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Eagles further review: Birds still learning how to pace themselves

After opening with a furious pace, the Eagles are still figuring out the best way to slow down the tempo when necessary.

Eagles offensive lineman Lane Johnson and quarterback Michael Vick. (Yong Kim/Staff Photographer)
Eagles offensive lineman Lane Johnson and quarterback Michael Vick. (Yong Kim/Staff Photographer)Read more

HOW DO YOU play with a lead in the second half, then run down the clock, when you built that lead by playing at the most furious pace the NFL has ever seen?

This is something the Eagles will have to figure out. It helped make a 33-7 laugher of an opener into a 33-27 game, in which the Redskins were rooting around for an onside-kick recovery that would have given them a chance to steal the win, with 1 minute, 14 seconds left Monday night.

"Part of what we do, and our success, is that we get into a rhythm," coach Chip Kelly said. "It's not as much taking your foot off the gas from the standpoint of the tempo you play at [that causes the offense to stall], it's just maybe play selection, some of those other things . . . You don't want to go three-and-out and just take 20 seconds off the clock. It's a fine line. It's something, as I get a better feel for our guys, and they get a better feel for us, it's something you're always going to continually work on. Four-minute offense, so to speak, is just as important as 2-minute offense.

"You do everything 90 miles an hour; now you've got to get back to driving through the city streets, you can't drive 90 miles an hour. You have to settle down and make sure you can still negotiate the car. That's just a work in progress. We haven't been together for a ton of time."

Kelly noted that "we put them on the field a little bit" in the second half, particularly with a Jason Avant fumble early in the fourth quarter that led to a quick Washington touchdown.

The Redskins knew the run was coming in the second half, with the Eagles wanting to kill clock, so they crowded the box, making it harder to spread them out and open those huge running lanes that LeSean McCoy - that's NFL rushing leader LeSean McCoy, with 184 yards on 31 carries - zipped through earlier. Slowing down the pace certainly helped the panting Redskins defenders regroup.

"We've struggled a little bit in camp - when we go slower, it's actually out of the norm for us," center Jason Kelce said yesterday. "As an offense and an offensive line, we have to get better at handling those situations . . . We had a delay-of-game call when we were trying to run out the clock, taking forever, because of thinking we have more time than we do . . . It was a good learning experience for us."

DEVELOPING STORY LINES

* DeSean Jackson, with seven catches, was the only Eagle with more than two. Maybe that's why Pro Football Focus decided that Michael Vick ranks 27th in its cumulative quarterback summary after Week 1, a curious ranking for a guy who threw two touchdown passes and no picks. Vick was 15-for-25, for 203 yards. In looking in depth at PFF's evaluation, I noticed it didn't credit Vick with ever throwing the ball away, in 25 attempts. I saw him throw it away at least twice. So I wonder, as usual, how authoritative that breakdown really is. Vick missed a few throws early, but he played an effective, smart game. Meanwhile Cam Newton, whose team scored seven points in Week 1, is PFF's 10th-rated QB.

* Didn't get a chance to ask DeMeco Ryans about this, but it sure looks on tape as if he is frantically signaling Cary Williams to come up to the line on the corner blitz that led to Williams' second-quarter sack of RGIII.

* Eagles special-teams coverage was excellent. The Redskins averaged 7 yards on two punt returns, 18.7 yards on three kickoff returns, Donnie Jones had four punts downed inside the Redskins' 20. Shout-out to Chris Polk, who streaked in and tackled kickoff returner Chris Thompson at the Redskins' 9 in the second quarter.

* It kind of got lost, because it preceded the lateral "fumble" for the Redskins' first touchdown, but the Eagles played hurry-up right through a fourth-and-1 at the Redskins' 21, didn't take a timeout as they might have under Andy Reid, just lined up and ran the ball 4 yards up the middle for a first down. Crisp, clean, effective. "It was well done," center Jason Kelce agreed. "We were trying to go so fast, I think I actually pointed out the wrong linebacker as the point on it, but because we were going at a high speed, it ended up working out."

OBSCURE STAT

The Eagles rushed for 263 yards Monday night, their most since Nov. 11, 2001, against Minnesota, when they rushed for 272. Monday's game was the 15th-highest rushing total in franchise history.

WHO KNEW? That cornerback Cary Williams could cause major problems for other teams, as well?

EXTRA POINT

If you'd like something to worry about after Week 1, Michael Vick put himself in harm's way much too often Monday night. Vick decided to make himself a blocker on a couple of wide-receiver screens, and, more ominously, he kept diving forward at the end of runs.

No Redskin ever just reached over and touched Vick down on those occasions; instead, someone invariably took a pile-drive hit to Vick's kidneys or ribs, as the Eagles surely would have done had Robert Griffin III presented such opportunity.

Chip Kelly was asked about both situations yesterday. He said he intends to tell Vick to lay off the blocking. But Kelly said we'll just have to live with the pile-driver hits at the ends of runs. (QBs who slide conventionally are deemed down, and aren't subject to being hit.)

"I think that's the way Mike likes to do it, I think that's the way he's going to do it," Kelly said. Asked whether these hits won't start piling up, Kelly said: "I hope it doesn't. I'm also realistic in terms of, I don't think, at 33, we're going to get him to hook slide. We can talk about it, wish for it. I don't see that happening." Vick gained 54 yards on nine carries, 6 yards a pop.