Philadelphia Eagles - How Much Have They Suprised You?

Hi guys, never read anything in this section before however I believe I know a fair bit about American Football (I'll let you be the verdict on that)

Have they suprised you, because they have surpised me, they've been way below what I was expecting from them in truth... Bringing in so much strength and depth it hardly seemed like a level playing field and I was tipping them to at least make it to the Conference Playoffs... now it looks like they'll be lucky to get a wildcard into the playoffs. So why hasn't it worked? They have so much talent excellent DB's - Michael Vick - blah blah blah but yet the haven't exactly got the top teams shaking in there boots why do you think this is?

I never went for the hype to be honest, as soon as that idiot VY labelled them the Dream Team they were destined to fail.
The Kolb trade made no sense to me because gaining Nmandi when they already had Cromartie and Samuel was always going to create some locker room issues and maybe this is deeper than we currently believe.
Also, when you have a QB like Vick the risk of injury is increased so the need for a reliable back up is obvious, Kolb can do that job because of the character he is, VY has proved on various occasions that he doesn't have the character to do this and has the ability to destroy alot of good things.
Then of course you have Andy Reids play calling when over the years he's had various capable RBs only to keep asking his QB to drop back, particularly in games where clock killing should be the call.
Then there's DJax who has been one of the most explosive WR/PR players in recent history, the guy deserves to get paid but the focus was so heavily aimed at rounding up every stud FA they forgot about this guy.
The turnover ratio is -7 which ranks #26 in the league - and we all know if you don't look after the ball it's damn hard to win games, as the O-line collapses too often - though I would caveat that with a question of whether Vick takes too long to make a play.
I expect Reid to be out by Thanksgiving

ps Wildcard spot ? Think again my friend, perm any two from Falcs, Buccs, Bears, Lions and Cowboys, minimum needed this year I think will be 10-6 and at 3-6 that suggests they need to win their next seven straight and hope tie-breaks go their way (3-5 in conf).
Plus they face the Pats, go to the Seahawks who only last week showed the Ravens how tough it is to win out West, and face the rejuvinated Jets as well as tough division match ups against Giants and Cowboys who both have comfortably better records.
Vick and co will be parked up on a beach come post season....

How much is their poor performance down to the lockout and not having a full off-season to train with all the new guys? I'm guessing not much, because 10 weeks into the season you'd expect them to have sorted out all the kinks and they're still not firing on all cylinders.

I don't think the Eagles were ever as good as everyone thought.

Vick, much like Gareth Bale, is riding a rep made on the back of 2-3 excellent games last season and now everyone has figured out how to play against him to make him less effective.

Where the weakness in the defense comes is mostly down to the lockout, Jenkins, Babin, Cromartie & Nnamdi all had limited time to get to know their team mates and when FOUR major pieces of your defense has that issue wholes are likely to be opened up, it also doesn't help when their linebacking corps doesn't do justice to the quaity of the linemen and DBs.

The Eagles being 3-6 is typical of the Eagles. Choking when the spotlight is upon them.

I think the Eagles have surprised most people this year, 21 of 27 voters picked them to win the NFC East this season https://www.606v2.com/t11828-who-will-win-the-nfc-east?vote=viewresult

The offense ranks 11th in points average, 3rd in total yards, 10th in passing yards and 1st in rushing yards, that all looks pretty good to me maybe not as good as it should be but then DeSean Jackson hasn't been at his best, though he has still shown he has talent with a 17.3 ypc also Jeremy Maclin and Jason Avant have managed to perform pretty well, plus Brent Celek is beginning to re-emerge. I think that handing it off to LeSean McCoy more would probably prove to be a wise choice considering the season he has been having.

The defense ranks 19th in points given up, 13th in total yards, 11th in passing yards and 17th in rushing yards (which may be isn't as bad as people would have expected). The issue they have is that teams know they can run the ball when they want and they are likely to pick up the yards they need. Also the pass defense hasn't been as good as people would have expected when they thought of a team with 3 of the probable top 10 corners.

Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie and Steve Smith have both been disappointing this season. With Vick currently injured we will see if trading Kolb away for DRC was such a good idea.

They've definitely been a bit of a surprise to me. I think a lot of it is due to the lockout because, yes, they brought in some stud defensive guys, but they installed a defensive coordinator who was coaching the offensive line last year (!?!). He may be capable, but it hasn't shown so far -- the team has gone away from a blitz heavy defense to more of an execution defense and I think the missed OTAs because of the lockout definitely hurt them.

And now the injuries are really starting to pile up. Vick has a couple of broken ribs and he may still be able to go, because he's a tough guy, but I think they're done.

As a side note, Mike Vick has been killing my fantasy team!

Surprised me a fair bit.

I'd be one of the guys who voted Philly into the "top spot" in our preseason polls and I genuinely thought they could do it.

That said, with this silly dream team label and the amount of signings they made this year at short notice I did feel that it would either work like a house on fire and they would be 14-2 or could potentially cause cracks and leave them say 9-7 and out of the playoffs.

I believed the first, but he latter looks the likely outcome - but even the record quoted there could be considered optimistic.

I go on and on about it, but Castillo at DC just doesn't make sense to me and as Grizz said, Andy Reid is terrible at fourth quarter playcalling in tight games and that has been the situation a fair few times this year.

By the way when I said they'll be lucky to make a wildcard this season in my OP I didn't mean I think they will make them, in all honesty I think they're taking the standing 8 count and not making any moves to get back up, one more loss could rule that out anyway!

I suppose in one way you could and maybe should have seen this coming... But I don't think many did, including me I was duped into the Eagles being the team to beat this season how wrong was I!

I also picked Eagles to win the East - remember they came closer than anyone to knocking out the Packers last year in the play offs, another 6 inches on that Vick pass and OT beckoned, so it's not like they were a bad team last year they just decided to scoop up any big FA name.

But the reason I thought they'd win the East is the state of the oppo and in fairness the Giants and Cowboys have performed better than I expected - Giants now go on a tough run so their 6-3 could easily end up 9-7, the Cowboys might just nick this div.

But on the Eagles I thought salary cap might be an issue and whilst I haven't seen end numbers I did see an article on NFL.com in early August where Eagles had just $2m left and hadn't re-signed DJax and a few others, the fact DJax didn't get the payday he wanted (and probably deserved) may have had a bigger effect that Reid and co expected, and is DRC another Fat Al 'cos he's been average at best....

I opted to the Cowboys out of blind support for my team and I think last weeks destruction of the Bills proved our playoff credentials.

However, I see the Eagles much like Manchester City. They also brough in all these superstar players and nothing happened for them in the first few seasons- but with the right coach and time they will be a formidable force in a year or two say.

I would love to be a fly on the wall during their sessions to see how they all fit in as a team family. I can imagine with some player's egos in there it must be at breaking point sometimes especially when a team is losing. It will certainly be interesting to see how Reid manages to contain this.

As for Vick- I think he has almost been rumbled and teams know how to stop him. He is in my fantasy team as my #1 pick and in a way I regret this choice despite the good numbers he comes up with as I have to have a good back up QB due to his fragileness owing to the way he plyas. Same goes for Jackson...last year they were unstoppable and enjoyed watching them play as much as the Boys it was so good.

As for the defence- it almost seems a bit toothless from the games I have watched. As mentioned before it was a blitz heavy package but I just don't feel they pose a great enough threat. At the moment they rely on outscoring the opponents which is cool...but when they are misfiring its a disaster and as such the Cowboys and Giants will walk this conference.

The buck stops with Andy Reid. I think the guy is a good assessor of talent as he's picked up a number of good players and dumped players at the right time, but his decision making on the sideline sometimes makes me wonder what he is seeing. Or is it his ego gets in the way?

I think he's another Holmgren - had his success and will probably move into the front office and mentor a replacement, or go GM another team.