Donovan's shoulders, for the past 3 weeks, today especially, he's received the blame. Even though Donovan threw 3 interceptions against the Bucs I still feel that today's performance was even worse. I felt like we just stood in the same spot the entire game, the offense was on and off the field in the blink of an eye, it took us 5 drives to produce a 1st down.

Donovan needs to command that offense, especially since we have young players and guys that haven't been here long, all around him. There has to be a demand to at least put one touchdown on the board, I think it is humiliating that our team walked off of the field without a single touchdown. Even towards the end of the game we came close to putting up 7 points but 3 straight incomplete passes lead to a field goal.

There were situations today where the wind made it a little hard for Donovan to throw, a wide open Reggie Brown had a pass fly over his head in the end zone because the wind got under it. But there were also many times today where players were thrown to when they weren't looking, easy passes were dropped, and there were just miscommunications throughout the entire day.

Our offense is way better than it looked today, no one got involved and this offense is at its best when we have the ball going to 10 different guys. At the beginning of the year our offense looked too good to be true, I'm tempted to say that it was, but I really don't believe that. An offense doesn't just disappear but ours sure needs to be revived before it's too late.

Rest and Relax, Not This Time

Whip this team into shape. Scream at them in the locker room, have longer practices, hold players accountable for their actions. Something needs to be done to stop this team from spiralling out of control. Losing in the NFL is a very slippery slope and what previously was looked upon as a small disappointment in New Orleans has blown into a 3 game losing streak.

Before I agreed with players on the team, like Donovan McNabb, who said that we could be 7-0 right now if just a few things went our way. Now after further review I'm sick of that because that is a complete excuse. No matter what you say we are 4-4 and if you think that we're deserving of a 7-0 record than play like it, we sure didn't today.

In previous years when the BYE week would come along the players would usually get most, if not all of the time, to themselves to relax. Not this year. Andy is bringing the hammer down on a team that has let down an entire city because they have the ability to win, but apparently not the desire.

Even in a normal week with an opponent just 6 days away the players usually have Monday off. Last week after a last minute loss, for the second week in a row, the players were required to go in for a film session on Monday, something not usually done. Well the approach didn't work the first time but Andy is trying it again.

Despite the fact that the team doesn't even face an opponent this week, the players are going to be back at the Nova Care Complex tomorrow. In previous years the team wouldn't practice during the BYE, according to Derrick Gunn the team is practicing this week. So if players were looking to this week to get some vacation time in, think again. If you don't play with respect you don't deserve the privilege to have a week off.

I have said that I have no idea what to do about getting this team to develop some emotion right out of the gates. That's where Andy Reid comes in handy, as the head coach this is his problem to deal with, even though the players are blaming themselves. He is again taking a proactive approach to fix things and do it quickly. He is making himself heard and the players are getting the message, Sheldon Brown said he's "never seen him so pissed before."

The BYE week could not have come at a better time, this team needs to step back and realize that they are on their way of sabotaging an entire season. Maybe having to sit at home this Sunday with the bitter taste of a loss will put some fire under this team, but I just don't know. The only thing I know is that I'm scared of where things are going and this is going to be a long 2 weeks.

No Heart

I first titled this post "Lack of Urgency" but then I stopped to realize I'm being way too easy on these guys, todays performance was a complete lack of heart. No one cared. I have to have an exception when I say no one cared though because there are a handful of players notably Brian Dawkins and Lito Sheppard that did not give up. But, the offense especially, had their mind on one thing, the BYE week.

Nothing is more disgusting to a Philadelphia fan than seeing your team play without heart. I understand that a lot of times there are players that don't take things as seriously as the fans do. Honestly to some guys it is just a job, once they are off of the field they get into their $150,000 cars and move on. I don't even hold anything against those players because to actually be a stable person, you can't let yourself get so enveloped in the game.

But there is a difference between the guys that can just move on and the guys that don't show up at all. Brian Dawkins makes it evident every single game, preseason or playoffs, that he has every fiber of him into the game ready to give his all. So he had to be furious when there were guys just loafing around without a care in the world, despite today's game being very important.
Dawkins did address the team after the game was over, which is a rarity for him to do, especially after a loss. He repeatedly mentioned that he is dissapointed in the players and that it has nothing to do with the coaches. Dawk said that "dissapointment" is the key word in the locker room right now and there is not a guy on this team that doens't feel that way, lets hope not. Regardless of whether or not the coaches are preparing the team enough emotionally for a game, Sheldon Brown even said that getting a team emotionally ready to play isn't the coaches job, he said that as grown men the players should be able to get themselves mentally prepared.

The emotion that you need to play the game doesn't mean that every single player needs to be out pacing around the field before a game the way Dawk does or screaming at the center of the field as the team huddles up prior to the game like Trot. What it does mean is that when the opening kick off commences, you have to be prepared to play right then and there. No waiting until halftime to get things rolling because though that might have worked in the past, it didn't work today.

Was the Cowboys game, previously seen to me as one of our best moments, actually bad for this team? Of course, especially now with a 4-4 record, that divisional win is huge for us, but I think emotionally it threw the team off track. Everything was built up into one game that we had to win, it was repeatedly referred to as a "playoff type" atmosphere. Once we won the game it set us up for dissapointment against the Saints. From that point on though we were suppoused to be fine, right? We've been horrible from that point on.

I'm scared that some players actually thought the season hinged on that one game and if we won it, than everything else would fall in place. We quickly have seen that that is definitely not the case as we begin a scramble to not get lost in the NFC before this year is over.

Embarrassing

Andy Reid couldn't have said it better himself, today's performance against the Jaguars was embarrassing. Dropped passes, stupid penalties, missed tackles, those are all characteristics of a losing team and we made every single one of those mistakes.

Andy was probably as mad as I've ever seen him after the game and I'm happy he was. I think I would have gone crazy if I had to listen to another week of "we need to do a better job" lines because obviously, the performances haven't gotten better over the past 3 weeks.

This team is in a position that I never would have imagined. I am so angry and disappointed with the players because the talent is here, just not the desire. The actual team we have is a very good team but no one can put anything together. I have no idea what the problem is, there is an obvious lack of urgency but I don't know how to fix that.

The scoreboard today gave the Jaguars no justice, they won this game 10 times over and the score makes it look like we were actually in the game. From the opening drive where we went 3 and out until the unsuccessful onsides kick, we sucked.

I always go through and talk about what went wrong, focus on positives and establish ways to try to fix the negatives. But there were no positives in this game as everyone just lost complete focus. I'm not sure if they were looking ahead to the BYE week too much or if they just don't care anymore, I have no answers.

The only thing I know today is that the Jaguars ran all over our defense, but yet that really wasn't why we lost the game. The stagnant offense was unable to get any running game going and actually just unable to move the ball at all. When plays were there for us to make, we repeatedly made mistakes.

A Little Mix Up

Apparently the team thought that today was the BYE week, so no one bothered to show up.

A Little Change Should Go A Long Way

This game is bigger than I thought it was going to be at this point. I previously viewed it as a game of mediocre importance heading into the BYE week. But because of the way things have shaped out over the past 2 weeks, this team will be crushed if we head into the BYE at 4-4. Even more important than the team morale will be that we will be yet another step behind the Giants.

It seems that David Garrard is going to start, when you look at the weather forecast calling for heavy winds, the Jaguars should have an advantage. Not necessarily an advantage over our defense but they are lucky that Garrard isn't going to have to go out their and throw the ball around. Quite possibly they will want to just have him run with it even more since it will be harder to pass due to the high winds.

I don't expect us to see many problems in Donovan's adaption to the weather. I'm sure he realizes that the way he first reacted to the weather in Tampa Bay last week hurt him but he eventually rebounded. Even with high winds I don't expect Donovan to have a hard time throwing on a secondary that gave up 27 points to the Houston Texans last week.

The highlight of the day is going to be the return of Donte' Stallworth. It appears that he will be playing, thank god, which should add a new dimension to the offense. We saw what a healthy Donte' can bring to the team in Week 1 and 2, now it's time to see it again. The quick fire start that the offense has been missing the past 2 weeks, should be revitalized with Stallworth in the lineup.

While Stallworth was gone Donovan was able to get more practice in with Baskett and Brown, both younger players. We saw how effective both of those guys can be, so to think that we have another play maker coming in is very exciting. Donovan and Stallworth have missed time working together because of Stallworth's injury but with very little practice they came out firing on all cylinders in Week 1, we've seen it done before. Donte' really should make it easy for Donovan because he has the speed to just completely humiliate a DB and I'm planning on him doing that to the Jaguars.

Previous to last week Brian Westbrook had gotten lost in the shuffle. With his knee injury limiting him in practice, he was limited on the game field as well. But somewhat forgotten in the terrible loss to the Bucs was Westbrook's amazing performance. Over 100 receiving and 100 rushing yards and he scored to put us ahead with only 33 second left in the game. Having Westbrook get the ball more often just increases our success rate. Every time he touches the ball a defense needs to fear him, more than any other player out on that field.

I just think our offense is too much for the Jaguars defense to handle. Between even just the main guys in Stallworth, Westbrook, and L.J. Smith, there are so many places for Donovan to put the ball. Than take into account guys like Reggie Brown, Hank Baskett and even Correll Buckhalter. The Jaguars should be overwhelmed by the talent on this team.

Come out of the gates ready to play, sounds simple but has been a problem. If the team can't get up for this game, especially heading into a BYE week, than there is something seriously wrong. I always have a fear of the players losing focus heading into their week off because they are awaiting their long overdue rest. But no one is going to be happy sitting at home next week if we lose this week. So they're not going to let it happen.

Leftwich or Garrard?

At this point right now we don't exactly know who the starting Quarterback of the Jaguars is going to be on Sunday. On the first day of practice, Wednesday, Head Coach Jack Del Rio split practice reps between both quarterbacks. Then Thursday Byron Leftwich sat out of the entire practice. This isn't a Tony Romo/Drew Bledsoe situation like in Dallas, the uncertainty of the Jaguars starting QB on Sunday is because of injuries.

Since the Jaguars Week 4 loss to the Washington Redskins, Byron Leftwich has had pain in his ankle, the same one that he broke a year ago. There is no bone break of ligament tear but it is still causing him pain. He claims that there is no correlation between this injury and last years broken bone but it is still a cause for concern. I talked previously about Byron being a very tough QB, always willing to play through injuries. It seems like a good quality but it has hurt him in the past, for coming back from an injury too early, and it seems to have hurt him again this year.

That is something that we experienced with Donovan in 2005 when he was playing with his Sports Hernia. In the beginning of the year he was still playing well despite the injury but as the season progressed it became harder for him to play. It came to a point where people were questioning whether we would be better off with Mike McMahon playing instead of an injured Donovan. I think Donovan knew that once he went down the season would be over and so he battled for as long as he could until the injury became severe in the Monday Night loss to the Cowboys. Once Donovan did go down, the season was gone as Mike McMahon and Koy Detmer were absolutely horrible, hence them not being on the roster this year.

Jack Del Rio seemed frustrated with himself that Byron played through the entire 27-7 loss to the Texans this past week. He expressed the fact that he feels Byron was hampered throughout the game because of his ankle injury and he should have stepped in and prevented him from playing or at least benched him during the game. We see time and time again, a player coming back too soon from an injury because they don't want to miss a game. In this situation Leftwich was trying to be a good teammate by playing through the pain but he ended up hurting the team because he wasn't at full strength. Jack Del Rio noted that changes needed to be made in the way that their team handles game day problems like that because someone should have spoken up and gotten Byron off of the field since he was obviously struggling because he was hurt.

With this injury we aren't completely sure which quarterback we are going to be facing on Sunday, will it be Byron Leftwich or back-up David Garrard? This is a little more complicated than these situations normally are because if Garrard comes in the team needs to game plan for him running the football. Garrard is way more mobile than Leftwich is and is known to get out of the pocket to make a few plays.

Garrard did a good job filling in for Byron last year when he broke his ankle, going 4-1 in the starts he made. You have to respect those wins because he is a back-up QB but it also needs to be taken into consideration that the teams he played in that 5 game stretch all weren't very stiff competition, except for the loss to the Colts. Everyone else who they beat: Browns, 49ers, Texans, and Titans all finished with losing records last year with a combined record of 16-48.

David Garrard has started 8 games in his career and has always displayed good strengths as a passer. But what we need to fear him for is his running game. In the games that he played in last year he averaged 24 rushing yards a game, which isn't a Mike Vick number or anything but it still needs to be kept in mind because he can kill you on those important 3rd down conversions with his legs. I would be surprised if Byron Leftwich doesn't play on Sunday but the thought of preparing all week for a pocket passer in Leftwich and then having to play a running QB makes me nervous.

I'm expecting Leftwich to play, but for Jack Del Rio to split time in practice between both QB's leading up to an important game, you have to think that he is seriously considering playing Garrard. If that does happen we won't be given the normal advantage as a defense in playing a back-up QB because I think Garrard is a valid starter in the NFL. If he was on another team that didn't have their money invested in a starting QB, he would be pushing for playing time. Of course he has the inexperience that will cause him to make some mistakes but he isn't someone that will force the Jaguars to lose, they will still be competitive.

Eerily Similar

Through different circumstances during his career, people have come to realize that Byron Leftwich is one of the toughest quarterbacks in the league. That is also something that has been said about Donovan McNabb because of his common practice of playing through injuries. The proof for Byron even goes back to his college career where his most memorable game at Marshall University was one when he led his team from a 17 point deficit to victory, despite playing with a broken shin. I can still picture the footage of him being carried down the field by two of his teammates because just walking on his leg put him in too much pain.

Leftwich really reminds me of Donovan but not in the obvious ways, not because he's an African American Quarterback, and not even in the way that he plays. Both guys actually have very different playing styles especially considering Donovan is much more mobile. But some of the things that both of these guys have endured are actually eerily similar. The two that stick out in my mind both actually revolve around toughness and leading a team despite trying circumstances.

First when I think of Byron winning a football game with a broken shin it reminds me of Donovan throwing 4 touchdown passes on a broken ankle against the Arizona Cardinals. Only 3 plays into the game Donovan was sacked by Adrian Wilson and fumbled the ball, in the process he injured his ankle. It was believed at that point that he had a sprained ankle and he continued to play in the game. He actually went on to have one of the best games of his career where he completed 80% of his passes and threw for 255 yards, 4 touchdowns and just 1 interception. As we all know after the game once the X-Rays were taken, it was realized that Donovan had a broken ankle which would keep him out for the rest of the regular season.

