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Leadership not the Eagles' problem

"Leadership is a three-run homer in the ninth inning." - Casey Stengel THE 1998 EAGLES featured these players: Brian Dawkins and Hugh Douglas, Irving Fryar and Ike Reese, Duce Staley and Jeremiah Trotter, Kevin Turner and Troy Vincent, Mike Caldwell and Michael Zordich.

For Cullen Jenkins and the Eagles, making plays is the focus. (AP Photo/David Duprey)
For Cullen Jenkins and the Eagles, making plays is the focus. (AP Photo/David Duprey)Read more

"Leadership is a three-run homer in the ninth inning."

 - Casey Stengel

THE 1998 EAGLES featured these players: Brian Dawkins and Hugh Douglas, Irving Fryar and Ike Reese, Duce Staley and Jeremiah Trotter, Kevin Turner and Troy Vincent, Mike Caldwell and Michael Zordich.

They did not lack for personality, or backbone. They were not short on players who would get in a teammate's face if he felt the situation called for it. Leadership, character, we all are familiar with the shorthand - and these guys had it. And there were a lot of them.

And the Eagles still finished 3-13 that year, the last for Ray Rhodes as their head coach.

The point is that, in the NFL, it really is about players and schemes, except when it is about schemes and players. Except in the most extreme cases, the rest of it is just stuff sports writers talk about.

So far, the discussion surrounding the budding disaster that is the 1-4 Eagles of this season has been centered on turnovers and on a defense where the players either aren't good enough or aren't a good match for the system or aren't being well-coached. That is as it should be.

Because the rest of it really is just something to talk about.

"There's plenty of leadership on this team, guys taking responsibility, guys getting other guys going," defensive end Jason Babin said. "You don't need some guy to motivate you. You don't need the guy next to you to motivate you. These guys, all across the board, are motivated to win and make plays."

When you ask Babin who a leader on the team might be, he immediately comes up with Cullen Jenkins' name. Jenkins is new to the team but he is a veteran player, and a good player, and his NFL story is one of persistence. Players are attracted to that, and Jenkins' personality is one where he comes across as exceedingly level-headed when he speaks.

You ask him about it, and Jenkins says leadership really is not an issue on this team that can neither stop the run nor hang on to the football.

"I think it's just talk," Jenkins said. He was seated in a stall in the Eagles' crowded, morose locker room after their 31-24 loss on Sunday to the Buffalo Bills. He was taking on all comers with microphones and notepads.

"We've had some guys talk to the team," Jenkins said. "I've even talked, a couple of times. It's just a matter of eliminating the mistakes. The way this team came out and fought today, we were playing together. We were playing toward a goal today and you could see it. It was just the mistakes. Every time we would take a step forward, we'd take two back, or we'd shoot ourselves in the foot."

They are about out of feet, as we all know. The game Sunday in Washington means everything. The difference between 2-4 and 1-5 is the difference between hope and oblivion when it comes to the playoffs - and when there is no hope, all the leadership in the world sometimes cannot keep things together.

"I don't think anyone in this locker room imagined being 1-4 after the first five games," linebacker Moise Fokou said. "It's really disappointing to us, but we saw some good things out of this game. It's a long season, 11 games left. You can never give up. This football league is a funny thing. A lot of people might be some Cinderella stories at the beginning but it can turn very easily. Right now, we're going through a lot of misfortune, a lot of disappointment. But we're never going to give up. We're not going to quit. There's a lot of football to be played. We've got to keep fighting . . .

"We see the potential we have in this room," Fokou said. "We see it on the field at times."

Seven letters that explain everything, then:

at times.

For all of them, this really is a time for looking inward. There are no speeches for times like this. It isn't that easy.

Leadership is a form tackle on third-and-9.