What I saw: Eagles vs. Rams
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What I saw: Eagles vs. Rams
Sheil Kapadia, Philly.com
Here are my observations from today's Eagles-Rams game:
* Michael Vick's final numbers: 14-for-32 for 187 yards and two touchdowns. He also added 100 yards on eight carries on the ground. Overall, Vick accounted for three touchdowns. It wasn't always pretty, but he found his playmakers downfield and demoralized the Rams' defense with his legs. The Eagles finished an impressive 8-for-12 on third down. And they converted two of three red-zone chances into touchdowns.
This was a throwback game for Vick. I need to re-watch to see how he did against the blitz, but overall, he just did what he does best: make plays. The Eagles designed plays to get him out of the pocket, and Vick escaped on his own many times.
* DeSean Jackson was targeted 12 times and finished with six catches for 102 yards. He had two plays of 25+ yards. Those numbers could have been even better. Jackson dropped a bomb from Vick in the second that would have been at least a 40-yard gain. And he couldn't make a difficult catch in the end zone at the end of the first half. On the other hand, he went up between two defenders to pull down a 41-yard reception on the first drive. Last year, he had just four catches for 8 yards and a touchdown in the red zone, but Jackson had a red zone score in the third, hauling in a 6-yard pass from Vick.
* The Eagles had several issues with getting to the line of scrimmage late in the first half. They used all their first-half timeouts before the two-minute warning.
* Jackson, Jeremy Maclin and Jason Avant all had catches of 20 yards or more in the first half. Steve Smtih was active. He was on the field for at least a couple plays but did not get a ball thrown his way.
* In the first three quarter, LeSean McCoy had 27 yards on 11 carries. He then exploded for 95 yards on four carries in the final 15 minutes, including a 49-yard touchdown run. Last season, McCoy averaged 6.1 YPC in the fourth quarter. He had two touchdowns, when you add in the earlier 7-yard reception.
* McCoy, Ronnie Brown and Dion Lewis each had a carry in the first half. That was surprising. Brown finished with 7 yards on four carries. Lewis had 10 yards on two carries. He was unimpressive as a kickoff returner, with 36 yards on two returns.
* Former Eagle Quintin Mikell sacked Vick and forced a fumble in the red zone in the first half.
* Steven Jackson took the Rams' first offensive play 47 yards for a touchdown. His longest run last year was 42 yards. The Eagles were in their base defense. It looked like Moise Fokou and Kurt Coleman were out of position/blocked on the play. The Rams' offense averaged 5.9 yards per carry, but they were just 2-for-12 on third down. Jackson was sidelined for most of the game with a quad injury.
* Three of the Eagles four defensive ends - Jason Babin, Trent Cole and Darryl Tapp - had sacks. Juqua Parker did not, but he had a touchdown on the play where Tapp stripped Bradford. Overall, the four defensive ends had four sacks (two by Babin) and eight QB hits. As a team, the Eagles had five sacks and 11 QB hits. Cullen Jenkins added a sack and two QB hits.
* Jarrad Page had a couple nice moments, starting at safety alongside Kurt Coleman. He stopped Brandon Gibson short of a first down on a third-down play in the second. And he nearly came up with an interception in the red zone in the third.
* I'd have to double-check, but I believe Nnamdi Asomugha was only targeted twice. One was a pass interference call in the end zone, and the other was a deep ball to Gibson. Asante Samuel saw a lot of action. And Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie played in the slot in the nickel. Asomugha blitzed once on the play where Cole was called for a late hit.
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Run defense improved as the game went on, but was always sketchy at best. We gave them more 3rd down conversions on penalties then they earned. They barely through the ball down the field all game, throwing at our linebackers instead. It was ugly, but in the end the Eagles defense kept them from racing our offense.— PorkChopExpress- "McCoy, Ronnie Brown and Dion Lewis each had a carry in the first half. That was surprising." This is Reid's way of extending a limited playbook for this game because the o-line had little time together, and a couple of guys are pretty new. Run the same plays but with different style RB's, and you aren't quite as predictable.
— Dr Bri - eagles linebackers stayed 6-7 yards off the line, were seldom attacking, just absorbed hits, instead of hitting. With the wide 9, linebackers will need to bounce around, move up, and try to avoid being a stationary target. Other than time management, team looked explosive, and solid on both offense and D lines.— camasbud
- you're dead on...way too much depth, and Casey Matthews may have missed more tackles than he made. — bearsfriend
- Sheil, game talk is interesting but couldn't stay logged on to it. You HAVE to start filtering out some of the morons. Hard to take the time to read creditable comments with some much white noise. Not worth the time for people who just want to talk football.— tpizza
- While both Vick and Jackson had mistakes in their games today, their abilities as game changers made the difference offensively...Vick masks problems so well when he escapes, and today his third down prowess showed. (Why the Rams let up blitzing is beyond me)...Costly penalties today enabled this game to go on much longer than it should have....Sideline shots of Howard Mudd are priceless.— bearsfriend
- sheil, when you rewatch the game, take note of the times that vick was sacked on play action, or from that stupid tight bunch formation that creates the short corners and invites the secondary pressure... a disproportionate amount of the negative plays came from the tight bunch or out of PA.
the play action was particularly egregious when, in typical andy fashion, they ran it on 3rd and long, when there IS no credible run fake. i've been complaining about this for over TEN YEARS. i remember a long time ago, ONE reporter finally asked andy about it and he mumbled something about running a PA pass because it allowed them to get into a particular protection, which seemed completely asinine to me.
its impossible for a QB to see a secondary blitz from the backside of play action when his back is turned.— poetx - Interesting point. I too would like to hear you follow up on this Sheil. — bc3030
- Needed that one. Atlanta getting blown out won't make next week any easier. Saw some improvement on the OL as the game went on. Limiting home team to 6 points after that first run was good no matter home it was done. Was run/pass ratio almost 50/50? Who are those guys Butch?— tpizza
- Vick's ability to escape pressure is unbelievable. He's trapped in the pocket and simply explodes around the outer defensive end. On other plays, his athleticism is breath taking. On play after play it looked like he was tackled, but he somehow twisted his body, maintained his balance and escaped for a big play. I've seen players do this kind of thing before, but I'll have to admit that Vick's unique skill set may be as broad as it is deep.— Falkirk
Hard to swallow a victory like this when you want to question consistency. The number of plays for long gains on the ground are alarming to watch, yet the end result belies your perception. I can only assume at this point that what we saw was a team that is still coming together and managed to put it together correctly a good many more times that not today. It's also baffling why the Rams did not stick with things that were working for them on the ground, I'm glad they didn't, but why? The loss of Steven Jackson certainly helped us a lot, but I don't want to take too much away from the guys. The Eagles went out there as a work in progress and made progress in their work. I really have to hand it to the coaches and players who obviously worked hard enough to establish enough cohesion to soundly beat a very good team. Should we be concerned about Vick's low completion PCT and the average performance put on by our Dbacks? Just looked like a good bit of our air defense was dropped balls and Bradford overthrows.- If Kolb was back there, this would have been a loss. He has the best receiver in football, experienced O-line, and is losing to the worst team in football.— Astro Jones
- Asante Samuel played very well, even made a hit that popped the ball loose resulting in an incompletion. The interference call on Asomugha was BS. Impressive game by the d-line. It's been awhile since the Eagles had a d-tackle who could get qb pressure.— p-diddy
Casey Matthews can't be starting at MLB, time to face the facts, maybe next year.
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