Philadelphia Eagles defensive coordinator Bill Davis and his troops must prepare for a cat and mouse game against Peyton Manning and the Denver Broncos Sunday. Photo PhiladelphiaEagles.com
In spite of leading the Denver Broncos to the league's top offense and standing alone as the NFL's leading passer through the first three games of the season, Peyton Manning has plenty of respect for Chip Kelly's high octane offense.
"From an offensive standpoint, we have to be on our game," Manning said Wednesday in a teleconference. "We have to be executing. We have to protect the ball, because if you're giving Philadelphia and Michael Vick and [LeSean] McCoy short fields and not doing your job, they're capable of scoring a lot of points and a lot of points quickly."
Manning and the Broncos are lighting up scoreboards to the tune of just over 42 points per game, which certainly will put the onus on the Eagles defense on Sunday afternoon at Sports Authority Field.
"One of the great things about coaching or playing in the NFL is these challenges," Eagles defensive coordinator Bill Davis told reporters Wednesday. "As players and coaches, we have pretty solid egos ourselves. We're not going to back down from any challenge, and our players are very anxious to accept the challenge, and let's go see what we can do against them."
Conquering that challenge may be easier said than done for Davis' troops.
Following matchups with the Washington Redskins, San Diego Chargers and Kansas City Chiefs the Eagles defense is allowing an average of 438.33 yards per game.
And those numbers are pre-Manning.
With all of that said, in order for the Eagles to find success in Denver, the defense needs to stick to it's game plan.
"You can't get in awe of Peyton Manning," DeMeco Ryans said Wednesday. "Yeah, he's a great quarterback. Get over it. Everyone knows he's a Hall of Fame guy. Get over it. What do you have to do to win this game? That's the mentality we all have to take."
Manning has more weapons at his disposal arguably than he has had at any previous point in his career. Wes Welker, Eric Decker, Demaryius Thomas, Julius Thomas and Knowshon Moreno compound the challenge of slowing one of the greatest quarterbacks to lace 'em up in league history.
"Most teams have a star that you can target and take away," Davis pointed out. "But with Peyton, he makes you defend the entire field."
Matt Lombardo is the Editor-In-Chief of Eagledelphia and also an on-air personality on 97.5 FM The Fanatic in Philadelphia. Join the conversation and follow Matt on Twitter.
