As we begin the ritual dismemberment of Andy Reid, I have start with a personal confession: I don't tend to criticize  individual  play calls very much. To me, it's just a waste of breath. There are so many things that we don't know about a given situation -- mostly, what the defense is showing -- that it is really hard to make an intellectually-honest case that you had as much information as the head coach when he chose a particular play in a particular spot.

In an over-arching sense, I get on Reid all the time because he throws too much -- mostly because it puts his quarterback at physical risk. But down near the goal line at the end of Sunday night's game, I'm not going to tell you that play-action would have worked any better, or that running to the other side would have mattered, or that they had a pass play that might have shaken something  free for the tight end (not the starter), or the running back (not the starter), or the fullback (who has about 4 games' experience), or the wide receiver (missing one of the starters).

I honestly thought that, given everything, handing the ball to Correll Buckhalter from 18 inches away was OK.

But because Buckhalter got stuffed -- because the Eagles got stuffed four times from inside the 4-yard line -- the recriminations will be long and loud. That's all fine and all a part of the gig. We need a head to stick on the end of a pike -- at least until the baseball  playoffs get started on Wednesday -- and Reid's is as good as any.

In the end, though, it is about the continuing saga of trying to improve in the red zone,  and about the talent on the field.  Without the big receiver who was not acquired in the off-season, you limit your options. Without that receiver, tight end L.J. Smith becomes an enormously important target, you limit your options further. Without running back Brian Westbrook, you limit your options even more. And without All-Pro right guard Shawn Andrews, well, you get it.

The Eagles now have only eight touchdowns in 17 red zone possessions. The number by the week. Here are the touchdown scorers: Westbrook 5, Smith 1, Buckhalter 1, McNabb 1.

Key stat: Westbrook 5.

They had tried throwing it the previous time into the red zone (an unsuccessful trip that ended with a field goal). There  was a 6-yard pass to Brent Celek, a 4-yarder to Jason Avant, an incompletion to Hank Baskett, a 4-yard loss when McNabb tripped coming away from center,  and an incompletion to Avant. It was a fairly typical Reid trip into the red zone. He threw -- oh, and it didn't work. I'm sure there was wailing about that sequence, too.

Look -- I don't know the answer. But I have to believe their impotence on that earlier red-zone trip left Reid wondering if he had any viable passing options down there at the end. He also said McNabb's chest contusion took the quarterback sneak out of the arsenal. And we all know that things  would  have been much different had Westbrook been able to play -- you know it, I know it, Reid knows it. Even with injuries at tight end, receiver and guard, all significant  players, Westbrook would have covered for all of them.

But Westbrook wasn't there.

Given that, given everything, I really do have to admit: I didn't hate a handoff there to Buckhalter from 18 inches away.

CHICAGO - "The scoreboard is frozen," referee Walt Coleman announced to the crowd at Soldier Field. It was early in the fourth quarter of a football game that would not end, a night when the quarterbacks wore bulls-eyes and the running games were useless and nothing for either team really went according to form.

It was more demolition derby than football, much more about mistakes than anything else. That the Eagles will always miss Brian Westbrook remains plain enough. That Bears quarterback Kyle Orton is still Kyle Orton is also fairly obvious.

But as it wound down, slowly, inexorably, it came to this: the Eagles, trailing by 24-20, about a half-yard away from the end zone with 3:40 left to play. Eagles coach Andy Reid called a timeout to put together a play. The field goal was decided against. This was it, a chance to salvage a bruising, difficult night.

I formation…calling signals…the give is to Correll Buckhalter, who took the ball and battered in behind the right side of the Eagles' offensive line and immediately met resistance.

It was close, but not really.

No gain. Chicago ball.

Bears 24, Eagles 20.

This is life without Brian Westbrook. This is what happens when you play without one of the great offensive weapons in the National Football League. This is what happens: you don't get into the end zone on four cracks from inside the 5-yard line.

Westbrook came out before the game and tested his ankle on the turf, tried to run a little, cut a little, and then huddled with coaches and team officials to make a decision.

When the decision was no-go, it changed everything.

There is no camouflaging a loss like Westbrook.

1950:

 

1980:

 

1983:

 

1993:

 

2007:

 

Next?

My night began with a post about how Cubs manager Lou Piniella was resting three of his biggest bats -- Aramis Ramirez, Derrek Lee and Alfonso Soriano -- in a game with huge implications for the Mets, Phillies and Brewers. And how it kind of mocked the notion of the integrity of the pennant race that everyone in baseball loves to talk about.

