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Friday, May 23, 2008
Birds' questions: Odds, return men, running backs

As Memorial Day weekend is upon us, we hit exactly two months until training camp. Rookies arrive at Lehigh on July 21 and practice the following day. The remainder of the team arrives July 24.

Between now and then, the Eagles have three more camps. Rookies and selected veterans return next week for workouts Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. The entire team is in for OTAs from June 3 to 6 and June 9-12.

As we count down the days, we thought it might be interesting to hit on a couple of issues and see how you are feeling ...

* Jeff Haney in the Las Vegas Sun cites the Grand Sierra Sports Book (granted, we have never heard of them) as having the over/under for Eagles' win this season at 8.5. Are you taking the over or the under? By the way, New England is at a crazy 13.5.

* Also according to Haney, citing the Las Vegas Hilton sports book (we have heard of them and been there, too), the Eagles' odds to win the division are 9-2. Dallas is listed at 5-9, the Giants at 7-2 and the Redskins at 7-1.

* Special teams clearly has been a big part of the Eagles' offseason plans with their free-agent acquisitions and the drafting of potential kick/punt returners. If the season started today, who is back there receiving the first kickoff and/or the first punt -- DeSean Jackson, Lorenzo Booker, Quintin Demps, Bam Childress, JR Reed, Correll Buckhalter, somebody else?

* Les Bowen wrote about the running back situation the other day with Tony Hunt and Lorenzo Booker vying for carries behind Brian Westbrook. Here is the breakdown of carries by running backs last season: Westbrook, 278; Buckhalter, 62; Hunt 10. Fullback Thomas Tapeh had 5. The Eagles generally had three running backs activated last year with Reno Mahe being one of them to return kicks and Hunt often deactivated. How do you see that playing out this season? Will the three active running backs be Westbrook, Booker and Hunt, with Buckhalter not even making the team?

* And the age-old question about the Eagles: Will they add a wide receiver before the season begins? All signs point against that happening, but remember what they did with Donte' Stallworth.

 

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About The Daily News' Eagles Blog
Les BowenLes Bowen has covered the Eagles for the Daily News since 2002. Before that, he spent nearly 13 years covering the Flyers. It took Les only a few seasons after the switch to figure out that there was no penalty box at the Linc, and that the time really wasn't his, despite what Andy Reid kept saying. Les came to Philadelphia and the Daily News from Charlotte in 1983. In the intervening years, he has pretty much lost track of NASCAR, and his accent. He, his wife Barbara, and their two sons live in Haddon Township, New Jersey.

Paul DomowitchPaul Domowitch has been with the Daily News since 1982. He has spent most of his 26 years at the paper covering the Eagles and pro football. A native of Wilkes-Barre and a graduate of Wilkes University, where he spent 3 years as the sports editor of the school paper and zero semesters on the dean's list, Domo came to the Daily News from the Fort Worth (Tx.) Star-Telegram, where he covered some very bad Texas Ranger baseball teams. His first beat at the Daily News actually was boxing, which he covered just long enough to lose two sports coats to blood spatter before moving on to football. Domo and his wife Shelley, who is a University of Oklahoma grad and is dangerous to be around following a Sooner loss, have been married 27 years and have raised 2 terrific daughters – Allison, 23, who attends Boston University School of Law; and Amy, 21, a sports marketing major at Clemson. When he's not writing about football, Domo enjoys reading Robert Parker, John Sandford and Harlan Coben novels and playing pickup basketball when his arthritic hip doesn't object.

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