That display of sacrificing your own body to get your team a win is something that both Byron Leftwich and Donovan have done before. Byron has taken some of the biggest hits I've ever seen, but yet get right back up and play the next snap. We also know how Donovan began the 2005 season playing great despite having the infamous Sports Hernia. He fought through the pain that he felt every time he moved, just to get us some wins. Donovan was the September Player of The Month in 2005, before the injury and some distractions, forced the season to crumble.

One of the stranger similarities that I find between both Donovan and Byron involve Donovan during the 2002 season, after he broke his ankle, and Byron just last year.

In 2002 after Donovan's broken ankle game against the Cardinals in Week 11, he was out for the following 5 games and was replaced by Koy Detmer, then A.J. Feeley. Feeley stepped in and went 5-1, leading the Eagles to continue on their playoff aspirations. Once the Eagles made the playoffs Donovan rushed back to play against the Atlanta Falcons. It was a good decision because the Eagles ended up beating Atlanta 20-6. But the following game, the NFC Championship game against the Bucs, the Eagles lost 27-10 and the blame was shouldered on Donovan who threw a game ending interception to Ronde Barber. Many fans questioned whether Donovan came back too early and they decided that maybe if A.J. Feeley was in the game we would have won.

Last year Byron Leftwich started 8-3 before breaking his ankle in Week 12 while playing the Arizona Cardinals, the guy that injured him was Adrian Wilson, the same guy that took down Donovan 3 years earlier. Just like A.J. Feeley, the Jaguars back-up David Garrard came in and was successful going 4-1 in the remaining games and clinching a playoff Wild Card spot. But in that playoff game Leftwich struggled as the Jaguars lost to the Patriots 28-3. Similar to Donovan and A.J. Feeley, fans questioned whether the team would have been better off with having David Garrard continue to play and not rush Leftwich back.

I think it's so weird that both of these guys have some strange things in common. Both showed their immense toughness by playing with broken legs to lead their teams to a win. Then they both suffered broken ankles from hits by Adrian Wilson of the Arizona Cardinals, each taking them out for the remainder of the season as their backups came in and finished off the drive to the playoffs. Also they both were criticized for coming back too early from the broken ankles as they went on to lose in the playoffs.

Donovan and Byron have completely different techniques, besides being big athletes that can break a few tackles, but have experienced some of the same things. I'm excited to play Leftwich on Sunday but lets hope his toughness doesn't cause us any problems.

Importance of Jaguars

Every week I declare a game important. Frankly, because every single game is important when you only play 16 weeks. The game against the Jaguars this Sunday doesn't hold the significance of an NFC East game or even a conference game considering we're playing an AFC team. But emotionally this team has already been through a lot despite it only being Week 7.

Right now we are in a 2 game losing streak and to extend that streak to 3 games would kill this team. Though I don't think the NFC East is the best division in the NFL, I do believe that it is the most competitive so to be yet another step behind the 1st place team, the New York Giants, would be devastating. Especially considering the Giants are most likely going to notch another win this week, considering they're playing the Tampa Bay Bucs that only looked good last week because we made them look good.

This team knows that they should have a much better record than they do. Of course you can point to the fact that we really haven't caught a break all year, but if the stupid mistakes were eliminated, or at least minimized, we wouldn't be in this position.

The Jaguars surprisingly lost to the Texans last week which really made no sense. I didn't watch the game but from what I've seen of it the loss really was at fault of the Jaguars secondary along with 2 Jaguar fumbles which led to 14 points for the Texans. Houston's ability to capitalize on the turnovers and not turn the ball over themselves, led the way for an easy victory.

Jacksonville is a much better team than what they showed on Sunday, that is simply seen from the teams they have beat prior to Sunday like the Cowboys and Steelers. The Jaguars got off to a great start in those 2 wins and then despite a loss to the Colts, they showed that they were able to hang with a Super Bowl contender because they were in that game all the way until the last minute when Byron Leftwich threw a game ending interception.

The season has struggled from that point on as they lost the following week to the Washington Redskins, who have proven that they aren't a very good team considering they are so inconsistent. Then they shut out a bad Jets team, as they should have, and went into the BYE week with a 3-2 record as well as the respect of a lot of people around the league. But to come out of a BYE week and lose to the Hoston Texans is pathetic.

Despite the fact that the team had an extra week to prepare for their match up in Houston they really were humiliated in that loss. So even though we think that the Eagles are coming into the game with a lot of hunger to win because they lost in the final minute two weeks in a row, the Jaguars are in the same boat.

We need to win this game to end the losing streak and because we can't give up a game at home. It is harder to win on the road so we have that simple advantage over Jacksonville but we can't drop another game before going into the BYE week.

Take a glance ahead at the schedule, after the BYE week we have another home game but it's against a divisional opponent, the Redskins, so that is a must-win. Keep moving on and you have the Colts, Panthers, then 3 away divisional games, and finally topped off with the Atlanta Falcons. There is a long stretch ahead to make the playoffs and it starts with the Jaguars. In order to succeed we have to win the easier home games like this Sunday's match up. We already screwed up by dropping the games against the Saints and Bucs, just making this trip a little bit harder on ourselves.

Keep The Faith

"If you don't think this team can make the playoffs, if you don't believe in us, then get off the bandwagon, because we don't need you." - Michael Lewis

Is This Team Disciplined?

One of the questions that arose in yet another very dull Andy Reid press conference today was "is this team disciplined?". It's a legitimate question considering that there have been numerous penalties this year that have cost us games. The most frustrating part about those penalties is they are just stupid mistakes, not necessarily the obvious holding and false start penalties but ones regarding behavior.

This team does need to have swagger, of course, that was something that the 2004 Eagles thrived on. Also you want your team to be able to play smash mouth defense, not let teams walk all over you, and with that technique comes a mentality of toughness from the players. But lost in that lately has been just ridiculous mental mistakes which at first are blamed on the individual player but as the occurrences become more frequent you wonder if the coach needs to really start bringing down the hammer.

Just off of the top of my head we have had some very costly penalties this year, more than I ever remember before and it is only Week 7. First was the Trent Cole kick to the groin against the Giants, there was the Omar Gaither 12th man call in New Orleans, and even Jerome McDougle was called this week for kicking a flag. Mixed in there are all kinds of pass interferences, offensive and defensive, which have also given up big chunks of yardage.

Overall, we lead the NFL in penalty yardage with 441 total yards, ridiculous. That is 105 more yards than the pathetic Oakland Raiders and 94 more yards than the Cincinnati Bengals who have trouble suiting up every week because 95% of them are incarcerated.

The only thing that gives me a little hope that progress might be made is that normally the players are off on Mondays but today Andy Reid brought the whole team in to look at game film. He didn't give any details as to why, but I think we can figure it out. Someone needs to step up and get the offense to produce in the 1st half and keep the morons on the team from committing stupid penalties. There really isn't much more this team needs to be successful, we have seen in the 3rd quarter of the past 2 games that these players can put up points. In the first 3 quarters of the Giants game we saw that this defense can rattle the opposing offense.

Now for once, just one week, put both the high scoring offense and dominant defense together in one game. It would help if they both started playing from the 1st quarter on so we don't have to come out of the locker room at halftime every week with a 17 point hill to climb. We can do this, this team can make plays, Andy just needs to point them in the right direction.

Where's The Luck?

Currently we are 4-3 and as Cris Collingsworth pointed out with just a little bit of luck we could be 7-0. Of course there are different factors that have led to the losses to the Giants, Saints, and Bucs but what is most painful is that every single one of those losses came on the last play of the game.

Against New York it was a Plaxico Burress touchdown in overtime, New Orleans it was a 31 yard field goal by John Carney, and today it was a 62 yard field goal by Matt Bryant.

In all of those losses I thought it was the worst I'd ever felt after a defeat, but that feeling has been getting worse and worse each time. It has gotten to be unbearable.

It's pretty ridiculous and is very trying on a team. The only thing I can hope is that the football gods are bottling us up some Miracle at the Meadowlands type of luck for use later in the season. Where's Herm Edwards when you need him? Is anyone ever going to cut us a break?

We Need Donte' To Light The Fire

Despite speculation that Donte' Stallworth might be back this week to play against the Bucs, he didn't end up playing. The only chance he has to play before the BYE week is Sunday against the Jacksonville Jaguars. Of course I'm not ready to get into the details of that game yet, I need a few days to heal from this one, but if I'm not optimistic right now I don't think I'll be able to survive such a heart wrenching loss.

The offense has gotten off to slow starts against the Packers, Saints, and now Bucs. Some people might say they got off to a slow start against the Cowboys but that was nothing like these other debacles. Against the Cowboys we still put 17 points up in the 1st half, it was just that mistakes cost us a lot more points than that.

Somebody needs to light a fire under this offense and the only man I can think who is perfect for the job is Donte' Stallworth. He's a guy that lets us take those quick shots down the field and he opens up the passing game even more for Baskett, Brown, and Smith.

As I talked out before, both Brown and Baskett have benefited from Stallworth's absence. Baskett was able to have a huge day against the Cowboys and Brown did the same against the Saints. Reggie's production has been much more consistent than Baskett's but the inconsistency that Hank Baskett is exhibiting right now is something that we saw from Reggie during his rookie season, it just comes with the territory.

But those guys alone haven't been able to help the offense start off lightning quick and it has been killing us. Even just the presence of a player that hasn't been on the field much this year should be able to add some excitement to Donovan and company because I have no idea why each week it's like pulling teeth to get the offense's motor going.

Time for Panic? No, Time For Urgency

Prior to the game I said there would only be a reason to panic if we lost one of the next 2 games before the BYE week. Well we found a way to do just that.

Looking ahead at the schedule the games only get tougher. To lose these past 2 weeks to teams that we are better than just kills you. It then forces you to go into every other game as a must win situation and that is so draining on a team.

I'm not panicking because I don't feel like this team can do it, I do feel like we can do it, but it's time to panic because that is the only way we can get some urgency into this football team. Starting a game off slow on offense has now been a ridiculously monotonous practice. Week after week we are talking about the same exact problems, nothing is getting fixed. After the Giants game Jeremiah Trotter said it was the best thing that happened to them because it taught them a lesson. Now I'm starting to realize that it just taught the defense a lesson, not the offense, these past 2 weeks the losses have been because of the slow starts on offense.

The comfortable lead we set ourselves up with in the NFC East has now diminished these past two games. The 1st place spot isn't ours anymore, we have a possibility of tying for 1st place, but that depends on tomorrows game. Right now we are 4-3, the other 2 contenders in our division, Cowboys and Giants, are both 3-2. So no matter what happens when the Giants and Cowboys play each other tomorrow, one team is going to move up to first place.

The question that arises is if the Giants take 1st, then we move down to 2nd because the Giants have the tiebreaker win over us since they beat us in Week 2. What I hope happens is that the Cowboys win tomorrow because though we both would have the same record, we beat the Cowboys in Week 5, which would give us the tie breaker to still hold 1st place.

It's a confusing game that we are going to be playing throughout the entire season in the race to the playoffs. As of right now there are 3 big contenders in our division between us, New York, and Dallas so letting games slip through our fingers, like today, have the possibility of killing us.

I'm not scared but we have to realize that we made this battle so much harder. The perfect scenario was to go into the 2nd half of the season with a little bit of a cushion. I hoped to get the cushion by beating the easier teams on the schedule, such as the Saints and Bucs. Now though we have marginal room for error as we face our toughest opponents like the Colts and Panthers.

We can still do it, but when slip ups happen like today it just increases the pressure on your divisional games. Now we can't afford to lose a single divisional game, much easier said than done.

Control Your Emotions

Jerome McDougle handed the Bucs 30 yards because of a penalty in the 4th quarter that ended up resulting in a Bucs field goal. After Cadillac Williams was stopped for a 2 yard loss the Bucs had a 2nd and 12, McDougle got a sack and was obviously elated, especially considering all that he has been through. But after the play he realized there was a flag on the ground for a grabbing Gradkowski's face mask, I wouldn't have been mad if that was the only call because it was a mistake he made in trying to make a play.

But immediately after the flag was thrown he let his emotions get the best of him and he went over and kicked the flag, a complete sign of disrespect to the officials. That unsportsmanlike conduct call added an additional 15 yards to the penalty, setting Tampa Bay up on the Eagles 43 yard line. That mistake gave the Bucs offense new life and let them run an additional 2 and 1/2 minutes off of the clock in a very critical situation. Once they were finally they stopped Bryant was now able to make a 44 yard field goal which pulled the Bucs lead to 6 points, forcing the Eagles to get a touchdown on their next drive.

We did get a touchdown, so McDougle was saved there. Though the field goal that is going to be talked about most is the 62 yard game winner, those 3 points in the 44 yard field goal proved critical when we ended up losing by a 2 point margin.

There are no excuses for Jerome McDougle. He knows that he really messed up, he has apologized, but he realizes that no matter what he says he can't take back a stupid penalty. It hurts even more to realize that the game might have turned out differently if the Bucs didn't get the chance to kick that field goal.

Gave All He Could, Not Enough

Every time we start a game we shoot ourselves right in the foot. This week the offense was halted in the entire 1st half because of dropped passes and turnovers.

The most scrutinized situation of the game, that is going to be over analyzed all week, is the play at the end of the 1st half which left at least 3 points on the field. As we look back we see that those 3 points could have won us the game.

The offense had 1 minute and 2 timeouts to go down the field and score before halftime. It would have been a much better situation to have at least 3 points on the board as opposed to zero. The 2 minute drill was working perfectly, a lot of execution along with Donovan running the ball, put us only 6 yards away from the end zone. We had 8 seconds left to take one more shot at the end zone, if nothing was there, just throw it away and kick the field goal. But for some reason which I will never know, whether L.J. ran the wrong route, Donovan thought that he was in the end zone, I have no idea. But Donovan threw it to L.J. Smith who landed at the 2 yard line, giving us no time to stop the clock. Three points left on the field because of poor clock management.

It is extremely frustrating for the clock management situation to be something that is so recurring. The first time that clock management really became an issue was in the Super Bowl and the problem hasn't subsided since then. I remember last year this was an issue and this year it has been an issue. Andy Reid won't give any answers except that they need to work on it, ya think?

