Chaney to MLB; Matthews to WLB
The Philadelphia Inquirer Blog - Eagles
Chaney to MLB; Matthews to WLB
Jeff McLane, Inquirer Staff Writer
Jamar Chaney is now the Eagles' starting middle linebacker, replacing rookie Casey Matthews, who will move to weak-side linebacker, team sources said.
The shuffling of the linebackers included Moise Fokou moving from weak-side linebacker to strong-side linebacker in place of Chaney.
Chaney confirmed the moves following the afternoon practice.
"This is the position I like to play," Chaney said. "I liked playing [strong-side] but I was just getting used to it."
Chaney believed that the move was partly made "because I was at [middle linebacker] last year and had some pretty good success at it. ... Growing up you always want to be the leader of the defense and I take on the challenge and look forward to it."
Two games of watching running backs run rampant through the middle of the Eagles' defense was apparently enough for coordinator Juan Castillo to make the moves as the Eagles prepare for Sunday's home opener against the New York Giants.
"It's not really different, it's all basically the same," Matthews said of the changes.
The Matthews experiment in the middle is thus offically over. The rookie, a fourth-round draft pick, struggled in two starts. In fact, the entire linebacker corp has not played particularly well thus far. In the opener, the Rams ran for 154 yards on the ground. On Sunday, the Falcons gained 138 rushing yards, including a 61-yard run from Michael Turner in the fourth quarter that set up the game-winning score for Atlanta.
Chaney moves back to the middle where he played most of last season as a backup. When he did start, filling in for the injured Stewart Bradley, he fared well.
Then a rookie, Chaney tallied 16 tackles, a forced fumble and a quarterback hurry against the Giants on Dec. 19. A week later against the Vikings, he recorded eight tackles. And then in a playoff loss against the Packers, Chaney notched 11 tackles, a forced fumble and a hurry.
Many had Matthews pegged as an outside linebacker in a 4-3 defensive scheme coming out of Oregon. He'll get his chance to play there on Sunday.
"He played outside in college so he might feel more comfortable out there," Chaney said. "He was out there practicing today. He said he's already starting to like the position so that's a good thing.
"With [weak-side] he doesn't have to worry about making no calls. He did a good job. Out of all the rookie linebackers in the league he probably had the most pressure or responsibility on him."
Fokou moves back to strong-side where he played most of his first two seasons.
"It's not a huge change but you're doing different jobs," Chaney said.
The Eagles had felt Chaney was better suited to play strong-side in Castillo's scheme because of his cover skills. But Atlanta tight end Tony Gonzalez had his way against the second-year linebacker on Sunday, although many have suffered the same fate against the future Hall of Famer.
Chaney said the nickel defense will remain the same at linebacker with either Matthews or Brian Rolle -- and sometimes Keenan Clayton -- playing alongside him.
Yeah, they're running a little scared of what could happen this season if they don't correct the problem. Andy's neck is on the line and it should be because it's been awhile and you still can't get it right. Since he's the coach and he decides on the personnel he should get all the blame in my book. This is sink or swim territory now!— levans4598- I bet you Rolle nails a starting job by the end of the season.— rad205
- It only took 4 preseason and 2 regular games for Juan to figure out what Philly Fans already knew. Casey Matthews isn't ready to be a starter in the NFL at any linebacking position. Lamar Chaney should have been the starter at MLB, based on his production last season. Eagles brass will be trying to save face with their glorification of Matthews but truth be told, Brian Rolle is a much better player than Casey. Rolle will be the next option once Clay's step-brother flops at his new position. You know this all started when Dopey Andy selected Juan as DC, over more qualifed (but more expensive) candidates. Hopefully Washburn is really running the Defense and Juan is just the goofy cheerleader on the sidelines!— younged
Comment removed.- According the Cheney, this move to the inside is new to him...where is this news coming from???— rvb2321
- first watkins, then matthews; getting to be a troubling trend: troubling that the coaches who are too close to the situation having drafted these guys think things are going to work out when the average fan in the nosebleed seats know they won't.— vegasscott
- Hopefully this year is Reid's last— DrumsAndBeer
- All Reid needs now is to put Jamal Jackson back in at Center!!!!!!!
— Rollie - Let's just be happy it is happening in week 3 and not week 9 when we can't make the playoffs without a miracle. Hope to see a difference on Sunday.— carmendmv
- Great, now we will run to the Weak Side.....Tom Coughlin!!— zidane
- Everything is so simple. You just need a Pro Bowl level plater at every position and some luck. Why can't Reid see this????? Boy, I sure wish you guys were running the team. Any idiot can run an NFL team so you're all qualified.— MikeP
- Lance Briggs is too slow and expensive. Bad idea.— momeara001
- Would it have been that bad to just resign Stewart Bradley? Seriously?— Mr. Underhill
- Juan, Put the Madden 12 controller down and start concentrating on the job at hand!!!!!!— zidane
- They can reshuffle these guys all they want, but it isn't going to make them NFL players. I've never been one to call Andy Reid dumb because I always felt he was a smart football guy. But I have to tell you, starting a rookie at middle linebacker (the only reason seeming to be that his last name is Matthews), starting a second year guy at strongside (who played better at middle but wasn't anything special), and a guy at weakside (who hasn't ever been any good) is completely nonsensical. To exacerbate things, he makes his former offensive line coach the defensive coordinator. Who does that? Every year he acts as though linebackers are unimportant to a defense even though every great defense in the history of the game was anchored by their linebackers. On top of this, he puts together a half-hazard offensive line, while signing a quarterback to 130 million dollar contract. Why bother when any quarterback is going to be mincemeat before the season is over? Every year, he makes these out of the box decisions that no one would make in a million years. If these decisions had won him titles, I could buy it, but they haven't. In fact, they have gotten him beat. I'm starting to feel that he got lucky for a lot of years because Ray Rhodes left him a lot of defensive talent and Jim Johnson knew what to do with that talent. Once that talent got old and now no Jim Johnson, Reid is beginning to prove himself to be absolutely clueless in regards to building a team and understanding what sorts of things a team needs to be successful. I hope I'm wrong, but I don't expect this team to win anything, not as long the current decision making and the philosophy behind it is still intact.— Hemingway
