Eagles' D needs more than just a CB
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Eagles' D needs more than just a CB
Sheil Kapadia, Philly.com
By now, you know the numbers.
In 2010, the Eagles' defense gave up a franchise-record 31 touchdown passes. Only the Cowboys and Texans allowed more (33 apiece).
And opponents scored on 78.26 percent of their trips inside the red zone against the Eagles. That was by far the worst mark in the NFL. The Texans were second-worst at 67.8 percent.
But it wasn't all bad. The Birds limited opponents to an 80.8 QB rating, which ranked 11th. And the Eagles' 23 interceptions were third-best.
With an (hopeful) eye on free agency, I decided to focus in on those touchdown passes to get a better idea of how teams attacked the Eagles and why opposing offenses had so much success.
Before I get into my findings, I must give reader Mark a big thank you for setting up a spreadsheet for me, which made it pretty easy to chart the touchdowns. The MTC readership came up big once again.
Please note that I did not count the Week 17 touchdown pass against the Cowboys, but I did include the playoff game against the Packers. So overall, we're working with 33 passing touchdowns allowed.
WHO SCORED ON THE EAGLES?
I know, the better question might be: Who didn't?
Here's a chart of how those 33 touchdowns broke down, position-by-position:
| Position | Touchdowns |
| Wide receivers | 16 |
| Tight ends | 11 |
| Running backs | 6 |
The numbers surprised me. We all know the Eagles seem to always have trouble covering opposing tight ends, but 11 touchdowns?
Overall, tight ends and running backs (combined) accounted for more touchdowns in the passing game than opposing wide receivers.
What does this tell me? While the consensus is that the Eagles need to find a right cornerback as soon as the lockout is over, one player is not going to cure all this team's problems against the pass.
Linebacker is a major concern. The Eagles have drafted five LBs in the past two seasons, but the position, for the most part, is an unknown. We don't know how much Jamar Chaney and Keenan Clayton will improve from their rookie years. We don't know if Stewart Bradley is going to be here, if he's capable of staying healthy or if he can play at a consistently high level. And we don't know how NFL-ready rookies Casey Matthews, Brian Rolle and Greg Lloyd will be.
My hunch is that the Eagles will let the young guys battle it out for playing time, but if there's talent to be had in free agnecy, this is the right offseason to make a move.
BURNING THE BLITZ?
Sean McDermott based his defensive philosophy on Jim Johnson's teachings, but teams had plenty of success when the Eagles didn't blitz and only rushed only their four defensive linemen.
On the 33 touchdown passes, only 10 came against an Eagles blitz.
Meanwhile, more often than not, opposing offenses had success scoring on the Eagles without keeping in extra blockers. On only 13 of the 33 touchdowns did the offense use more than their five offensive linemen to protect the quarterback.
On four of the 33 touchdown passes, Eagles rushers outnumbered the offense's blockers, but the Birds didn't get to the quarterback.
TOUCHDOWN TARGETS
Which Eagles were burned the most? This was a difficult one, and I tried to make sure I took an honest look. On eight of the touchdowns, I really couldn't tell. That might mean an offensive player got between two defenders in zone coverage. Or the opponent might have scored on a screen or a quick throw where really the whole defense was at fault.
But for the other passes, I thought I had a pretty good idea of which Eagles defender was responsible in coverage:
| Defender | Touchdown Targets |
| Dimitri Patterson | 5 |
| Ellis Hobbs | 4 |
| Joselio Hanson | 4 |
| Ernie Sims | 3 |
| Nate Allen | 3 |
| Quintin Mikell | 2 |
| Stewart Bradley | 1 |
| Jamar Chaney | 1 |
| Asante Samuel | 1 |
| Juqua Parker | 1 |
It was pretty easy to tell when a cornerback was responsible in coverage. Safety is a very difficult position to track off of TV, but I did my best.
To that end, there were several instances where Nate Allen got to the ball right after a touchdown catch. I did not count those against him in the chart above. Allen showed great potential as a rookie, but after re-watching the touchdowns, it was clear they need improvement from him in pass coverage.
I like Joselio Hanson more than most, but he had his issues, giving up four touchdowns.
If you're wondering why Juqua Parker is listed, he got caught in coverage on a zone blitz against Tony Gonzalez and the Falcons.
WHERE'D THEY LINE UP?
The receivers who caught touchdowns on the Eagles lined up in a variety of places.
The two most common (eight TDs each) were on the left side opposite the Eagles' right cornerback and on the line of scrimmage, where the tight end did damage.