Donovan needs to shoulder the blame for this one. No matter what the reasoning was, he screwed up big time. Though he ended up redeeming himself by scoring 3 touchdowns, it wasn't enough and as much as I don't want it to, the blame has to go to Donovan because if we had won the way I thought we were going to, I was prepared to give the credit to Donovan.

In the 2nd half, despite coming out by throwing an interception that was returned for a touchdown, Donovan rebounded and put the team on his shoulders.

He, along with the entire team, was obviously affected by the 102 degree heat in Tampa Bay. These guys were conditioned to deal with those kind of conditions back in August during training camp, but it's been awhile since they had to play in such heat. Donovan was visibly hindered by the temperature, as you saw when he threw up during the game, but he didn't let it affect his play. He wasn't going to let the heat take him out of the game, and he didn't.

After throwing those 3 interceptions everything completely shifted. Donovan started taking things into his own hands as he ran 6 times for 76 yards, he looked like the much younger version of himself. He really seemed to put the offense on his shoulders in the last quarter and a half. Guys were getting involved with Brian Westbrook having an amazing day and Reggie Brown also doing great as well.

But when it all came down to it, it wasn't enough. This game could have been looked back on as a heroic effort by Donovan to be able to rally the troops and come from behind to win. Honestly though, that would have just covered up issues that are going to be talked about now that we lost. Even if Bryant had missed the 62 yard field goal, the team still would have had to address the fact that yet again, the offense started off ridiculously slow.

Losing Turnover Battle

Starting with the 1st drive of the game, the problems with turnovers began. We were driving down the field in the opening possession, really seemed to be clicking out of the gate on offense. Then Jason Avant fumbled and the offense didn't recover for the entire 1st half. Losing the ball so early in the game stings but there is just so much left to do, I wasn't that pained by it. I had seen success with moving the ball down the field on that drive, so I didn't think it would be that hard to get the offense going once again, but it was.

I was not used to seeing Donovan throw so many interceptions. That really has been something that he could pride himself on. Up until this game he really only had 1 interception, the other one that is in his stats was in a meaningless Hail Mary at the end of the 1st half against the Saints, I don't even count that. That changed today though, as Donovan threw 3 interceptions, and as the commentators pointed out, the last time he did that was in the Super Bowl.

Ronde Barber had a field day humiliating Donovan by not only picking off 2 passes by returning both of them for touchdowns. Along with Barber's two interceptions was an interception by Juran Bolden, but that turnover just resulted in a 3 and out by the Bucs offense.

McNabb almost screwed things up even more when he fumbled the snap on a 3rd and 1 where he was going to sneak it. Thankfully he recovered the ball but he still sacrificed a first time in the process.

If we had won this game it would have been very surprising because usually the team who wins the turnover battle wins the game. But even though the game winning field goal wasn't technically set up by a turnover, if the 4 turnovers never happened, we wouldn't have been put in that position.

33 Seconds

It only took 33 seconds for absolute elation to turn into absolute defeat.

Today was yet another crushing loss that rips out your heart and pounds it into the turf. Just add it to the list.

My first instinct is just that this isn't fair. I mean honestly, who makes a 62 yard field goal? Then right after that I fall into feeling that it's just so typical. No one would ever let us just heroically come from behind and march onto victory, not at all, not the Philadelphia Eagles.

I'm starting to realize now that I can't even complain about how unfair it is for the Bucs to make a ridiculous field goal attempt. We lost the game fair and square. If we had actually came out playing like a football team, not went scoreless in the 1st half, than this wouldn't have been a factor.

This just makes me sick, now we do have a right to be in panic mode. Before the game I said I would start to panic if we lost today or next week, well that happened.

This week is going to suck.

I don't have anything to say. I can't handle this. This isn't fair.

1-4 A Deceiving Number

Take a glance at the Tampa Bay roster, you're going to see a lot of names that you recognize. Ronde Barber, Joey Galloway, Mike Alstott, Simeon Rice, Derrick Brooks, and the list goes on.

The last time that we played this team they humiliated us. It was the first game at Lincoln Financial Field and we were playing for revenge. The previous season the Bucs had beaten us in the NFC Championship game at home, in the last game at Veterans Stadium, than they came into the inaugural game at the new stadium and shut us out 17-0.

The teams facing eachother today are altogether different from the teams that played in that 2003 game, but there are still a lot of the same veterans around. Brad Johnson and Joe Jurevicius are no longer there, the same way that Bobby Taylor and Troy Vincent are no longer here. But there are guys on the Bucs like Barber, Rice, and Brooks who all took part in beating us that year. Also there are guys on our team like Dawkins and McNabb who should still remember the loss.

When you see those veterans on the roster it's surprising to see that they're 1-4. This team isn't as bad as their record depicts and I actually don't understand how they went 4 weeks straight before gaining their first win.

This week the urgency to win doesn't stem from any other motives except simply adding another win to our record. In past weeks we have played on Monday Night, which gives the game more attention than normal. Then we faced off in a extremely hyped up rival game against the Cowboys and this past week the attention surrounded around a possible let down against the Saints, which ended up happening.

Obviously every single week, no matter what, I'm going to say we need to win because in the NFL you only have 16 opportunities to win, far less than in any other sport. This week the win needs to come for the same reason it needs to come next week, we have to go into the BYE week 6-2.

After today's game we play the Jaguars at home, another must-win, because after the Week 8 BYE we are bound to slip up somewhere. Whether it be against the Colts, Panthers, or in our 3 straight divisional road games, we will hit some bumps along the way to the playoffs. I think this team has the talent to beat every single opponent on our schedule but the NFL is just so competitive, some times balls just don't bounce your way, there are bad calls made, there is always that unknown factor.

I'm not looking past this Tampa Bay team because I know that they are going to try and establish the run against us the way they have for the past 2 weeks against the Saints and Bengals. They are lead by a great coach in Jon Gruden and their rookie QB, might be a rookie, but he is proving himself more and more each week. The defense is full of veterans that we have played before and guys, like Ronde Barber, who have forced us to lose games in the past.

I normally don't panic but I will say right now, if we lose today or next Sunday, than I'm going to panic. We HAVE to go into the BYE week at 6-2, there are no other options. When you are in a division as competitive as the NFC East, with both the Giants and Cowboys rebounding from rough starts, there is no room for mistakes.

It's Been Awhile

I feel like it's been year's since we've seen Donte' Stallworth out on the field. The last time he made a real contribution was in Week 2 against the New York Giants when he snagged 5 balls for 81 yards and a touchdown. That was during his two opening games in Philadelphia where he put up big numbers.

It all started with the regular season opener in Houston where Stallworth carved up the Texan's secondary to catch 6 catches for 141 yards and a touchdown. As I said before, that was followed by a Giants game where he was also productive, not the leading receiver that week, L.J. Smith was, but he still contributed.

From that point on Donte' has been pretty nonexistent as he has battled hamstring injuries. He has only played 1 of the past 4 games, it was against the Packers, where he only had 1 catch for 26 yards before leaving the game early with a hamstring injury. That wasn't where the hamstring problems started though. After the touchdown performance in Week 2 against the Giants, Stallworth sat out in Week 3 against the 49ers. At that time to be it seemed like it was just the safe thing to do, he was a little banged up so just let him rest, we were big favorites to win the game.

The next week he played against the Packers, that was the last time that we saw him on the field and it was October 2nd, it's now October 21st. He's been battling a hamstring injury, one that has seemed to plague his whole career. That was a negative about him when he was brought in, that he has chronic hamstring and groin problems. It didn't take long before we saw those problems emerge.

In Donte's absence we've had both Reggie Brown and Hank Baskett really emerge. They were both supposed to be our starting WR's prior to the trade for Stallworth but in all of the hype that followed Donte' to Philadelphia, they were ignored. They could have reacted negatively by realizing that Donte' was brought in because the coaches didn't feel we were strong enough at WR with just both of them. They didn't though, they used it as a motivational factor and have really benefited from Donte's presence.

When we look back on this time of the year I think we will really appreciate the fact that Stallworth was out because it really gave Baskett and Brown both time to break out. Everyone in Philadelphia knows who both of them are but now, Reggie Brown especially, they are beginning to earn respect around the league.

We have the #1 passing offense in the NFL right now and by a big margin. We are averaging 290.8 passing yards per game whereas the team in 2nd, the Green Bay Packers, are still 38.8 yards behind us with 252 passing yards per game. Donovan McNabb is still the league leader in passing yardage, I think he has been all year, with 1849, again by a big margin, having a 230 yard lead over the 2nd place QB Marc Bulger of the Rams. He also is first in passer rating and touchdowns, pretty impressive. Of course these stats don't add up to anything if you're not winning, but we are. Yes there have been bumps in the road such as the let down against the Saints and the melt down against the Giants but through these times we have learned that this is a very good team, I will even say a great team.

The offense has not seemed desperate for Stallworth to make a comeback, we are doing just fine without him. So it's great to think that once he gets healthy again there is just another option for Donovan to go with the ball. Even more importantly than that Stallworth is a great deep threat, which we did seem to miss against the Saints where we repeatedly went for the big pass down field but had drops by younger receivers like Hank Baskett and Jason Avant. Though Stallworth isn't known for having great hands, he is able to get more separation from a DB than Avant and Baskett can, which gives him a much better chance to come down with the ball.

The storyline this week for the Eagles is whether Donte' Stallworth will play or not. Personally, I don't care. He increases our chances of winning because he is another play maker to add to the offense. But, like Donovan, I'm confident in the guys we have on the field right now. I'm not about to rush Stallworth back and have him re injure himself, which is what I believe happened when he played against the Packers and that mistake has kept him out for much longer than previously expected.

If he plays, awesome, if he doesn't we have Brown and Baskett ready to go for another week.

Jim Johnson's 2 Favorite Words

Rookie Quarterback

The strength of our defense is that we have such a good coach in Jim Johnson he is able to really confuse an offense. It seems like he knows what an opposing offense is going to do before the offense even knows what they're going to do. His ability to predict and game plan for a certain type of attack, always gives our defense the upper hand.

As much as Jim will never come out and say it, in respect to his opponent, you know that he is going to have a fun time showing Bucs QB Bruce Gradkowski blitz packages that he has never seen before. Right now Gradkowski is surprising many people because he is actually managing the Bucs offense pretty well right now, which is rare for a rookie to do.

Gradkowski lead the Bucs to their first win of the year last week in an upset over the Bengals. It's not like Gradkowski is in a position like Ben Roethilsberger was in during the 2004 season. The key to Ben's success was that the ball was only in his hands 20-something times each game, the Steelers really relied upon their running game. Also the guys that Ben had around him were veterans like Hines Ward, Jerome Bettis, Randle El, all play makers.

The Buc's do have some receivers that give Gradkowski options with Joey Galloway and Michael Clayton. Galloway being a more experienced receiver but both of them not outstanding players. They have to be feared, especially in the redzone, one of the reasons for Tampa Bay finally winning over the Bengals last week was they were throwing the ball more. The running game is what keeps the team going but Cadillac Williams was pretty much a non-factor at the beginning of this season.

After breaking out to a huge start his rookie season last year, Williams started to slow down as the wear and tear on his body got worse. Jon Gruden learned that they can't run the kid into the ground, so this year Williams hasn't been getting nearly as many carries as he was the same time last year. In the beginning of the season Williams was ineffective, averaging about 2.6 yards per carry. In the past 2 weeks his average has been double that, about 5.2 yards per carry.

A big factor of such a drastic change in a few weeks has been Tampa Bay's opponents. In the first 3 games of the year they played the Ravens, Falcons, and Panthers all much stronger running defenses than the past 2 weeks with the Saints and Bengals. Playing a team like the Bengals, that they were able to run on, gave them the opportunity to open up the passing game a little bit to.

Gradkowski has had 4 touchdowns and only 1 interception in his two starts. Along the way he also has been using his mobility to get out of the pocket and away from pressure in an effort to avoid sacks. He's been sacked 4 times but he doesn't take big losses on those sacks. When Chris Simms was starting he was sacked 4 times but he lost 32 yards in the process. When Gradkowski takes a sack he doesn't lose so many yards, often times because he is trying to get out of the pocket to run with the ball, he's not easy to bring down. He has 38 rushing yards all thanks to being a much more physical QB than Chris Simms.

Despite the fact that Gradkowski has been impressing people and he very well could be starting for Tampa Bay next year because this is the final year of Chris Simm's contract, Jim Johnson will expose him as a rookie. Last week Drew Brees utilized quick 3 step drops to prevent us from getting pressure on him. The Saints offensive line played very well and made our 4 man rush nonexistent.

That is not going to happen for a 2nd week in a row. There is going to be plenty of pressure in the rookies face, forcing him to make quick decisions and hopefully mistakes. He will show a few flashes of brilliance but Jon Gruden is going to try and do what the Saints did. Run the ball and keep the ball out of Bruce's hands.

Splitting Time

Right now no one is completely sure what the problem is with Michael Lewis. You can go back and dissect the big plays he's given up, it all comes down to a misstep here or there, biting too hard on a double move, all mechanics. But when a player consistently has a problem, then it starts to become a mental issue and that is where things get tricky.

After the Saints game it was obvious that Michael Lewis was pretty dejected. He said all of the right things, that when he was benched he was just hoping for Sean Considine to be able to go in and make a big play, he wasn't thinking about himself. But it couldn't have helped him very much when he woke up the next day and saw the front page of newspapers referring to him, deservedly so, as a liability. That is just something that professional athletes have to deal with though, when the praise comes it comes from everywhere, but when the criticism comes it seems like even more people are dishing it out.

The coaches knew that something needed to be done and they were very proactive about the situation, no one is going to just sit on their hands to prevent a players feelings from being hurt.
Andy Reid made it clear that the problems on Sunday have led him to give Sean Considine more playing time. It's a big deal to just voluntarily change your starting safety during the middle of the season, especially when the replacement is only in his 2nd year in the NFL, so Andy is going to have both of the guys play and over time we will see who the starter will be.

Up until this point Michael Lewis has been the starter, he hasn't missed a game since his first start in 2002. It is actually very frustrating that this even has become an issue because no one is saying that Lewis doesn't make plays, far from it. He's a very hard hitting safety, I mean the guy has had game clinching interceptions and has 2 sacks this season, but if you give up more big plays than you make, it becomes a problem.

