Nick Piccone
Not one Eagles fan should be satisfied by what we saw on the field yesterday, but one Eagles fan on reddit went back and watched the offensive snaps from yesterday’s game. He (she?) took note of how the Eagles adjusted in the second half to what the Cowboys’ defense was doing, but they ran into turnover problems. Sounds like the same stuff that plagued them last season. Here’s what bieberhole696 had to say about the offensive gameplan.
Even though the game looked largely the same throughout, the first and second halves were very different.
First half: They had our running game figured out schematically. They did the same thing as Atlanta and made stopping the run their #1 priority while playing one-on-one coverage against the receivers. Almost everyone from their front 7 burst through the line anticipating the run. Barbre and Gardner actually had good games according to PFF grades. The worst blockers were Celek, Peters, and Kelce. This shows that they had our running game figured out.
Second half: We actually adjusted well to what they were doing. We ran a lot of play action screen passes. They jumped through the line anticipating the run and we threw the ball to a running back or receiver in the flat. This led to big chunks of yards. As a result, they didn’t bite as much on the run and our run plays were more successful. At the end of the drives, our offense ran into turnover problems. First, Sam Bradford threw an interception in the endzone. Ertz was well covered while Cooper (who was the next in the QB progression according to Aikman) was WIDE OPEN. On the next drive, Bradford missed a WIDE OPEN Agholor on 3rd down, forcing us to settle for a field goal. Later, Bradford slipped and fell on one play which stalled a drive. On another drive, Bradford botched the snap and fumbled. For our final drive, he threw an interception to a well-covered Ertz.
We’ve seen a lot of slow starts and fast finishes from Chip Kelly. This game had the slow start but it didn’t have the fast finish. Obviously you would like to start fast every game and not have to come from behind to win, but the Cowboys had a great game plan against us. It was a game that we needed to grind out in order to win, but we couldn’t do that.
As for Bradford, he’s still just in his second game back. Most of the turnovers resulted from miscommunication between him and Kelce or the receivers. I think the more he plays and gets used to the system, the better he will perform.
The Eagles’ defense played well even after losing Kiko Alonso and Mychal Kendricks. Their offense looked somewhat better, but still not good enough. Is Chip able to adjust? Maybe. Two games in, and I’m still in wait-and-see mode, teetering on pushing the panic button. But this guy (girl?) went back and watched all of the Eagles’ offensive snaps. I couldn’t do it. I’m not sure you could do it. But maybe, just maybe, the season isn’t over yet.