Eagles' defense has day to forget

Last week in this space, we were singing the praises of Sean McDermott and the Eagles' defense.

And rightfully so.

The Birds had forced turnover after turnover and shut down one of the league's best rushing attacks in their opener against the Panthers.

Quite a difference a week can make.

Today, the Saints' offense and Drew Brees picked apart McDermott's unit to the tune of 423 total yards and 23 first downs. Probably more surprising than Brees' success was New Orleans' ability to run the ball. Mike Bell carried 17 times for 86 yards, and the Saints averaged 4.6 yards per carry as a team.

Through the air, the Eagles had all kinds of trouble with big target Marques Colston, who had eight catches for 98 yards and a pair of touchdowns.

Eagles safety Quintin Mikell said the real Eagles defense is the unit we saw in Week 1.

"We're the team that we had last week," Mikell said. "This week, it's almost a game where you gotta watch the film, learn from it and move on. That's just not what we do around here. We were playing on our heels. We weren't playing aggressive. You can't do that against a good team. And they're a good team. They came out and they made a lot of good plays. But I feel like we're a good team too. We just didn't play our best game tonight."

The Saints often started their drives with great field position, but the Eagles looked confused at times, missed tackles and got little pressure on Brees.

The Eagles will get a break in terms of matchups in the coming weeks. The next four games are against the Chiefs, Bucs, Raiders and Redskins. None of those teams feature prolific offenses.

But on this day, they had no answers for the Saints.

Earlier we posted on the Ellis Hobbs fumble.