On the other side of things I'm really excited with what I've seen from Sean Considine so far. He has played well in his limited role this year. He is always in on special teams and one of the best players on that whole squad. The time that he sees on defense is usually in nickle packages and in that role he already has made plays. So having Sean on defense for us isn't a big stretch right now. It is just that he is still a young player, he missed the majority of his rookie year with a shoulder injury, so he has a big learning curve.

As much as I wanted a change to be made with Lewis I'm happy that Considine isn't just being thrown into the fire. I honestly believe he would have handled it well but we aren't in a time that calls for panic. We have the resources necessary to work Considine in slowly and eventually see if he serves better in Lewis's full time role. There really is nothing to lose by giving Considine more snaps because he is a guy that is going to be on this team for many years to come, Lewis might be gone after this year, so Sean needs to see as much time as he can.

Different Team in 3rd Quarter

We've been through all of the things that made us lose on Sunday:

• We lost at the line of scrimmage as Donovan was sacked 3 times but yet we were unable to sack Drew Brees at all.
  
• The Saints completely eliminated Brian Westbrook from the passing game, holding him to only 3 catches for 3 yards.
  
• Michael Lewis got burnt deep...once again.
• Stupid mistakes were made between the 12 men penalty, dropped passes, and clock management problems.
  

When you're watching a team drive down the field for 8 1/2 minutes to close out a game, it is more than frustrating. So when that game winning field goal was kicked, everyone was left with a very bitter taste in their mouths. Amidst all of that it is easily forgotten how well the team played in the 3rd quarter and the very beginning of the 4th.

You can conclude that even looking back means nothing because we did end up losing the game. But you have to take into account that this is only Week 6 and despite losing we do have a very good team. There are obviously things that need to be fixed, but no drastic changes are required.

After a tumultuous first half which resulted in only 3 points on the board and 106 passing yards, the locker room had to be pretty quiet. Nothing was working, we had receivers dropping passes, no pressure on Drew Brees, and a fumbled punt return.

Things changed quickly in the 3rd quarter though. On the 3rd play of the second half Donovan completed a 60 yard pass to Reggie Brown for a touchdown, beautiful. When the Saints got the ball back they abandoned the run game for some reason and our defense quickly stopped them.

Then after the ball changed hands a few times we had it back with about 5 minutes left. A 76 yard drive was put together, aided by a 20 yard pass interference call, and the series ended with an L.J. Smith touchdown. We tied the game up.

Almost as soon as the defense got on the field Darwin Walker intercepted a tipped pass. That set up a 15 yard touchdown run by Reggie Brown, we took the lead.

But we only held that lead for about 2 minutes, then everything began to go downhill. Michael Lewis got burned on a 48 yard touchdown to Joe Horn. After the Eagles had the ball for only a few minutes they gave it back to the Saints offense who were on the field for the remainder of the game. As Donovan just sat on the sideline waiting for one more shot to drive his team to a win, the defense was unable to get off of the field.

During that 3rd quarter of football this team put up 21 unanswered points. The offense was able to score 3 touchdowns and the defense forced a turnover by getting pressure on Brees.

Against the Giants we started off great but lost the game in the 4th quarter. Against the Packers we started off slow but regained it in the second half. We beat the Cowboys because we actually played 4 quarters of football. Not 3 quarter like against New York and not 2 like against the Packers and certainly not 1 like we played against New Orleans. All 4 quarters.

In these past six weeks we have seen that this team has the talent to play great and win a football game from behind. We have seen that this team has the talent to play great from the beginning. Now it's time to put both of those instances together to form a great game overall. I have no idea how to do it because I'm not sure why there is so much inconsistency. Right now I can only rely on the coaches and I trust Andy, Marty, and Jim to get things done.

No One's Job Is Guaranteed

We have seen in the past, when something isn't going right, the coaches aren't afraid to make changes to the starting lineup.

Even going back just 2 years ago to 2004 we had a pretty major change midway through the season.

Our defense was having trouble stopping the run. We had Mark Simoneau at middle linebacker but he was injured so he missed a week. In his place Jeremiah Trotter got the start and actually surprised the coaches with how well he played. No one could believe that the Trotter that the Redskins had just cut could be like the All-Pro Trotter we once knew.

From that point forward Jeremiah Trotter was the new starting middle linebacker. Simoneau never developed into another role after losing his MLB job to Trotter. Eventually, this year, Simoneau was traded to the New Orleans Saints where he now gets to start.

Jim Johnson didn't care that Simoneau had earned his starting job through training camp. Jeremiah Trotter was a late addition to the team and he quickly showed that he was better than the struggling starter. It wasn't personal but a starting job was changed, all for the better of the team.

It actually ended up really paying off because as soon as Trotter started, the entire defense improved in stopping the run. That one change was pretty risky considering that the middle linebacker is such an important position but there needed to be improvements made.

It has happened before and it can happen again. Right now Michael Lewis's starting job is definitely in jeopardy. This is not an overreaction to him letting up one big play yesterday, this has been a continuous problem throughout last year and it has now carried into 2006.

I think if you are going to make a change this week is the week to do it. We are playing a team that won their first game of the year last week and is playing with a rookie QB in Bruce Gradkowski. Not even completely give the job to Sean Considine, but give Considine more snaps. We need to see if he is an improvement over Lewis and if he isn't at least it should push Lewis a little bit more to see that he isn't guaranteed anything on this team.

I'm not sure when or if a change will be made but it is obvious just from the way Andy Reid was talking at his post game press conference. Michael Lewis is not a lock to start at strong safety. It is going to be very interesting to see how this plays out.

D-Line Ineffective

The inconsistency at D-line is very frustrating. There are many times where the plays you make are dictated by the opponent. You are obviously going to have more sacks when you line up against a much weaker offensive line. But for our defense to lead the NFL in sacks but yet be unable to get any pressure on Drew Brees all day was mind blowing.

When we struggled to disrupt Brett Favre in the pocket 2 weeks ago I understood why. For one thing he's Brett Favre and he is known for being able to quickly get the ball out of his hands. Then to go on and sack Drew Bledsoe 7 times a week later made sense because he is the complete opposite of Favre. Bledsoe is known to hold on to the ball way too long and take a sack instead of throwing the ball away.

I wouldn't have believed you if you told me that we wouldn't sack Drew Brees a single time today. The only time that we actually did get to him was in the 4th quarter with 3 minutes left. But that was soon taken back because Omar Gaither messed up, he was on the field when he shouldn't have been resulting in a flag.

Brees wasn't sitting back and just throwing down the field all day but he did when he needed to. The majority of their success looked exactly like what our offense looks like when we are clicking. They just kept running typical west coast offense "dink and dunk" plays. A 5 yard pick up here, quick snap and throw it to Reggie Bush in the flats, etc.

The only difference in today's defensive line personnel as opposed to other weeks was that Sam Rayburn saw his first game time of the year. Up until now LaJuan Ramsey had been suiting up in Rayburns place. There was no real reasoning to the change, Ramsey had been doing a good job, I just think they wanted to get Rayburn back in there for a little bit. Just putting Rayburn in though was no reasoning as to why our line had such a hard time getting to Drew Brees.

It seemed like today the defense really was just trying to stay at home, not over pursue Reggie Bush and give up a big play. Whatever it was it can't happen again, Bruce Gradkowski needs to see a lot more pressure than Brees did.

Lost In The Loss: Reggie Has Great Day

Not many positives about this game. I still feel that we are a better team than the Saints, but I will feel that way for almost every team we play.

Something that can't be forgotten though is Reggie Brown and yet another stellar performance from the emerging star.

Reggie had two scores today: one running and one receiving. He had 6 catches for 121 yards with the longest reception, 60 yards, being completed for a touchdown.

The other touchdown that Reggie had was on a running play and it was the 2nd time we saw him run the ball this year. Against the Packers he ran once but this play was executed perfectly and resulted in a 15 yard touchdown, his 2nd of the day.

It's great to see how well Reggie is doing right now because on the other side of him is Hank Baskett who has come up with big games, like against the Cowboys, and fallen short in others. There is a big consistency problem that Baskett is fighting but while he is working through rookie struggles, Reggie is showing how much he benefited from the extended playing time he saw in 2005.

One positive of that disastrous season was the chance to get so many young players much more playing time than they normally would have seen by this point in their careers.

The thing that should scare all defenses is once Donte' Stallworth gets back on the field. Reggie Brown isn't just any 2nd year player. He is already establishing himself as a legitimate threat and having Stallworth across from him will give Donovan very reliable options to complete passes to.

Enough Is Enough

The game had started off very slow for the Eagles offense but by the beginning of the 4th quarter they had posted 21 unanswered points. It just felt like everything was finally going our way until Joe Horn scores a touchdown on a 48 yard pass. The defender who let up the big score? Michael Lewis.

Last week against the Dallas Cowboys the game seemed to be in the bag. The Eagles just needed to stop one final play a 4th and 18. The 1st down is converted, giving Dallas the ball just 6 yards shy of the end zone because Michael Lewis was flagged for pass interference.

Two big plays. Two big mistakes. Against the Cowboys, Lito Sheppard bailed us out. This time once the Saints tied up the score we were unable to finish it off with a win.

The most telling sign after the Joe Horn touchdown was you didn't see Michael Lewis back in the game. When the Saints had the ball for their 8 minute 23 seconds, 16 play drive, Lewis was sitting on the sidelines. In his place was 2nd year player Sean Considine.

Andy's reasoning for this was he wanted to get Considine a few plays. I think it was more than that. If you just want to get a player "a few plays" you don't do it during a drive where your defense has to post a stop to win.

It looks like the coaches think that Michael Lewis is a liability and I agree with them.

Michael really seemed to emerge in 2004 as a hard hitting strong safety. He even earned a trip to the Pro-Bowl along with teammates Brian Dawkins and Lito Sheppard. From that point on though he has had problems.

No one is accusing Lewis of not playing hard. I mean he swarms around the ball constantly. He has tons of tackles. We also know that he has the ability to make big plays himself. But you can't have a safety that you don't trust is able to lay back in coverage when you need him to and be able to go up and swat down a ball. He hasn't given us any reason to trust his ability.

The most compelling part of this all is that he is playing in the final year of his contract. Right on his heels is Sean Considine a 4th round draft pick last year. We've seen how much of a force Sean is on special teams, now it looks like Andy wants to give him that opportunity to transfer his talent over to defense.

Maybe not this week, maybe not next week. But with the way Michael Lewis is playing right now, this is going to be his last year in Philadelphia. If that is the case than Sean Considine will be starting and he needs to start getting some experience now.

Mental Mistakes Ruin Game

It seemed like on every down there was a flag being thrown. Sometimes the flags really shouldn't have been there but other times we were deserving of them. If you want to win games you can't make stupid mistakes, that was something we were victim to against the Saints.

The one that stands out in my mind the most is when we sacked Drew Brees on a 3rd and 10 which would have taken the Saints out of field goal range and we would have gotten the ball back with 3 minutes and 13 seconds left. But after celebrating we realized there was a flag against us for having 12 men on the field. Ridiculous.

The sideline commotion after the flag was thrown made it look like Omar Gaither was on the field when he shouldn't have been. A stupid rookie mistake made by a stupid rookie player.

We ended up having 8 penalties for 67 yards which really isn't crazy. I mean that's not acceptable but not unheard of.

What killed us was just the timing of those penalties.

A 2nd and 9 turned into a 2nd and 3 because Darren Howard jumped offsides. Later in that drive Matt McCoy is called for a horse collar tackle, turning a 3rd and 2 into a 1st down on our own 16 yard line. Just 2 plays later the Saints go on to score.

Something finally good happens, Lito Sheppard intercepts Drew Brees, he even does a nice job of returning it to the 30 yard line. Well on the offensive first drive following that turnover Hank Baskett gets flagged for a very controversial pass interference call. We end up going 3 and out and having to punt the ball.

That combination of an offensive flag quickly leading to a 3 and out happened a few times. First with Baskett's PI, then with Reggie Brown holding.

What kills me is the 12 man on the field flag which seemed to be Omar Gaithers fault. Jim Johnson should also be blamed for not noticing it but still, Gaither needs to know when he is supposed to be on the field.

These penalties: Gaither's 12 men on the field, Baskett's interference, Reggie Brown's holding, and Matt McCoy's personal foul all have something in common. Every single one of those guys contributed to the loss and they all are either 1st or 2nd year players.

Right there it just shows you that though we have games where our youth helps us win such as Basketts big game against the Cowboys or a LaJuan Ramsey interception against the Packers. There are also going to be games where we will be exposed for having so many inexperienced players.

I love the youth on this team and wouldn't change it because it keeps us in contention longer. But as I've said before, with youth comes inexperience, and that inexperience lost us the game today.

Second Half Come Back Not Enough

The 1st half against the New Orleans Saints was awful. The offense, which I thought was not going to have much trouble against the Saints Defense, was completely halted, unable to move the ball. On the Eagles opening drive things looked like they would be fine but after losing 8 yards on a sack, the offense really was at a stand still for the entire rest of the half.

There were definitely questionable calls that were made by the refs, but none of them caused us to lose the game. Just as many times as bad calls were made against us, we would come back and shoot ourselves in the foot. It was a horrible combination of mental mistakes that caused us to lose this game.

Offense:

Time after time there were shots taken down the field to open up the passing game but nothing fit together right. Hank Baskett had two opportunities to pull in deep balls, Jason Avant should have had the sideline catch where he bobbled the ball once he landed out of bounds. As much publicity as these receivers got after a great performance against the Cowboys, you can't hide rookie mistakes throughout an entire season.

Hank Baskett has shown why he wasn't drafted this year. I love the kid, I think he is going to be a nice contributor for us, but he even dropped a deep ball against the Cowboys. He just always is so close to catching it but he either lands on the ball wrong or isn't able to put it away securely and he drops it once he hits the ground. Those mistakes forced Baskett to end the game without a reception today. Extremely frustrating.

Donovan McNabb's performance would have been better if he didn't have so many of his passes dropped. Right now numbers don't mean anything but it's disappointing that his passes without an interception streak ended today because of a stupid "go for it all" shot down field at the end of the 1st half.

Reggie Brown had his 2nd 100 yard day of the year putting up 121 yards on 6 catches and a touchdown. He also ran a touchdown in, thanks to great blocking from Jon Runyan and even some from Donovan.

