With an atrocious Phillies season nearing the end, the fans in Philadelphia looked to have a ton to look forward to with the beginning of Eagles season. A new-look team with a potentially improved defense. Most notably, the offense would be run by injury-prone quarterback Sam Bradford and tailback DeMarco Murray. In week one, the loss to the Falcons was tough, but the Eagles showed plenty of promise in the second half. On Sunday against the Cowboys, the offense looked awful and big-money cornerback Byron Maxwell continued to blow coverage. On Monday afternoon, head coach Chip Kelly had his press conference to the media and admitted his embarassement with the Eagles play in Sunday's 20-10 loss to drop them to 0-2.
"I was embarrassed … that's not the way we're supposed to play football and that's not what we're all about, but we didn't play well yesterday," he told reporters. "I was embarrassed on how we played yesterday." [NFL.com]
One of the biggest changes the Eagles made this offseason was in the running game. They traded east to west back LeSean McCoy to Buffalo and signed both DeMarco Murray and Ryan Mathews, creating a potentially dominant backfield with Darren Sproles in there as well. Through two games, things haven't exactly worked out for Murray, who gained a total of two yards on 13 carries. Murray isn't all to blame though. The offensive line was one of the biggest issues in yesterday's game. The pocket collapsed on multiple occasions and there were no holes for Murray to run through. After the first two games, the Eagles are last in the NFL with 70 rushing yards. Despite that, Chip Kelly has no plans to change the personnel on the offensive line.
“Obviously, too much penetration from the defensive line,” Kelly said. “We didn’t stop penetration all night long.
“I feel like it can be fixed. We’ve had a couple games here since we’ve been here where we haven’t run the ball well, and we’ve rectified that. We didn’t run the ball well against San Francisco a year ago, we didn’t do a very good job running the football, but we straightened that out.
“A lot of it comes down to fundamentals. It’s still a fundamental football game. The blocking, throwing and catching aspect. It’s a combination of all those things, and unfortunately one of them would rear its head on every play. A lot of it comes down to fundamentals. Maybe over-thinking things a little too much instead of just going out and playing.” [CSNPhilly.com]
Moving to quarterback play, Sam Bradford didn't look comfortable at all in yesterday's game. For the second straight week, there were no attempts for big plays down the field and on numerous occasions when it was third and long, the result was a dump pass to a running back for a minimal gain. Bradford had two interceptions for the second straight week and had a variety of passes overthrown and underthrown. Bradford's play hasn't put his job on the line though, as Kelly remains confident in the former St. Louis Rams signal caller, making sure to mention his preseason successes.
"I have confidence in Sam going forward," Kelly said.
"He was extremely sharp in the preseason," Kelly said. "It's not like he is rusty…he was as sharp as anybody in how he threw the ball during the preseason." [NJ.com]
With the offensive line struggling to get any sort of running game going, it will be hard to spread the ball and let Bradford take shots down the field. He's attempted just five passes of 19 or more yards this season, all of which were incomplete. In the first half of Sunday's game, Bradford passed for just 24 yards and he admitted to feeling rusty. His coach defended him though, saying that he didn't have much time to make great decisions either.
"I feel a little bit of all three of those tonight," Bradford said when asked if he felt rusty, like he was pressing at times or if he felt out of rhythm. "Tonight was tough. I think the biggest thing for us as an offense is we have to establish a rhthm. If you get a 3 and out 3, and out, 3 and out, and you're not converting on third down. You're not giving yourself a chance to convert on third down because you're in third and long … It's just tough."
Despite his struggles, Kelly basically absolved his quarterback due to how poorly a job the offensive line did at protecting him.
"I don't think he had a lot of time on some of those," Kelly said. "I think there was a combination of things. We had some drops on key third downs that could have extended drives. Until we take a look at the tape, I can't give you a full evaluation." [NJ.com]
Bradford finished Sunday's game 23-of-37 for 224 yards, a touchdown and two picks.
The Eagles sit at 0-2, but the season is by no means over. Things may look bleak, but the rest of the NFC East sure doesn't look great either. The Cowboys are 2-0, but just lost Tony Romo for an extended amount of time. The Redskins are unlikely to make much noise and the Giants are 0-2 after two collapses, most recently this week against the Falcons.
