Eagles make losing look effortless

SEATTLE - The Eagles have crawled up into a ball now, their position both fetal and futile. They can only hope that this was the worst.

To watch them blow lead after lead in the fourth quarter of games this season was maddening. To watch too many of them fail to compete against the Seattle Seahawks last night in a 31-14 loss was much different, and much worse.

The issue now is effort, and they know it. They know what this game looked like to anybody who had the stomach to stick it out to the end.

"There's going to be a lot of anger," defensive tackle Cullen Jenkins said. "I'm sure, right now, there's a lot of people out there ticked off, and they should be. Any fan wants to see their team do good. It's one thing, if we're going out there and teams are just better than us. But they're not. We're going out there and giving away these games. I can just imagine, from a fan's standpoint, what it looks like, watching the games.

"It probably looks like a lack of effort, lack of fundamentals, a lack of everything. The fans are going to be frustrated."

It is such a jarring sight - not only to see an Andy Reid team so ridiculously underperforming, but to see it spanked by a team such as this. But as a wise man once said, you are what your record says you are. And at 4-8, after this mess, the Eagles' record says they stink.

In the absence of starting quarterback Michael Vick and his broken ribs, the Eagles stole a game against the Giants and then completely rolled over in the next two. To get pounded by the New England Patriots is one thing. To get dismantled by the Seahawks is something completely different.

"I know there are some guys that are a little down," defensive end Trent Cole said. "I can't speak for everybody. But I know a lot of guys in here who are going to keep fighting. We've got to keep everybody feeding off of us. That's what we do . . . keep fighting to the end. Be a real man and fight to the end."

After the game, Reid was asked about three different ways if he thought the team was still giving full effort. Each time, he said it was. It is what he has to say. But the available video evidence suggests, if nothing else, that he has players who are allowing themselves to be worn down by the losing. You wonder if he understands how impotent this team looks.

"We didn't give up," left guard Evan Mathis said. "It might look like that, but I know inside we didn't give up . . . Outside looking in, some people might question our locker room, but I think we have a great locker room."

Yes, Vince Young was terrible at quarterback as Vick's replacement. (Working definition of terrible: four interceptions.) But the real story of this game was a defense that rolled over early and forced Young into a position of having to play from behind, a position from which he was never going to have a chance.

The most unforgettable video from this entirely forgettable season might just be that of the Seahawks' first touchdown, the one in which running back Marshawn Lynch appeared to be buried in a crowd of Eagles and Seahawks, only to emerge on his feet and untackled and prance into the end zone with a 15-yard touchdown. That, right there, is the story of 2011.

They are just so soft on defense. Safety Nate Allen had a really rough night again, and was in and out of the lineup. Cornerback Nnamdi Asomugha is a worse tackler than Asante Samuel, which is saying something - and, to make his inaugural Eagles season even worse, he left the game with a stinger/concussion in the first half and never returned.

All over, the Eagles have collapsed. Last night was an embarrassment. It is true that Young is limited, and that he does not appear to have the arm strength on the long ones, or the accuracy on the short ones, or the ability to get the ball out quickly on any of them. This will never be a high-scoring offense when he is running it - at least, not this year.

The Eagles were never going to win the game with that kind of quarterback play. But they never had a chance when the defense rolled over early.

"We've got to respond," Jenkins said. "We've come up with all the words that say, 'Oh, there's great effort here and all of this,' and try to plead our case. But fans don't want to hear that. Fans want to see it. They want to see it out there on the field. They don't want to hear about it after the losses. I bet they are getting tired of hearing us. This is eight losses now . . . "

Four games to go, then. And now, all questions have become fair.