The running game actually was successful today. It seems that the Saints did their best to eliminate our big plays and just let us run, their strategy worked. Brian Westbrook had 16 carries for 72 yards but he didn't start picking up that yardage until the 2nd half. In the 1st and 2nd quarter we just kept trying to pass but nothing was happening.

Going into the game I thought if our offense had any trouble it would be running the ball. The Saints found a way to eliminate our deep passing game which shut us down. Time after time we just kept trying to throw it deep on them but we were burned with dropped passes, penalties, and over thrown balls.

Defense:

The focus leading up to this game was on Deuce McAllister and Reggie Bush, when talking about the Saints I barely even gave Joe Horn one sentence. I will admit that I completely wrote him off. He hadn't done anything spectacular up to this point in the year, I mean the guy has to slow down sometime right? Well not today, he had 6 catches for 110 yards along with 2 touchdowns.

Even with the defense focusing on McAllister and Bush they still combined for 160 yards between passing and running. It wondered why McAllister wasn't used even more than he was. Every time he touched the ball he was picking up big yards, averaging 5.3 yards per carry but they only gave him 12 carries. I think if they had given him 25 touches his averages still would have been very high, no one was able to touch him. He just hammered right through our defensive line and after initial contact he would keep going for at least 5 more yards, we were way over matched.

Reggie Bush didn't hurt us too badly. He hit the outside a few times picking up runs and little dump off passes but it wasn't enough to really paralyze the defense.

Special Teams:

CUT DEXTER WYNN!!!!!!! The fumble on the punt which lead to a touchdown killed us. Everything started to go our way and than what was originally a 7 point deficit turned into a 14 point deficit. That part really ended up not mattering because we went on to score 21 points in the 2nd half, but by that time it wasn't enough.

That fumble really wasn't Dexter's fault because Ryan Moats ran into him but on the next punt return he did fumble and it was his fault. Thank god we recovered it but you just can't make stupid mistakes like that. Also keep in mind that there were 2 times when we punted and Wynn had opportunities to down the ball in the 5 yard line and both times he messed up.

I'm sick of this kid, bring on Reno Mahe.

Just Enjoy It

As an Eagles fan you learn to adapt to disappointment. It's not something that you consciously do but it just develops over time. No matter how great things look everyone is really just waiting. Waiting for something to go wrong, because it always does. You think if you don't get your hopes up you won't get your heart broken once again.

Don't do that this year.

Right now things are great. We are 4-1, beat the Dallas Cowboys, and everyone is giving us our accolades. This week we had Lito Sheppard named the NFC Defensive Player of the Week, Andy Reid was voted the Motorola Coach of the Week, Donovan McNabb the FedEx Air Player of the Week and Hank Baskett the Diet Pepsi NFL Rookie of the Week. Everyone is respecting this team.

Going into the season on every sports show people only had negative things to say about us. Now everyone is jumping right back on the bandwagon. Donovan McNabb was being questioned about his ability to run this team, now he is an early favorite for MVP of the league.

A lot can change very quickly in the NFL.

This year though, especially after having to endure such a bad year last season, just sit back and enjoy all of this. Don't just wait for something to go wrong. There are going to be major bumps in the road, injuries to important players, losses that should be wins, that is just how football is.

To just enjoy it doesn't mean be happy win, lose or draw. That is not possible. It just means when we have weeks like this past one where we had a great win, always keep things in perspective, but most importantly just have fun with it.

You might wish that our running game was a lot stronger or that everyone was healthy. But just thank god that we aren't a team like the Browns, Lions, Packers, etc., all teams with no shot this year.

Eventually we will be one of those teams again. A team ready to rebuild. But we are no where near that right now.

When those years come you will be so mad at yourself if you didn't just enjoy what is happening right now. We have a great team with tremendous potential.

At least for this one year just ignore your instincts to be so pessimistic and wait for disaster. See how much better the season is.

I know this team, so trust me on this. This year, you won't be disappointed.

Get The Run Going

Our offense isn't having much trouble scoring but the touchdowns have been coming from big plays, not long drives. That is a concern in the future because as the season progresses things get harder week to week and there are going to be games where we are forced to run the ball.

As much negative attention as the running game has received lately, I think that a lot of it is unnecessary. The offense has been putting up points pretty quickly, leaving our defense on the field a lot longer than most other team. But the statistics don't lie and right now our running game is averaging 4.6 yards per run and we are averaging 114 rushing yards per game, that's pretty good.

The NFL is constantly about "what have you done for me lately." So the first sign that critics of our running game point to is the measly 52 rushing yards that we had on the Dallas Cowboys. The biggest factor for such a low production in Week 5 was in part to Brian Westbrook not fully being back from his persistent knee swelling.

Up until Oct. 11th, Brian Westbrook really hadn't practiced for about 3 weeks. He had gone into the 49ers game with no practice and performed well. Than against the Packers he sat out after not practicing during the week and this past Sunday after not practicing he played against the Cowboys. Westbrook even acknowledged that reason for his fumble early in the game was because he is rusty from not practicing.

Things are looking up now with Brian Westbrook practicing for 2 straight days on Wednesday and Thursday. It's the first time since early September that he had practiced back to back days.

But Marty Mornhinweg even said that he realizes he didn't give Westbrook enough touches against the Cowboys, I think it was some reservations about Westbrook's health since he hadn't practiced all week. With Brian practicing more consistently now, I think we will see him running the ball more.

Also keep in mind that the short screens and little dump off passes are equivalent to a running game in the West Coast offense. Towards the end of a game to preserve a lead you want to be able to run the clock out while still gaining first downs. Just because a play might technically be considered a pass doesn't mean you aren't utilizing the same techniques. As part of the West Coast system you often substitute runs for short high percentage passes.

The healthier Westbrook is, the easier it's going to be to keep the run going. We've also seen that Correll Buckhalter is starting to get some of the kinks worked out of not playing for 2 years.

Buck's performance has been overshadowed by the stupid mistakes he has made. The only time that Buck has been focused on by fans has been when he was part of a failed 4th and 1 against the New York Giants, which really could have changed the entire game. Also Buck fumbled twice (only one was his fault) against the Green Bay Packers.

I think that we are going to see more and more of Buck as the season goes on and he gets more comfortable. He needs to be used as an alternative to running Westbrook all of the time. We need to have Westbrook and Buck both lined up in the backfield, that way we have the ability to either run with Buck or if we pass than Westbrook can be a receiver and Buck is great in pass protection.

For the offense to keep producing week in and week out the running game needs to get up to par. But with the weapons we have between Westbrook and Buck, it's going to happen.

Is He Serious?

I know we've moved on and everything but I couldn't keep quiet about this.

Just when I thought I couldn't hate T.O. anymore than I already do.

In a 45 minute rant regarding his status in Dallas, basically saying that he wants the ball more, he drags the Eagles into the situation once again.

While crying like a baby, (nothing new), he goes on to say "And the team we lost to, they know they should have lost."

Are you serious?

Not only does T.O. not have the ability to play nice on his own team but he has to go and say that we know we should have lost? This guy makes me sick.

Now this only fuels the stupid fire that will lead up to the next game against the Cowboys on Christmas. Keep talking T.O., prior to this last game Drew Bledsoe made it clear that he welcomed teams to blitz him because he believed he had the guys around him that had the ability to counteract the blitz. Something tells me he didn't feel the same way Monday morning after he was sacked 7 times.

Welcome Back

The biggest changes to this team in comparison to the 2005 Eagles have been aided by the additions of Donte' Stallworth and Darren Howard. This game is going to be interesting for both of those guys because each spent their entire career, previous to Philadelphia, in New Orleans. Each guy has a lot of friends on the other sideline and it has to be a weird situation for them.

Both players have really thrived on this team and I think it is because they never have been in a winning environment. Stallworth was with the Saints from 2002-2005 and every one of those years the Saints didn't make the playoffs. He often was playing with a terrible quarterback in Aaron Brooks and going into this year there was a coaching change that Stallworth really got mixed up in.

The situation isn't much different for Darren Howard. He was with the Saints from 2000 until this year and his only winning season was his rookie year, 2000, where the team made it to the playoffs. When he was put alongside a great set of players like Mike Patterson, Darwin Walker, and Jevon Kearse, he had to be amazed by how much better it made him play.

Since coming to the Eagles, Darren Howard has been deemed "the beast" by his teammates for his ability to constantly get pressure on the QB no matter where he is. Currently he has 3 sacks and he has really stepped up since Jevon Kearse went down with a season ending knee injury.

Donte' Stallworth started off the year on fire. His first game with the Eagles against the Texans he had 141 yards and a touchdown. Since then against the Giants he also had another touchdown and racked up 84 yards. Things started to get complicated in Week 3 against the 49ers, he was a game time decision not to play with a hamstring injury that had started to bother him against the Giants. After coming back to play in Week 4 but not being productive he sat out again against the Cowboys and in his absence Hank Baskett really stepped up.

In his short time spent here Donte' has already shown his blazing speed and ability to get open. On a few occasions he has also showed why he has been unable to be a top receiver in the game, because of his inconsistent hands. The hamstring injury bothering him now is something that has him listed at doubtful again, which gives him a 50% chance to play on Sunday.

Darren Howard is going to come roaring out of the gates on Sunday, not even because he's playing his former team but just because he plays like that all of the time. As for Donte' Stallworth I'm sure every part of him wants to get out there and play against the Saints especially because he left the team on a little bit different circumstances.

Once new head coach Sean Payton came into New Orleans, right away he didn't click with Stallworth. Payton didn't like how much time Stallworth was missing with a hamstring and groin injury and it caused tension between the two of them. There is not a reported blow up or anything but they just didn't get along, Payton didn't seem to like his supposed nonchalant attitude.

After Stallworth was traded Joe Horn expressed that he felt it was somewhat his fault, he didn't teach Stallworth to do better. The situation was strange and it had to leave Stallworth wanting to go back and show his former coach that he made a mistake. I don't think that Donte' is bitter about the situation though because he got to go to a better team with much higher chances of winning. It had to hurt him though to leave such good friends behind.

Howard and Stallworth both seemed to have moved on to better things and have been happy for it. The same can be said for two former Eagles: Mark Simoneau and Hollis Thomas, both who are on the Saints. Often a different environment can really change a players career for the better. You wish the best to Sim and Thomas and hope that Stallworth and Howard succeed here.

Reggie Bush: A Saint In New Orleans

The additions of Drew Brees and Reggie Bush have completely turned the New Orleans Saints offense around. Previously one of the worst in the league with QB Aaron Brooks at the helm. The only time that the Saints had highlights on Sportscenter was when Brooks was being ridiculed for throwing the ball behind him, he's horrible.

Things are different in New Orleans now with a revamped Superdome and a recharged offense. The favorite combination already seems to be "Brees to Bush" as Reggie Bush has quickly become Brees's main target. The versatile running back has experienced the vast majority of his success in the air right now, leading the team with 34 catches for 250 yards. He hasn't been as great running the ball but that is where Deuce McAllister comes in handy.

McAllister was someone who actually has a lot in common with Drew Brees. Once Reggie Bush was drafted, it seemed like McAllister's time was over in New Orleans. But the addition of Bush actually has revitalized the running back who last year played only 5 games before tearing his ACL. With the knee injury last year, people also wondered whether McAllister would be able to handle pounding the ball again, if his body was going to handle the hits well. He seems to be doing so, McAllister is seeing a lot of touches this year, more than previously expected, he already has 79 carries for 380 yards and 4 touchdowns, averaging 4.8 yards per carry.

The guy handing the ball off to McAllister, Drew Brees, has been doing a great job of controlling the games. He currently has 5 touchdowns and 2 interceptions but most importantly he has a nice completion percentage of 65.3%. Before Aaron Brooks was someone who was constantly throwing interceptions, making mental mistakes. Now Brees has provided confidence at the QB position once again. Not only does he not make mistakes but he is able to stay in control of the offense, they don't need him to do everything, he just needs to be the leader out there, which he is doing.

The WR position in New Orleans looks a little bit different this year, mainly because of the trade that involved the Eagles, bringing Donte' Stallworth to Philadelphia. One of Stallworth's best friends, Joe Horn, has been a consistent threat on that team through thick and thin. Horn is someone that you really feel for because he has put up great numbers since joining the team in 2000, but has only seen once successful year, in 2000. The fact that he has stayed with the franchise and not done what a lot of diva WR's do like Javon Walker leaving the Packers, says a lot about his character. On the field Horn is getting up there in age, this being his 11th year in the NFL, but he still produces. He hasn't been as flashy of a receiver as in years past but when thrown the ball he is making plays averaging over 14 yards per catch.

On the other side of the field at WR is rookie Marques Colston. He is someone the Saints had a lot of confidence in going into the season, he is one reason they felt they could do without Donte' Stallworth. Colston has been the biggest surprise but also the biggest success on their offense. Right now he already had 374 yards and 3 touchdowns, he is quickly showing that he one day will be Joe Horn's predecessor.

The Saints offensive line has been so much better than I thought they were going to be this year. They have only allowed 6 sacks so far this year, that is half of our total. Some of that can be attributed to the line giving Brees enough time but a lot of the credit also needs to go to Brees for his ability to get the ball out of his hands, not take the sack. The line is going to get a big test for our defensive line which already has 23 sacks this year, leading the NFL.

As Brian Dawkins pointed out, this team is going to try and take shots at our defense early. They want to get the crowd into the game and mess with the Eagles psyche. With the talent they have on offense, they have the ability to make those big plays. It's going to be a real test for our defense to slow them down. The key is going to be to take Reggie Bush out of the receiving game, similar to how defenses try and take Brian Westbrook out of our receiving game. It's a tough challenge.

The Talk Of The League

The New Orleans Saints are not the team that we believed they were in the preseason. This team has thrived under new head coach Sean Payton and he has brought with him to the Saints a little bit of a Bill Parcells mindset. Payton was an assistant head coach in Dallas from 2003-2005 and he was in charge of calling the plays in 2005 as the "passing game coordinator." He isn't as harsh as Parcells is but the technique of demanding respect from your players is something that he still utilizes. He is a disciplinarian and that can be seen strictly through the way he handles training camp, rookies aren't allowed to have a Saints logo on their helmet until they actually make the team.