On six occasions, the player who scored was lined up in the backfield. And a receiver lined up on the right side opposite the Eagles' left cornerback caught a TD on six occasions too (although only one of those was against Asante Samuel).
Five of the touchdowns came from the receiver in the slot on the right side.
LEFTOVERS
* The average length of the 33 touchdowns was 16.3 yards. The longest was Jahvid Best's 75-yard catch and run in the Eagles' win over the Lions.
* 25 of the 33 touchdowns were in the red zone. And 19 were within 10 yards of the end zone.
* 12 of the touchdowns were to the quarterback's right; 11 to the middle; and 10 to the left.
* I noticed an interesting trend on play-action passes. Of the first 14 touchdown passes the Eagles allowed, not a single one came on a play-action pass or a fake handoff. But offenses used play-action or a fake handoff to score on 10 of the final 19 touchdown passes the Eagles allowed. Again, linebacker play was a huge issue. They were caught in no man's land on multiple occasions.
* Trading for or signing a right cornerback should be among the first things the Eagles do once the lockout ends. But I'm less convinced now that the secondary is where they will make a major splash.
The defensive problems stemmed from a variety of factors: Lack of pressure from the defensive line, poor linebacker play, a hole at right cornerback and the overall scheme. The Eagles have already addressed a couple of those areas, getting rid of Sean McDermott and drafting safety Jaiquawn Jarrett in the second round. We'll find out in free agency whether they believe their current players can be good enough under Juan Castillo and Jim Washburn or if they think they need to add major pieces on 'D' to make a Super Bowl run.
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Without a big stud nose tackle in the middle the teams will run on us....and we have no big stud linebackers so ours will be run over....but then again the Andy's formula of light and fast has been so succesful that the trophy case is filled with Lombardi Trophies......Oh, you mean it is not......sounds like the definition of insantity to me....— nuggett- the problems with the eagles D is limited to three areas... 1) pass rush 2) linebackers )3 pass coverage. other than that, they are "gold standard".— nyphilliephan
No DT in the middle? Dixon was steller against the run. Look at the numbers when Bunkley started, and then Dixon did. Also, NTs are on 3-4s.— phillychaos- 2 words - PASS RUSH. Average CBs look much better with even an average pass rush.— DennyP
- Please send this data over to One Novacare Way like 5 mins ago! Clearly Andy and his staff either don't know how to quantify just how bad their linebackers are, or they think they can cover it up by drafting a bunch of DEs (i.e. 'fastballs') every single year. Please get just one legitimate LB!— stikolaboloni
- @DennyP what I interpret from that chart is opponents are finding way too much success hitting RBs with screens and swing passes out of the backfied, etc. and with tight ends up the seam. Neither of which the cornerback is responsible for— stikolaboloni
- No disagreement. All I said is we need a pass rush. As for the RB screens and swing passes, that's largely a LB problem but also a scheme problem. Too much dropping DL into coverage. — DennyP
- paterson was a lot worse than those numbers show i would like to see how many completions he gave up and the adv. rcb i still believe is a huge hole i think our DL is goin to be fine under washburne LB is weak but i dont think they will be terrible next season as long as chaney can pick up where he left off if stew comes back he'll be do or die i hope he shows up to play sam and chaney at mike— mamba710
- Even though we usually draft like crazy for the defensive line, it still is not up to par. We love those little guys who get run over or injured and cannot go a full season. And it seems we cannot find linebacks of talent.— 4thand10
- Great job crunching the numbers, as usual. One thing that jumps out is a bit of a discrepancy from your top line conclusions and the numbers provided. WRs accounted for 16 TDs but I see 14 between patterson, hobbs and hanson. Were they getting burned by TEs? Did the preponderance of TE and RB scores fall into the unassigned bucket of 8 TDs? otherwise, i see sims giving up 3 and no other high numbers for an LB.
It would make sense, though, because (especially since I chart games, too and realize the severe limitations of TV angles) folks could be off screen, or running through zones.
For the safeties, from what i recall of allen, he played mostly well, but had a couple of really bad games (TN comes to mind) which may account for the bulk of the TDs he gave up.
one thing that it will be very hard to show w/ pure numbers are the scheme TDs, where we did something stupid that made it almost a given that the opponent would score.
lastly, i'm surprised by the efficacy of the blitz. at least on scoring D. my recollection was a lot of big plays given up with the blitz. if we didn't give up td's on those, perhaps they were non-scoring but nonetheless back breaking plays on 3rd downs that extended drives and demoralized the defense, after playing solidly on 1st and 2nd. that was certainly a theme that i picked up on while watching.