Then they played the game and it got worse.

The big bats stayed on the bench, right to the end. Daryle Ward was the pinch-hitter Piniella called on in the top of the ninth inning with two runners on base and two outs in a tie game. Yes, Daryle Ward.

And the bullpen? Bob Howry blew the save in the eighth inning. Kevin Hart lost the game in the ninth inning. Carlos Marmol? Kerry Wood? Nope and nope. They stayed dry as the Mets scored one in the seventh, two in the eighth and one in the ninth to come from behind and win, 7-6.

Yes, it was wet at Shea Stadium. Yes, you are entitled to give some people some rest after you have clinched your own business. But propriety suggests that you rest one or two guys at a time and no more. Common decency suggests you don't take the field with the Iowa Cubs and then do nothing as the game slips away in the late innings.

But that is what Piniella did. And because of that, the Phillies' lead over the Mets is one game with three to play.

You know how, especially in baseball, they talk about the integrity of the game, and the importance of respecting other teams, and respecting the sport and the pennant race by giving a real effort.

Well, take a gander at what Cubs manager Lou Piniella is doing tonight at Shea Stadium.

Alfonso Soriano, not starting.

Derrek Lee, not starting.

Aramis Ramirez, not starting.

(Apparently there was a split-squad game in Tempe.)

In a crucial game for the Mets, Phils and Brewers, Piniella is sitting 76 homers and 276 RBI. If the Mets don't win this one, there ought to be an investigation.

Yeah, integrity.

Things are still fine for the Phillies. Really, they are. With a magic number of three for both the division title (over the Mets) and the wildcard (over the Brewers), they're going to get in.

But if they don't get it buttoned down by Sunday, they have a problem -- that is, the identity of their Game 1 starter in the playoffs on Wednesday. Because I just don't know that you want to be running Brett Myers out there at this point. I don't know if it would be fair to anybody, Myers included, to put him under that kind of a spotlight. It is why the timing matters here. It is why the Phillies need to clinch before Sunday so that they don't have to use Cole Hamels on the last day of the season.

If Sunday is meaningless, they can set up the rotation like this:

Game 1, Hamels.

Game 2, Moyer.

Game 3, Myers.

Game 4, Blanton.

Game 5, Hamels (with Moyer available on full rest, followed by a cast of thousands, if necessary).

The problems come because of the Phillies' dithering the last two nights. Now Moyer will likely have to pitch on Saturday in a real game, which would make him unavailable to start a playoff opener on Wednesday on regular rest. If both he and Hamels are unavailable for Game 1, that leaves Myers or Joe Blanton. At this point, neither is the ideal. There also is J.A. Happ, I guess, but I can't imagine they'd start him. At the same time, though, don't they have to put him on the post-season roster now as Myers insurance? If Myers has another one of those games, and they have to go get him in the second inning, don't they need Happ, just in case?

Anyway, if Hamels has to pitch Sunday, they can set it up like this:

Game 1, Myers or Blanton.

Game 2, Moyer.

Game 3, Hamels.

Game 4, Myers or Blanton.

Game 5, Moyer (with the Game 1 starter on full rest, followed by everybody).

Comparing the two potential set-ups, it is obvious which is superior. And so, while the Phillies are fine, they do need to hurry.

Now in their 10th year together, Andy Reid and Joe Banner seem like a part of the furniture around here -- you know, the comfortable chair whose arm you occasionally smash down upon in frustration. It is familiar and comfortable and a little bit battered. You cannot remember what the room looked like without it.

With that, consider the Detroit Lions and the Oakland Raiders.

Consider the costs of the mistakes they have made.

After years and years of stinkification, the Lions finally got rid of Matt Millen this morning as their boss. At least, that is the report on foxsports.com. They did it after the owner's son -- like his father, he is a man named Ford who has run the self-same car company -- went public with his displeasure. The time that franchise has wasted is criminal, and you don't need to tell the people of Detroit that fact. But they picked the wrong guy at the top -- and when you do that in the NFL, you put yourself into a hell that deepens with the day. You cannot get out of it until you get the guy out of it. In the meantime, you just die a little more, and then you die a little more again.

Compare to Reid and Banner. There is frustration sometimes, and anger sometimes, yes. But, honestly.

Oakland is different but the same. Crazy Al Davis continues to do crazy things -- this year's version leaves the Raiders with a head coach, Lane Kiffen, who apparently has to check on an hourly basis if he is still on the payroll. It is a ridiculous situation, with an organization apparently conspiring against itself. Their fans are proud to be insane and Davis apparently is proud to follow them. And the franchise sinks.