This team seemed to be in a rebuilding year because they brought in a new head coach, new veteran quarterback, and the 2nd overall pick in the draft. Those are all great things but they usually take time to develop, you don't see many new head coaches winning early. Payton has found a way to capture the emotion of this team, through what they experienced in 2005, and really channel it in a productive manner.

Drew Brees is a quarterback that is not only very underrated but very disrespected around the league. He was with the Chargers for 5 years, going into his 4th year the team drafted (well traded for with the Giants) quarterback Philip Rivers. The addition of Rivers showed everyone that the Chargers were ready to move on, the Drew Brees experiment was over. But with Rivers holding out of training camp it gave Brees time to work with the team more. He ended up starting that year and keeping his job throughout the season, he was very successful in 2004 and named to the Pro-Bowl as well as the Comeback Player of the Year. He expected that after such a great year the Chargers might resign him to a longer contract. That didn't happen though as he was slapped with the franchise tag which provided him with 1 more year on his contract.

In 2005 Brees had another good year, but the question that followed him around throughout the entire season was whether or not he would be resigned to a long term contract. Eventually at the end of the season after facing a brutal schedule, the Chargers realized they weren't eligible for the playoffs. So Brees played in the last game of the year, a meaningless game against the Denver Broncos. The worst thing happened in that game, as he injured his shoulder which provided even more questions about his future.

After much debate free agency hit and the Chargers didn't resign Drew Brees, it was his turn to hit the market and see who wanted him. There were two big QB's on the market this year: Daunte Culpepper and Drew Brees; teams could either trade for Culpepper or sign free agent Brees. The teams that seemed most interested in both of them were the Dolphins and the Saints. Eventually the Dolphins traded for Culpepper and very soon after the Saints announced the signing of Brees.

This move really has turned the franchise around. A dismal team for the past 5 years, not being in the playoffs since 2000, Brees had a lot of work to do. Then came the draft and it was expected that the Saints would end up taking Mario Williams or trade down a few picks because they did not need a QB and that seemed to be the next logical pick after Reggie Bush would obviously sign with the Texans. Well the obvious didn't happen as the Texans passed on Bush, signing Mario Williams, and like a miracle, Reggie Bush landed right in the lap of the Saints franchise.

Two revitalizing moves were made in the offseason to bring in a veteran QB and a future star running back that is arguably the best running back to ever play college football. This team started getting better and better by the day.

As the year started they quickly won their first two games against easier opponents the Browns and Packers, but going into the season they weren't locks to beat either team. The season really kicked into high gear when they played their first home game at the Superdome since Hurricane Katrina. The city got behind the team in full force as the Saints forced an upset over the Atlanta Falcons. Since then the team has gone 1-1, currently having a 4-1 record. But they are 2-0 at home right now, still riding that wave of emotion.

As Fun As It Was, Time To Focus On Saints

These past few days have been so much fun. We all have been reveling in beating the Dallas Cowboys and putting T.O. in his place. We are 4-1 right now and 1st in the NFC East, everything is turning out great. But, as much as I don't want to (I still have patience for a few more clips of T.O. blowing up on the sidelines), it is time to move on to the next week.

Hopefully the players haven't treated this win the same way the fans have. But that is why we're fans, we are allowed to celebrate a win for an entire week. Win or lose, the players have to move on to the next week quickly, otherwise they will be unprepared.

When the schedule was released, playing the New Orleans Saints didn't seem to be a tough challenge. They were a team in the rebuilding stages: new coach, new quarterback, and even a top draft pick. The Saints started off the season well by being 2-0, beating both the Browns and Packers, neither of those teams were very stiff competition, but it's still hard to win away games. So going into their home opener, the re-opening of the Superdome, was a very emotional game but it wasn't likely that they were going to beat the Atlanta Falcons who had started off the season so strong with their dominant running game.

That is where the Saints season really start to pick up, they shocked everyone by convincingly beating the Falcons. The next week they lost to the Panthers in a last minute field goal but was an accomplishment that they were even able to hang with Carolina, a team that was a Super Bowl favorite during the pre-season. This past week they stayed right on track and brought their home record to 2-0, beating the Bucs at the Superdome.

It is extremely important for the Saints to win their home games, as it is for every team, but they play with more emotion in the Superdome considering the circumstances they were in during the 2005 season. The biggest challenge we are going to face when we play the Saints on Sunday is having to go play on their home field, especially considering they have more support from their fans now than they ever have before.

We are coming off of a very emotional game against the Cowboys, there was so much hype leading up to the game and the team really had to fight until the very last second to win it. As we saw after the Saints first game in the Superdome, they had an away game and lost, it's hard to put up a win after playing in such a big game the previous week. That is something that we need to overcome because despite the fact that this game looks much harder now than it did when the schedule came out, we still have the hardest part of our schedule ahead of us and need to get all of these wins before the Week 8 BYE week.

The Dallas Cowboys came into a very volatile environment when they played us this past Sunday, the fans provided a playoff type atmosphere. The Superdome won't be as intense as the Linc was last week, but the Saints fans are aware that for the Saints to succeed this year they need to beat a top NFC team, and we are one.

It's not going to be hard for the Saints players to get up for this game, they are playing in front of their home crowd and want to prove to people they are for real. The challenge is for our players to be able to focus in and not lose track of what we are really fighting for this season. Beating T.O. doesn't win you a Super Bowl, the veterans know that, and they need to make sure the rookies understand that as well.

"Get Yo Popcorn Ready, Cause It's Gonna Be A Show"

From hilarious website: Profootballtalk.com

PFT PIC OF THE DAY

The popcorn was ready, but the show never started.

According to PFT.com Howard Eskin is reporting that after the game T.O. walked into the Dallas locker room yelling "Why did you guys bring me here! Why the (bleep) am I here!"

Apparently he wasn't too happy about losing to a team that he seemingly ruined for a season, especially when he thought he signed with a better team.

Walker Has A Career Day

Darwin Walker has been on this team since 2000 and has always been a very solid contributor on the defensive line. A massive defensive tackle with quickness that has found ways to break through the pocket. Last year he played great until he was hampered with a thigh contusion that ended up bothering him all year, really hindering his performance .This year he seems to be finishing up what he started at the beginning of last season and he shows no signs of stopping.

Drew Bledsoe absolutely crumbles when he gets pressure in his face. He already is known to hold on to the ball way too long, often times forcing him to take a sack instead of just throwing a pass out of bounds. He is an extremely arrogant quarterback and for no real reason.

Earlier this week in a locker room interview he basically said that they have performed so well on offense because of the guys around him. He said blitz me all you want but with the talent around me, it's not going to matter. Oh really Drew?

7 sacks later I don't think he is feeling the same way.

The group that combined on those sacks were Walker with 3, Cole with 1, Howard with 2, and Juqua Thomas with 1.

The biggest surprise of them all was Walker because not only do you not often see a defensive tackle get 3 sacks in one night, but we're not used to seeing it from Darwin. I'm not sure what lit him up to play so well tonight but he was just knocking Bledsoe around all night, completely relentless. I loved him.

As for the other guys, Darren Howard seemed to really emerged tonight. He was overshadowed in the beginning of the year with Jevon Kearse, then seemingly overshadowed with the attention paid to the loss of Kearse. Howard, who was our biggest free agent acquisition has been seeing much more attention from offensive lines with Kearse out. But not when Walker stepped up and had a big day, less guys were blocking Howard. It's a beautiful thing.

Yet Another Leading Reciever

Under Andy Reid, excluding the T.O. year and 1/2, the offense was always good at spreading the ball around. Different players would step up every week, a defense couldn't just zero in on stopping one guy. For the past 4 weeks that has been the case for us, we've had different players step up with huge games whether it be Stallworth, Smith, or Greg Lewis.

This week it was Hank Baskett's turn.

Baskett was a name that gained it's notoriety during training camp, which seems like years ago. A young physical undrafted rookie free agent from New Mexico that surprised the coaches and fans as continually working his way up the depth chart. Going into the season we expected to have Reggie Brown and Hank Baskett be our starting WR's, that was until Donte' Stallworth was given to us as an early Christmas gift.

With Stallworth out for the 2nd game this season battling a hamstring injury, Baskett chose today as his day to reemerge. He hadn't fallen off the face of the earth, each week, excluding Week 1, he had at least one catch. But the flashes that we had seen from him in preseason had not been seen again.

In the 1st half we saw Donovan try and hit Hank Baskett on a long pass along the sideline but he wasn't able to haul it in, it was very close. Donovan still had confidence in him though so later in the game he went to him once again for the same type of catch. On the 1st play of the drive starting from the 13 yard line, Donovan hauled it up to Baskett again. This time he made the grab and after initially making the catch he could have been tackled but he pushed the defender away and brought it in for a touchdown, 87 yards.

Despite talking about Baskett so much during training camp and even since then, I still just am so confused on where he came from. I mean how often does a rookie who went undrafted have a 112 yard game in his 5th NFL start. The kid had every team pass on him as he fell all of the way down the draft board despite being listed on some scouts as a 3rd or 4th round pick.

People were afraid of the fact that he didn't have the nice timed speed. He wasn't able to easily separate from defenders just by running down the field. But in an offense that values him for being able to make a quick catch and gain yards afterwards, he still has shown his ability to catch the deep ball.

There's no better person to cheer for this year than Hank Baskett. A complete underdog that has made contributions to this team. To have Baskett more than double T.O.'s yards on the day, that says a lot. Especially when you compare their attitudes and paychecks.

Litoooo Ohhh-ohh-ohh-ohh-ohhh

Lito Sheppard could not have opened his season any better than the performance he put up tonight. Lito was injured on the 1st play of the 1st game this year, so he really had never even gotten underway for the season to begin. Why not start off by going against one of the toughest offenses in the game with two Pro-Bowl WR's, that would be fun, right?

It was more than fun as Lito had a tremendous game with 2 interceptions, 1 game winning that was returned 102 yards for a touchdown.

The best part of Lito's performance, along with the entire secondary, was he was extremely physical with Dallas's wide receivers. Both Glenn and Owens have a height advantage on Sheppard, especially Owens, but he didn't let that hinder his game. Sheldon Brown has said before the the secondary's poor performance up to this point, excluding injuries, has not been because of physical limitations, it has all been mis communications among the defensive backs.

It had to be a lot easier for Sheldon, Dawk, and Michael Lewis to have Lito back there again because they are not only used to playing with him, but he is used to playing. When they had to play with Joselio Hanson starting at CB, that couldn't have been much fun. The younger guys need to get the reps but it's frustrating when you have a Pro-Bowl player on the sideline injured.

Question have been raised in 2005 and this year about Lito's performance. He was great in 2004 but last year struggled and eventually ended his season early with an ankle injury. Then when it came time for him to prove he was back, he was sidelined yet again. Hopefully we won't have to see the secondary without Lito again for awhile because the difference he makes was quickly seen.

Not to take anything away from the defensive line, they were a huge part of the secondary being able to play so physical with the Dallas WR's. But you still have to give Lito and Sheldon credit for keeping both Glenn and Owens in check.

I have to admit when we drew the pass interference penalty on a 4th and 18, that was set to end the game. I thought I was going to rip my hair out. I just could not believe it. But just a few plays later Lito snatches the ball right out of the hair and soars down the field, scoring a touchdown. After dropping 2 possible interceptions earlier in the game, Lito redeemed himself. He found a way to capitalize despite being so disappointed that the game should have been done by that point, he didn't let it bother him, and he closed out the game the best way possible. With a touchdown.

It Doesn't Get Any Better Than This

The story could not have been written any better. Throughout everything that has occurred since signing T.O. in 2004, Donovan has been a class act. He never lets the media see him sweat, and always came out being the better guy, off of the field. Today was his chance to prove that he is the better guy on the field too. It worked out well.

IN YOUR FACE T.O.! Donovan McNabb got the last laugh in the on going T.O. drama as Donovan completes the game with 2 passing TD's, 354 yards, and a rushing touchdown just for fun. Now let's compare that with T.O.'s stats...3 catches, 45 yards...HAHAA!

October 8th has been a date marked on every Eagle's fans calendars. Does anyone remember when on Jimmy Kimmel T.O. said that the Cowboy's lead would be so high that he would have time to sign autographs during the game? Didn't work out for him as he had planned it.

I can't explain how badly I wanted this win, how badly we all wanted this win. The stadium was crazy, it took a little bit for everyone to get going because as soon as the offense would take control of the ball in the 1st half, there would be some kind of disappointment. But especially in the 2nd half, no one gave up, and things finally started to go our way. It was perfect.

If I wasn't an Eagles fan I still would have appreciated this game because it was a hyped up game that actually lived up to the hype. It was a great game, back and forth, big play after big play. The attention leading up surrounded Donovan, who played great, and T.O., who sucked. But when it all came down to it it was the team that won, not a player. The actual team was the 53 guys who played with so much more heart and intensity, the Philadelphia Eagles. A true team, with an entire city behind them.

Everyone expected the usual guys to be the play makers but the way a real team works, the Eagles had players emerge tonight that got their chance to shine and really stepped up, 3 in particular: Lito Sheppard, Darwin Walker, and Hank Baskett.

Offense:

The running game was nonexistent which definitely got frustrating. Dallas focused on taking away our running game and did that successfully. What they couldn't stop though were our WR's. Hank Baskett, 3 for 112 yards 1 TD, and Reggie Brown, 4 for 79 yards, both had great days and they weren't aided by Donte' Stallworth who was out with a hamstring injury. Baskett and Brown took things into their owns hands, each having a big touchdown, for Baskett it was the 87 yards bomb from Donovan; for Brown it was the 40 yard flea flicker.

Opening the game Westbrook started off great, but then, he fumbled and it just seemed so typical. It was weird though because this is Westbrook's 2nd fumble this season, in the past we've barely ever seen him fumble. Brian Westbrook, though he might not have had over 100 total yards and he normally does, was still the key to the game. You didn't see Westbrook all over the field for a reason, the Cowboys focused on taking him out of the offense. They actually were successful in the way that they completely stopped the running game, but he still had 53 receiving yards.

Defense:

These were the guys that won the game for us. When the offense wasn't able to put long drives together the defense still held together, forced 3 interceptions and 2 fumbles. There were many times when the defense came out with a big play, went on the sideline, and were soon brought back out because the offense couldn't sustain a drive.

