Rebuilding The Nest: Long Offseason Ahead In Philadelphia

So it seems the third time is not the charm for the Philadelphia Eagles. Their 2009 season ended at approximately 11:35 p.m. on Saturday, Jan. 9, 2010, after a second straight embarrassment on national television at the hands of the rival Dallas Cowboys.

The Eagles were out-coached, exposed, and out-played for consecutive weeks following a six-game winning streak.

So Eagles fans will once again be subjected to Donovan McNabb and Andy Reid claiming responsibility for the team's failure in the playoffs.

Many Eagles fans will call for McNabb to be traded, Reid to be fired, or both. However before fans light their torches, grab their pitchforks and march on down to the Linc, they need to consider something.

Yes, Donovan McNabb did not make the big plays, and yes Andy Reid and his staff were out-coached, but most importantly the Eagles were exposed as a team in multiple places.

Yes, the injury bug played a role in the exploitation of the Birds, but the team's lack of depth in multiple positions was on full display against the Cowboys.

The Eagles' offensive line and defense were the victims of the Cowboys' attacks. These two units used to be the Eagles' strongest components earlier in this decade.

So what happened to the once league-best Eagles defense and All-Pro offensive line? Well, as is the case with all NFL teams: it all goes back to the draft.

Donovan McNabb was drafted second overall in the 1999 NFL Draft. Over the following ten drafts, the Eagles utilized their first round picks on offensive players a total of three times, twice on offensive skill position players.

They selected WR Freddie Mitchell out of UCLA 25th overall in 2001, Guard Shawn Andrews out of Arkansas 16th overall in 2004, and WR Jeremy Maclin out of Missouri in 2009.

Mitchell turned into a large bust, Andrews had a few great years but has fallen prey to a constantly ailing back, and the jury is still out on Maclin. The Eagles utilized first round picks every year except for 2007 and 2008.

The other Philadelphia first round picks after 1999 were as follows: DT Corey Simon, DB Lito Sheppard, DE Jerome McDougle, DT Mike Patterson, and DT Broderick Bunkley.

The emphasis on defensive players, especially linemen, in the Eagles' picks this decade is evident and lead to the building of the dominant Eagle defense that was revered for the majority of the decade.

However, while the Birds' defense dominated, their offense struggled. With the lack of skill infusion into the offense after 1999 (with the exception of the 2009 draft), it shows that the Eagles' ownership had the belief that Donovan McNabb was enough to take the team to and win a Super Bowl.

For the better part of the decade, McNabb threw to receivers like Todd Pinkston, Freddie Mitchell, and James Thrash. McNabb stood behind a wall of an offensive line composed of the likes of Hank Fraley, Jermaine Mayberry, Tra Thomas, and Jon Runyan.

Against the Cowboys, the once dominant defense was torn to shreds. The former great wall of an offensive line looked more porous than the average sponge.

The receiving corps is much improved, with DeSean Jackson, Maclin, Jason Avant, and Brent Celek. So what happened in between?

The fact that it took Philadelphia eight years to use a first round pick on a skill position player after they chose Freddie Mitchell is telling. McNabb's weapons on offense were non-existent until the addition of Brian Westbrook in 2002.

But during those years between 2002 and 2009, those dominant defenses and that offensive line aged along with McNabb.

When the ownership recognized that McNabb needed more offensive weapons, as evidenced by the 2009 draft, the defense was a shadow of its former self, the offensive line was rapidly aging and experiencing widespread health problems.

Now, the Cowboys exploited the Eagles' offensive line, and took advantage of a weak defense. These things are not the fault of Donovan McNabb, and Andy Reid does not possess a fountain of youth to keep these players in their prime.

What went wrong was that while the organization waited for McNabb to play Superman, the once strong components deteriorated and now they need fixing. The Eagles have several holes in their team, the most major ones are listed below.

Offensive Line

Fantasies of "The Great Wall" with the acquisitions of Jason Peters and Stacy Andrews, and the presence of Todd Herremans, Jamaal Jackson, and Shawn Andrews ran rampant in the preseason.

However, only Herremans and Peters played in the games against the Cowboys and did not play well. They saw Winston Justice mature and gave him a contract extension, with him in mind as the right tackle of the future.