— poetx - they need three LBs, two D-lineman and a safety. I'm sure nickels will get right on it, especially LB.— snakeplissken
- I agreed with boloni (can't believe I really said that) about the ability of the multiple assistant coaches the Eagles supposedly employ to crunch numbers like Shiel does and come up with adequate responses to keep the other team from scoring. Isn't that their job?!?— tomvallar
Great work Sheil. I believe the Eagles trade for a LB in the Kolb trade and sign Nnamdi Asomugha, Ike Taylor or Jonathan Joseph as there right CB. Let's hope they get a new CBA deal done quickly so the Eagles can make there moves.— briandawkins20- Doesn't matter. There's only one NFL team in PA that has a shot at the SB.
Hint: It's not the Eagles.— Sidney Crosby - is it the team that got a belt whoopin by there daddy on sbsunday? — first down
- After the choke last year, you can't be talking about the Squeelers... — gdibig
- And in other news, DUHHHHHHHHH. No S@!^ we need more than a CB.— Jeffritoe
- There is no one problem on this defense. The line needs a little more pass rush. The linebackers are all right, but can they be great, or at least very good? Samuel is a great ballhawk, but can be scored on. At the right corner there's no reliable Sheldon Brown, only some question marks. The safeties are good guys, hard workers. No Dawkins or Reed there. If this defense is to succeed, it will need super coaching and chemistry.— armchairGM
- Samuel gave up only 4 TDs in 116 "attempts" in the last two seasons. Please don't make him sound like he's a DeAnglo Hall clone. — phillychaos
- Great article SK. It seems to me that the entire defense has issues. We have a horrible rush when we go go with a four rushers. We are weak against the run that cries for help at LB and DL.The corners and safeties are all soft. Asante is a ball hawk but it stops there. They need way more help than right corner.— adipaolo
- Joe "Nickels" Banner!— Gigs1777
- Everybody calm down. We have an O-line coach that is going to turn around this terrible defense. We will also have a runningback as one of our D.B.'s Andy invented football didn't you know?— yourdaddy!
- Sheil Kapadia: great work, but there is a problem: The eagles Don't Read Philly.com. They think their booty doesn't stink and they have four SB trophies.— Don Cornelius
- When people complain about the fluff pieces, for example "The Eagles watched film on guys they drafted!", and other complain about there not being any other news. Well here's what we want. Don't just regurgitate the same tired nonsense. Do some analysis, dig around and find a story. Great job as usual, Sheil.— tripleplay83
- They drafted 5 LB's in the past year but the highest was the 4th round.— Ssteve115
- So? They drafted LBs in the 2nd round in the past too, and we know how they turned out. Believe it not not, there's plenty of talent in the later rounds. You just need to know who to draft. Chaney showed signs last year of being one of those players. — phillychaos
- So? They drafted LBs in the 2nd round in the past too, and we know how they turned out. Believe it not not, there's plenty of talent in the later rounds. You just need to know who to draft. Chaney showed signs last year of being one of those players. — phillychaos
- I could skip the entire season if Sheil kept breaking last year down. I thought I was the smartest Eagle fan on the planet but I learn a bunch from every article. Keep it up, I will keep reading.
When your red zone d stinks out loud it is clear that you have more than one issue. If the Eagles front office can read, solving their defensive puzzle seems much easier.— pking222 - A little birdie told me that Andy and Nickels are dialing down the list of players that had surgery last season...see if they can find a bargain.— Trashcan_Man
- good article. interesting and insightful. thanks for putting the work in.— PHLtoLAX
- wow, that was an incredible defense brought to you by Andy Reid. below average pass rush, HORRIBLE linebackers, only one good corner, and a question mark at safety...shocker.
this season looks like...question mark at pass rush, question mark at LB, maybe two starting CB's, and question mark at 1 or both safety spots. Um, knowing Reids track record there is no reason to be remotely optimistic that things will all magically go his way. guys will get injured, some will not pan out, and Reid will call 80% passing leaving the D tired and exposed over and over. cant wait. Andy, please fullfill your dream of opening a cheesesteak place at BYU and step down as coach ASAP.— CharlieGarner25 - Blah, blah, blah, blah. Let me really go out on a limb here and make a prediction........10 or 11 wins. Lose in the playoffs. Losers. Just like their 50 years without a title but keep rooting loser fans.— baabyrrej
- The Linebackers in Philly have been weak for at least the last decade and not since Reggie White has there been sufficient pressure coming from the defensive line. That's what made Jim Johnson so outstanding, those blitz packages. The Eagles need a punishing linebacker and a full size monster end to apply constant pressure.
— Dexter
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