Drew Bledsoe had so much pressure in his face throughout the entire night. Darwin Walker, beautiful. Everyone kept saying that the Jaguars had success against the Cowboys because their big DT's were breaking down the inside of Bledoe's pocket. Jim Johnson used the same exact game plan and Walker had 3 sacks. His 3 sacks were accompanied with 4 other sacks, 2 from Darren Howard, 1 from Trent Cole, and 1 from Juqua Thomas. The defensive line had an amazing night, they never let Bledsoe feel comfortable back there. Even when sacks weren't being counted up, they were still knocking him down. It seemed very similar to the Giants game when we sacked Eli Manning 8 times, he just started to get shell shocked and wasn't even looking down field, just for short routes to the outsides.

The secondary saw tremendous improvements with Lito Sheppard being reintroduced to the lineup. I wasn't sure if he would be able to just get right into the game, I wasn't sure how his injury was really feeling, it he was truely recovered. It seems like he is because he had a tremendous night. Lito alone had 2 interceptions, 1 coming from a pass headed for T.O. and the other was the game winning interception returned for a TD. Then Brian Dawkins had an interception on a pass with T.O.'s name on it as well, tough luck T.O.

Bledsoe will be having nightmares about this game for years to come and I wouldn't be surprised if he isn't starting anymore by the time we play them again on December 25th.

The Cowboys were able to run the ball all over our defense though. Julius Jones had 100 yards rushing and Marion Barber came in to add 22 yards to that mix. In the 2nd half the defense was doing a better job at stopping the run but we were just lucky that we didn't let the running game take control of the defense.

Special Teams:

The main reason I was so upset with Dirk Johnson was because I saw how great McBriar looked on the Cowboys. He was averaging 52 yards per punt while Johnson had only 40.8 yards on average. In a game that came to be so close, field position really could have messed up our chances. The same goes for the Cowboy's return game, they were so much better than Dexter Wynn, but hey...the Cowboys had to be good at something today right? We'll give them special teams.

It's All About The Injury Report

Leading up to this weekend my focal point in stopping Dallas has not really been about the team's game plan. We play Dallas twice every year, this will be Andy's 15th meeting against the Cowboys and 7th time against the Parcells led Cowboys. Not to say that finding ways to stop Dallas is a walk in the park but a big part of it is going to be based off of which players are healthy enough to play for us on Sunday.

The main questions marks are Brian Westbrook, Lito Sheppard, Rod Hood, and Donte' Stallworth.

The only person I'm confident will play is Lito Sheppard. He's practiced this week and Jim Johnson seems to be fine with his condition, expecting him to be able to bounce right back. He will probably struggle a little bit but you can also see that he is the freshest player out there considering he hasn't played since Week 1 (and he barely played then.)

Everyone else still is in the air whether they play or not. I don't think that Rod Hood is going to play, especially considering Lito is back. We saw before a shuffle when both Sheppard and Hood were out, the coaches tried every week to have one of them play. After Lito went down in Week 1, Rod replaced him but than against the Giants Rod was injured. He was somewhat forced to play against the 49ers because the secondary was so weak. Then going into the Packers game we were somewhat expecting Lito Sheppard to play but he didn't, either did Hood, but it was against a weak Packers offense.

Now playing a team with such a strong offense we need to have either Hood or Sheppard out there, it looks like Sheppard will be the guy.

I'm not sure what's going on with Donte' Stallworth, I'm actually extremely disappointed because a reoccurring hamstring problem was something that hampered him in New Orleans. If this becomes a problem that doesn't subside, don't count on him getting a contract extension from the Eagles after this year. Remember Donte' is playing with 1 year left on his deal that came with him from the Saints. Stallworth isn't someone we need to have out there to win but he is definitely someone that would make the job easier. He is so good at stretching the defense and with Reggie Brown being listed with a shoulder injury (but I expect Brown will play) we need all the help we can get.

My biggest concern is someone I've written about before, Brian Westbrook. It terrifies me to think he might have to go into this game without Westbrook. He is the guy on this team that makes everything click and he is such a valuable offensive weapon. If Westbrook doesn't play, it's going to be very hard to get the offense going. We saw against the Packers, without Westbrook the team was dead in the 1st half until something happened and they just exploded in the 2nd half. There's no room for have a huge comeback in this game, you need to get ahead and stay ahead early because it's going to be a dog fight.

If Westbrook doesn't play, then Correll Buckhalter is your man. We are lucky that Buck got some time to start last week but the success he did have was definitely overshadowed by the 2 fumbles he had on the 2 and 3 yard line (only one of them was his fault though.) If Buck had been able to put that ball away, he would have had 2 goal line touchdowns and showed people that we can run in short yardage situations. Also if Westbrook doesn't go Ryan Moats will definitely see about 10 carries, if Westbrook does go, expect about 5 from Moats.

I am scared of going into a game without Lito or Westbrook. Like I said It really looks like Lito is going to play, but you just never know, there have been constant game time decisions this year. If we can have both of these guys back than I have complete confidence we can get the win.

Is Westbrook Going To Play?

UPDATE: Westbrook missed practice again on Friday, Andy said that for the most part the swelling is under control, he wouldn't go into details.

Brian Westbrook is the key to this offense working smoothly. Of course, if Donovan McNabb doesn't play the entire team crumbles but outside of Donovan, Westbrook is our main offensive weapon. He is a powerhouse because he racks up over 100 yards consistently between his running and receiving game. The mismatches that he causes for a defense have him open up so many more lanes for other receivers like L.J. Smith and Reggie Brown.

The problem lately has been that Westbrook hasn't been healthy. He has been questioned his whole career for not being durable enough and people have said that Andy passing the ball more than running is because he's afraid to give Westbrook too many carries.

In the opening preseason game of the year Westbrook performed great on the 1st teams opening (and only) drive of the game. But after that game Westbrook sat out of the entire preseason with a foot sprain that he said was caused by the shoes he was wearing, they were too flexible. After coming back and playing in the Week 1 Texans game he was fine.

Until recently, leading up to the 49ers game Westbrook sat out the entire week of practice with swelling in his knee. He went on to play in a Week 3 win and seemed fine. But then after another week of not getting practice in he was expected to do something similar against the Packers, not practice but play. When it came time for the game to start though Westbrook was deactivated with the knee injury, it was suspected this was a precautionary measure to keep him as healthy as possible for the more important divisional game against Dallas, especially considering we have a short week coming off of a Monday Night Football game.

Now though as of Friday, Westbrook still hasn't practiced as Les Bowen of the Philadelphia Daily News has provided more information on the injury by researching with former Eagles trainers. He has come to the conclusion that he believes Westbrook is going to need arthroscopic knee surgery which could keep him out for at least 2-6 weeks, possibly more if the doctor found more damage in his knee when they opened him up. Now remember, this is all speculation from Les Bowen after Andy Reid reluctantly admitted that Westbrook's knee swelling is the result of a bone bruise.

All of this right now leads up to, will Westbrook play Sunday? If there is any level of comfort come Sunday morning he is going to play. This is such an important divisional game, T.O. aside, we have to win a game in the NFC East after losing 7 straight since last year. After that Bowen wonders if the surgery is the only way to deal with the situation than could we have him not play anymore and wait to come back towards the 2nd half of the season?

The only thing I know is that we need Westbrook to be out there on Sunday. He improves the offense tremendously and we are playing a very tough Dallas defense. Let's just hope that we can at least get him through this week, then we'll think about the future.

Very Few Weaknesses

Going into this Dallas game a lot of the focus is on the Cowboy's offense, I already talked about the numerous weapons they have for Drew Bledsoe. But I still think that the hardest thing the team is going to face if we want to win is going to be going against Dallas's Defense.

Currently they are ranked 5th in the NFL and as Marty Mornhinweg pointed out, they have very few weaknesses. The best team we've played up to this point was the New York Giants but that was more so because of their offense. We knew that their defense had weaknesses in stopping the passing game and we were able to exploit that. The situation is different now with Dallas not only having a very good pass rush, but having a top tier secondary as well.

The biggest concern about this week is if Brian Westbrook isn't healthy enough to play. But I will get into all of that later.

The Dallas secondary centers around safety Roy Williams, someone who as soon as his name is mentioned I picture him picking off Donovan last year and running it into the end zone in a last minute loss to the Cowboys. But this team has moved on, there have been changes made since losing twice to the Cowboys last year.

Roy Williams, who already has 2 interceptions, is a player that you have to keep your eye on throughout an entire game. He is ranked among the top safeties in the NFL more so for his hard hitting than for his coverage skills. I don't want to compare him to a future Hall of Fame player like Brian Dawkins but he does provide the Cowboys with a player that the offense has to know where he is at all times. He anchors what Mornhinweg described as a very big and physical defense.

The main component that Bill Parcells has installed in Dallas is something that he had been wanting to do since he got there, a 3-4 defense. Leading the way in the defensive line is 2nd year defensive end, Marcus Spears. A draft pick last year and a productive rookie, Spears has now taken his game to a new level and is a dominant force on the D-line. He is accompanied by other linemen such as Jay Ratliff, Chris Canty, and Kenyon Coleman all with at least one sack so far this year.

The focal point of any 3-4 defense are the linebackers and they have not disappointed with DeMarcus Ware leading the pack. Among the group is free agent pickup Akin Ayodele who I had targeted as a player that I wanted the Eagles to sign with the departure of Keith Adams. Also not to be forgotten are Greg Ellis and Bradie James, all of the starting LB's have combined for 55 tackles and 2.5 sacks. Normally the pass rush in a 3-4 defense is generated from the linebackers, which is the case for Dallas, but they are aided by such a solid defensive line that they do not need to blitz as much as other 3-4 teams.

This is by far the most solid defense we have played so far this year and it's going to be a challenge for our offense especially considering that Donte' Stallworth and Brian Westbrook are both at great risk of not playing on Sunday. Westbrook is listed as questionable with his knee, hasn't practice all week and Stallworth is listed as doubtful, also not practicing all this week.

If we go into the game with Brian Westbrook playing I don't feel there is much cause for concern, Donovan McNabb and Brian Westbrook together make a great duo that will generate many yards for the offense. Having Donte' Stallworth would be a great bonus and would definitely make the day easier but the key to the offense is Brian Westbrook.

Roper Back On Team

Dedrick Roper came into training camp, preparing to battle for a backup SAM LB spot. Dhani Jones was the starter but he wasn't so set, with Greg Richmond and Chris Gocong favorites to push him for a job. When Greg Richmond and Gocong both battled injuries throughout training camp, Richmond finally being cut and Gocong put on IR, it gave Roper an opportunity to try and make the team.

Eventually, Jason Short won the back up SAM LB spot behind Dhani Jones but we really haven't seen him out there on defense, he's just been used on special teams.

While the secondary was battling injuries this year at a time both Lito Sheppard and Rod Hood were injured and at the same time Jevon Kearse was put on IR. That left a roster spot open and it was filled with practice squad player Dustin Fox. Fox suited up to play against the Packers but really was only seen on special teams.

Now though with Sheppard coming back from his injury, there isn't as much need for the extra depth at having Fox at CB. So Dustin Fox was cut, put back on the practice squad, and in his place Dedrick Roper was signed.

Roper was brought in during 2005 because the team was lacking so much depth on special teams with player after playing getting injured, pulling special teams players to have to start on defense. Now Roper is back on the team and is a much stronger back up behind Dhani Jones than Jason Short is.

Short is a dynamic special teams ace but he still has not found a role on defense. The coaches have tried to find anyway for him to make the team, using him as a defensive end a little bit during training camp, but we had so many great DE's that we didn't end up needing him. He is too valuable for a special teams player to cut that everyone has just been crossing their fingers that Dhani Jones stays healthy so we wouldn't have to see Short (most likely though despite Short being listed as the backup, Shawn Barber probably would have filled in at SAM if Jones was injured.)

With Roper being promoted from the practice squad that left a spot open on the squad that was quickly filled by Dustin Fox.

Offensive Firepower

The Dallas Cowboy's offense is very good, but I don't think they are the best offense we've faced so far this year. I think the Giant's offense is stronger because they are more solid at running back and tight end, not to discredit Julius Jones or Jason Witten at all though because they are still very good players. The defense is seriously going to be tested against the Cowboys, once the 1st few plays are over the emotion won't matter as much as just who is the better team.

QB Drew Bledsoe is an experienced passer with a strong arm, but completly imobile. The key the disrupting Bledsoe's play is disrupting him in the pocket. That really goes for any QB that you play but especially Drew because after a few hits he will panic in the pocket, get rid all of the ball too quickly and throw interceptions. It is a mind game when you go against a QB like Bledsoe, Jim Johnson has to find ways to confuse him, use coverages that Bledsoe isn't used to seeing.

When you play you wouldn't really consider him a mobile QB, it's not like he bootlegs often or gets out of the pocket. But he has the skill of being so poised that he can get the ball out of his hands and avoid the sack, time after time. He often times will take the big hit but he doesn't panic in getting rid of the ball. That is the opposite of Bledsoe who is imobile considering that once the pocket begins to collapse, he either throws the ball where it can be picked off, or he will just duck and take the sack. You need to disrupt Bledsoe which we weren't able to do with Favre, especially in the 1st half.

The secondary still is banged up but we are on the road to recovery. Lito Sheppard practiced today and said that he wasn't held back at all, he went through all of the drills. It seems like he really is going to be set to play, I'm not questioning that. The uneasiness comes in with Rod Hood possibly being out again with a heel strain. He didn't practice on Wednesday which would leave Joselio Hanson to fill the role as starting nickleback. It is a concern having Lito coming off of an injury and this being his first game back, practically his first game of the year because he was injured on the 1st play in Week 1. But I am relieved to know that he will be back and the secondary is much more solid with Lito and Sheldon Brown starting.

The media attention in Dallas circles around their WR's and there is good reason for it. They are very strong at the position between Terrell Owens and Terry Glenn. You have two dynamic recievers between those two guys one, T.O., who excels after he gets the ball in his hands and than Terry Glenn who is a speedy deep threat.

Both players are veterans and give Bledsoe the easiest outlet the score. That is why we need to disrupt Bledsoe in the pocket so he doesn't have time to go through his reads, hopefully a sack or turnover will eventually result. Throughout the day Owens and Glenn will find ways to get open, we just have to figure out how to contain them. Our secondary has a little advantage considering they have played against Owens in practice in 2004 and some of 2005, but keep in mind that Owens also knows some of our DB's tendencies as well. It goes both ways.