Compare, again, to Reid and Banner. I am not going to argue that there never have been political struggles within the Eagles, spoken and unspoken, because that is the nature of organizational behavior. Stuff like that does happen on the margins because, well, it does. But I never have had the sense that these two very powerful guys did not support each other, and that they were working together to try to get it right.

There are probably some of you sitting there saying that it isn't any great accomplishment to be better than the Lions or the Raiders, and that Reid and Banner deserve no special praise for being better than the worst. That's fine and true. But the Eagles had significant problems before Jeffrey Lurie bought the team. When Leonard Tose was the owner, his life was a financial circus -- and it held them back as a franchise. They had a significant split between the football side and the front office side when Buddy Ryan was coach and Norman Braman was owner, and while it made for terrific theater, it held them back again (besides leading to Rich Kotite and the free-agent exodus of Reggie White and the rest).

The Eagles were Detroit. The Eagles were Oakland. We forget.

I don't expect the Phillies to answer the question because they have no reason to answer it yet. But they do have the ability to add J.A. Happ to their post-season roster if they want to add him, and it would not require any subterfuge to do it.

Back in the day, the only way you could add somebody who wasn't on your 25-man roster on August 31st was as an injury replacement. It led to all manner of phantom injury claims. Back in 1980, it took the Phillies the better part of two days to convince baseball commissioner Bowie Kuhn and National League president Chub Feeney that Nino Espinosa was really hurt, necessitating the addition of Marty Bystrom (5-0 in September as a call-up) to the playoff roster.

Today, the process is cleaner. Here is my understanding. On August 31st, your 25-man roster is set. At that point, your playoff-eligible players are anybody on the 25-man or anybody on the disabled list. However, those disabled list guys act almost like roster exemptions that can be cashed in during a post-season run. The Phillies have a handful of guys on the 60-day DL, including Tom Gordon. They are allowed to substitute for those disabled list guys by choosing from anybody already in the organization on August 31st. So Happ could essentially become Gordon, just for argument's sake, and then be eligible for the post-season.

Again, I don't know what's going to happen -- but that's the mechanism. A couple of people wondered if Happ might pitch a meaningless game on Sunday to end the regular season, if it is indeed meaningless. I wouldn't do it. I'd save him at this point for the post-season, either as a disaster starter, or a long rain-delay guy, or a long-relief guy, or simply as another bullpen arm.

 

Sifting through three weeks of stats has a meaningless quality to it, true enough. The number really don't begin to make any sense until midseason. One game can skew things beyond all reality. You engage in this practice at your own risk.

That said, I dug the Eagles' red zone stats out ot the NFL release this morning, trying to get a handle on where this thing might be headed. Because this team looks both good and fun so far, both competitive and interesting. Fun to watch, fun to disect -- a sportswriter's dream, it appears. So, anyway.

Through three games, the Eagles have shown some improvement in the red zone -- but not enough.

Last year, red zone offense was their greatest deficiency. It is the reason why I thought they should find another big target for quarterback Donovan McNabb. Because while I always liked their receivers and thought they were good enough, I also saw a quarterback who just wouldn't throw it to them down near the goal line, down in traffic. I thought he needed a big target but it never came. So now we see how it works.

In 2007, in their depths, the Eagles were getting touchdowns less than 40 percent of the time on red zone possessions, one of the handful of worst numbers in the league. After a rush in the last three games of the season, they goosed the number up to 45.1 percent overall -- 24th in the league. Even at that, it is the aspect of the game upon which everybody was focused in the off-season.

And this year? So far, they're doing better -- seven touchdowns in 13 trips inside the red zone, which is 53.8 percent, which is good for 14th in the NFL, which is good for mediocre. (Dallas has the same percentage, the Giants are worse and the Redskins are better so far.)

The Eagles have three passing touchdowns in the red zone and four rushing touchdowns. That is the biggest difference so far, that ratio. Last year, it was skewed largely to the pass (15 passing TD's in the red zone, eight rushing TD's). We all kind of suspected, if they didn't get the big receiver, that they might finally start to lean a little more on the running game in close, and they have. Brian Westbrook has been their biggest red zone player so far, and by a large margin.

But now, with the ankle injury, with the questions about whether or not he will play Sunday against Chicago, you wonder. With tight end L.J. Smith -- quiet so far, and now with a back injury -- you wonder even more.

So, yes, they're a little better so far. But it gets harder from here, and it remains the key to the season.