When it all comes down to it the attention needs to be paid to Terry Glenn who had huge games against us last year. Time after time Lito Sheppard and Sheldon Brown were burned on deep routes, that can't happen again. Owens has been productive for the Cowboys this year but no where near as productive as he was his first year for the Eagles.

At running back Julius Jones and Marion Barber provide a nice combination for their offense. Jones is the feature back, having a great game the past 2 weeks but he was even successful with, 72 yards, in their loss to the Jaguars in Week 1. Barber gets a handful of carries a game, normally 7-10, similiar to the role that Correll Buckhalter plays when Brian Westbrook is starting. But neither of the backs play as consistent a role in the passing game as our running backs do, especially not Jones, so that limits at least one threat on offense which is something that you have to face when playing Tiki Barber of the Giants.

Jason Witten is not a tight end that is going to blow the roof off of a game. There are a lot of great tight ends in the league right now from Tony Gonzalez to Jeremy Shockey to Antonio Gates but it is still very hard for a tight end to completly win a team a game. They will come up with key catches in clutch situations and often gain big chunks of yardage at a time but Witten hasn't been seeing the ball as much as in the past, especially considering that Bledsoe has many other targets in his wide receievers. Still though Witten needs to be accounted for because he is going to gain first downs, 3rd down conversions are going to be when you will see Bledsoe looking for Witten the most.

The determining factor whether we win or lose is the Cowboy's offensive line. As I said before, Drew Bledsoe does not play well while being blitzed and to blitz the most successfully we have to be able to get pressure from just our front 4. Against the Packers we barely blitzed, we just tried to get to Favre with our D-line. Things are going to be different this week as the defensive line should have a better game and be aided with the blitzing packages that Jim Johnson will throw Bledsoe's way.

Sunday is going to be tough but the Cowboys offense is going to face a terrible time dealing with our home field advantage. The Linc is going to be extremely loud everytime the Cowboys are on the field, I hope they get the ball first because I feel like our defense does the best job in setting the tone for the game.

Let The Circus Begin

T.O. week is here as national media are coming from all over to cover the Eagles and T.O. reunion. At this point in the week I usually have written all about the previous game and now I start moving on to the upcoming opponent. I didn't focus too much on the Packers game though because as soon as the 4th quarter hit against Green Bay and the stands began being flooded with "Dallas Sucks" chants, we all knew that there is only one focus this week, the Cowboys. No one cares about what happened last week with us beating a very bad Packers team, the challenge is this Sunday.

Ridiculously enough the promos for the game are referring to it as "the game of the year". It is important considering that we have lost our last 7 divisional games by going 0-6 in the NFC East last year and losing to the Giants already this year. So emotion aside this is important if we want to be able to stay atop the NFC East. A win could give us at least a 2 game lead over everyone in the division, it depends on who wins the Giants-Redskins game as well.

So much of the focus is on how the team is going to respond to this. There are so many different facets to that though because there were players on the team that supported him. When it comes down to it they are in the same fraternity of players and they don't have the hatred that the fans have. Most of the bad blood comes from Donovan but Donovan and T.O. aren't matched up against each other. At the same time though the defense is going to ready, they thrive on competition and this is the best time for them to prove themselves. Trust me, so much of it, there is no bulletin board material needed for this game, the defense is chomping at the bit.

Of course I feel this way every week, but Sunday I want to win so badly. We deserve this one. This game is so important to me because it is our only time that all of the fans really get to show T.O. how we feel about him. He honestly thinks, and has said, that he has support from some Eagles fans...is he serious? Everyone has been able to get little digs at Terrell in the past but when he walks on that field he will realize how everyone feels about him. It's going to be rough for him, especially considering we all know he's not even mentally stable to begin with. But what he did to this city, when he had the fans in the palm of his hand, is unforgivable. I'll make my voice heard on Sunday and everyone else in the stadium will to. It's our chance to talk, he's had interview after interview and taken shots at the team along the way. He threw the franchise Quarterback of this team, one of the best athletes in the NFL, on and off the field, under the bus. T.O. needs to realize that we've heard everything he's had to say and it's our turn now.

Finishing Strong

Eagles: 31 Packers: 9

The NFL is so strange in the way that things can change week to week. The past 2 weeks all of the talk has been about the team fading away in the 2nd half, giving up a lead. This week things were reversed as we came out of the gates very slow but rebounded in a big way.

Offense:

Donovan McNabb, I love this man. The offense took a shot when prior to the game it was announced that Brian Westbrook would sit out tonight. Not much information as of yet regarding the injury, it seems like it would just be precautionary. There has been swelling in his knee that has limited his practice time over the past 2 weeks but we played against the 49ers despite that. Tonight though he was deactivated, I think it might just be in an effort to preserve him for the Dallas game. If we desperately needed him to play against the Packers I think he would have been out there.

Every week it's a different player that comes out with a huge game, it's been Stallworth sometimes, L.J. Smith other times, but the guy that always puts up the big numbers is Brian Westbrook. He seems to be overlooked a lot and with him missing from the offense tonight it was definitely felt throughout the 1st half. Last week against the 49ers everyone, including myself, made a big deal out of Reggie Brown coming up big despite Donte' Stallworth sitting out that game. Well it becomes obvious now that the real key to open the offense up is Westbrook.

In Westbrook's absence the man to step up was actually someone who has been amazing so far, Donovan McNabb. But McNabb stepped up by using his legs to run the ball more, since it was harder to gain those rushing yards without Westbrook. When the offense seemed to be completely halted he broke out with 2 rushing touchdowns, also finishing just 3 yards shy (47 yards) of having more yards on the ground than Correll Buckhalter (49 yards). But Donovan didn't just have success on the ground, he continued his streak of having another great passing day, throwing for 2 scores and 0 interceptions. His accuracy was a little off at times, hitting a few guys at their feet, but in more cases he had catchable passes dropped by receivers.

No complete standouts in the receiving game, just a solid effort throughout. Definitely too many dropped passes, a few from Donte' Stallworth who left the game early with that hamstring bothering him again. The nice part was that Donovan got the ball to 9 different receivers, everyone is involved. Of course as a fan it's much funner when Donovan connects with Donte' Stallworth over and over again, but that just wasn't there tonight.

Like I said before, Westbrook aside, there is always a guy on the team that comes up with a big night. Tonight it was Greg Lewis who had 2 catches for 75 yards, both of them touchdowns. He quickly took advantage of the fact that Charles Woodson was out and he was matched up against a rookie CB. We saw G.Lew break out in the preseason with a huge game against the Steelers, having 2 grabs for 91 yards and a touchdown. That shows how strong he is at going deep, sometimes it's just hard for him to see time as he is buried in the depth chart beneath guys like Brown and Baskett. The more he makes plays like that though, the more game time he will see.

The 1st half was full of mental mistakes with a fumbled hand off from Donovan to Buckhalter (clearly Donovan's fault) at the 2 yard line which lead way for another fumble this time Buckhalters fault on the 3 yard line, 2 series later. There is no excuse for being unable to put points on the board when you're on the 2 and 3 yard line, twice in a game. Buckhalter redeemed himself a little bit in the 2nd half but not before Ryan Moats got to take some snaps. Moats had 7 touches for 22 yards and I actually thought he did pretty well. I was surprised he got as many reps as he did, it shows there is a growing confidence in him but more importantly just a curiosity about what he can really do. Based on play in the preseason, Moats shouldn't be here, but the coaches had him make the team based on prior performance at the end of 2005 and the fact that he is a 3rd round draft pick, pretty high. So when a situation occurs, like today when Westbrook missed time, than Moats needs to take advantage. I was actually pretty proud of him, nothing flashy, but he made a nice effort.

The end of the 1st half was a complete mess, not the way you want to go into halftime. We were down by two points and actually had 2 timeouts but chose not to use them as Donovan called the play at the line of scrimmage as about 30 seconds rolled off the clock. That time ended up being very valuable as McNabb took a sack when he just tried to do too much, he should have known the situation and just thrown the ball away. But then the special teams did one of the stupidest things I'd ever seen by faking a 54 yard field goal, I'll talk more about that later though.

Defense:

These guys need to be shown some respect tonight because they held Brett Favre's offense to not score any touchdowns and they forced 3 turnovers.

What I absolutely loved was how at the end of the game, with the stadium having probably 1/4 of the fans and most people at home with their TV's turned, off the defense posted a goal line stand. At this point most of the back ups were in and Aaron Rodgers was snapping the ball for the Packers but we have a defense that for the past 2 weeks has been questioned for letting up a lead. They stand pat and don't let a team score a touchdown, with 1 minute left, that would have no impact on the outcome of the game, beautiful. It really showed me how much heart this team has and that they honestly, from top to bottom, have learned from the 4th quarter loss to the Giants.

The defense wasn't able to post a sack for the first game all year but you have to take into consideration that we were playing Brett Favre and he was getting the ball out of his hands pretty quickly on every snap. The 1st half there wasn't any pressure on him at all, he really was just standing back there and I was surprised he wasn't able to pick apart the secondary with both Rod Hood and Lito Sheppard out of the game. But after halftime the defensive line really started playing better, still no sacks, but they were getting pressure on Favre much more frequently.

I think the secondary actually deserves the game ball because like I said, despite having Hood and Sheppard out, they were still able to hold Favre to 0 touchdowns and 2 interceptions. That is a really good job considering that the past 2 weeks he's had 6 TD's and just 1 pick. Joselio Hanson did a very solid, I'd even say good, job by starting at CB. That was a huge jump for him to make and there were times when he was facing off against Donald Driver who has so much more experience than him. Still though even when Michael Lewis went down for a little bit, Sean Considine stepped in and actually made some plays. Lewis ended up coming back strong by having an interception, actually 2 of them but 1 was called back because of a penalty by Joselio Hanson. I just imagined that we would see a lot of pass interference flags from the young guys back there, there was an illegal contact call, but the flags weren't all over the place.

Special Teams:

The fake field goal was a very stupid move that I would be ripping apart if we had lost the game. Of course, if the play was called and we had done it successfully I would have been elated, so this is a very "Monday Morning QB" statement. I just think that when you have a great kicker like David Akers, you're down by 2 points with 1 second left in the half, you would just try and attempt the field goal. There was no wind out there tonight, it was actually in David's range if he got lucky.

Mentally it can really hurt a team because after a dumb call like that, the team goes into the locker room with their heads hanging low a little bit because they weren't able to put points on the board. If we had attempted the field goal and made it, it would have been a great momentum shifter. As it turns out though in the 2nd half the momentum never seemed to sway from the Eagles, not even in the last seconds, but still.

I can understand that play being called if we had time to work with on the clock, do the fake and get the 1st down with Matt Schobel on the reception. But were they really expecting Schobel to score a touchdown? Didn't make sense.

Otherwise though I was really happy with the return game, especially on punts, between both Dexter and Reno. Each guy had nice returns of about 14 yards and the kick off returns were decent as well.

Overall:

I'd be lying right now if I acted like I'm focused on the Packers at all anymore. My mind has been on the Cowboys game since the schedule was released. Prepare yourself for a ridiculously hyped up week, tonight's Packer's game is going to be overlooked by many because we were expected to win and the only thing anyone cares about is T.O.

The "Dallas Sucks" chants were only just beginning to be heard at the Linc tonight as Michael Irvin was berated during his Monday Night Football broadcast stage. We just wanted him to forward T.O. a little message for us regarding next week: "get your popcorn ready, cause it's gonna be a show."

Monday Night Showdown

Monday Night Football is not as special as it once was. In the past when Monday Night Football was on that was all that people watched that night. As time has gone on and with MNF now being broadcast by ESPN, it's not as big of a deal.

Players still feel the added pressure of a Monday Night game though because that is when other teams in the NFL are watching. Being on the national stage gives your team the opportunity to prove to others around the league that you are serious contender.

A win over the Green Bay Packers tonight won't prove anything to anyone else but ourselves. The Packers are a team that is on the down slope and though they might have a Hall of Fame QB in Brett Favre, the supporting cast around him isn't so great.

The importance of a game like tonight is a loss would be humiliating. A win would increase the confidence this team has, keep the locker room happy, and most importantly keep us atop the NFC East. When you play an equal opponent the praise is much higher if you win, but even if you lose in a close match up, it might still hurt, but you learn how you rank among the more elite teams. That doesn't go for a game like this.

The atmosphere is going to be amazing, nothing gets a crowd more pumped up than a Monday Night Football game. No matter what the records are we are still playing the Green Bay Packers, it's serious business.

Winning Day For The East

Only 2 NFC East teams played on Sunday with the Eagles having a Monday Night game and the Giants having a BYE week. The Cowboys and Redskins both won yesterday, still keeping the division competitive.

The Cowboys struggled a little bit in the 1st half of their game against the Titans. Tennessee came out somewhat revitalized knowing that some changes were going to be made to the offense with Vince Young being named the starter. Drew Bledsoe threw an interception on the Cowboys opening drive but the Titan's shortcomings on offense soon were noticed as they put points on the board, a field goal, but failed to get a touchdown despite such a great opportunity. As the game went on and going into halftime Mike Vanderjagt missed a 24 yard field goal, the momentum seemed to have shifted to the Titans, but in the 2nd half things started to work out the way they should with the Cowboys scoring all over the Titans. It was expected Dallas would win this game, the Titans haven't won yet, but it took them a half before they really started rolling.

The Redskins game was one that I wish would have been broadcast locally because I only saw the very end of it, once the Cowboys game was obviously over, they switched to the Redskins game when they were tied with Jacksonville at 27 points. Overtime didn't last very long, as the commentators said, whoever won the overtime coin toss was the favorite to win the game and that was the Redskins. They easily gained yards with Clinton Portis and then Santana Moss caught a sideline pass, had 2 defenders miss him, and ran it in for the score. I was surprised that the Redskins offense was able to be so productive against a Jaguars defense that I thought was very good. It seems like the Redskins offense has been able to develop a chemistry that was not there at the beginning of the season.

Dallas winning was not a surprise, anyone would have called that. But the Redskins game definitely surprised me and looking into the future, it will be a very interesting match up when we play the Jaguars on Oct. 29th.

Next week though the NFC East is going to have some real battles when we face off against the Cowboys and the Redskins play the Giants. I'm not even touching that subject now though because there is a game to be played tonight. All focus is on Brett Favre and his Green Bay Packers.