With Jamaal Jackson tearing his ACL in week 16, this offensive line heads into the offseason as a large to do on the long list of Andy Reid and the front office.

Defensive End

Trent Cole is an absolute animal on the pass rush. However, with Juqua Parker and Victor Abiamiri opposite him on the line, he does not get much help from the rest of the pass rush and can frequently receive a double team.

The Cowboys took advantage of the Eagles' need to blitz to create pressure and took advantage of the man-to-man match-ups with their wide receivers. The dominant defenses of the past utilized excellent four-man pass rushes.

Linebackers

Yes, the loss of Stewart Bradley killed the Eagles early. But the Eagles have had a revolving door at the middle linebacker spot all season, and experienced a large amount of uncertainty at the other two slots.

Now with Bradley recovering from knee surgery, the Eagles could stand to upgrade all three slots in case Bradley cannot return to form.

Secondary

The loss of Brian Dawkins resonated with the defense throughout the season. One safety spot belongs to Quentin Mikell, and the other one needs a large upgrade over the trio of Macho Harris, Sean Jones, and Quintin Demps.

After the duo of Asante Samuel and Sheldon Brown, Ellis Hobbs will most likely explore free agency, and they could stand to upgrade depth-wise over Joselio Hansen and Dmitri Patterson.

Quarterback

Michael Vick will likely not be back next season. There are rumors that Kevin Kolb is disgruntled and not happy that he has been given an adequate chance to prove he is worthy of being a starter and that he wants to go somewhere that he can start.

Finally, McNabb's contract and Kolb's expire the same year. Depth will be a concern for the Eagles, and if they do not feel Kolb is the future then they need to invest in another quarterback in the draft to fill that slot.

There is quite the laundry list of improvements to be made by this Philadelphia Eagles football team, especially if the team wishes to continue its dominance over the NFC and return to the NFC Championship game, let alone the Super Bowl.

What If...

As we wind down the final weeks of the NFL season, and teams are lopped off each week, we get closer and closer to the Super Bowl.

With the final four set with the Pittsburgh Steelers, Baltimore Ravens, Philadelphia Eagles, and Arizona Cardinals, every fan starts to envision a perfect Super Sunday match up.

My question is: Should there be an All-Pennsylvania Super Bowl, what if the Big Game was moved from the sunny shores of Tampa, Florida to the snowy domain of Beaver Stadium, the home of the Penn State Nittany Lions, in State College, Pennsylvania ?

Personally, I am sick of the fact that we will probably never see any Super Bowl in the snow or the cold ever again. I understand that hosting the Super Bowl in these warm climates is a nice break for the players who play in the cold week after week, but you have to break up the monotony of sunshine state Super Bowls and at least break them up with occasional games in the cold or snow.

As a coach, this type of move would mean your team would have fewer distractions in State College than they would in, say, Tampa, or Miami (the site of next year's Bowl) and more overall focus on hitting the weights and blocks, and less on hitting the beach. Besides, if your players want to hit the beach, they can wait it out until the Pro Bowl, which might as well be beach flag football.

Not only would this break the monotony, but it would also draw more attention from the fans. There would be more interest in seeing the Steelers and Eagles play in their home state, in the snow, in what would probably go down as an epic, defensive, struggle. There is also the fact that you could put more people in the stadium as well. The current site, Raymond James Stadium, holds just over 66,000 people, while Beaver Stadium holds just over 107,000 and can reach 110,000 on big game days.

Think about that: Beaver Stadium can hold almost two full Raymond James Stadiums' worth of people. Plus, at the rate that Super Bowl tickets usually go for, there is a fortune of money to be made just by selling the 110,000 seats, before any sort of parking payment, concessions, or advertisements are even factored in. Not to mention, it would also do wonders for the State College economy.

Beaver stadium would also be able to be a neutral field, positioned 3 hours away from both Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, droves of both loyal fan bases would much rather make that trip than one that would require a lot of flying. You could sell 35% of the tickets in Philadelphia, 35% in Pittsburgh, and distribute the rest which ever way you wanted. That way, you would have a good number of loyal fans from each fanbase there, while still not excluding the rest of the country.

As for what Penn State gets out of this, they can receive a cut of the money made from the event, and will see the town around the university be booming economically by the large amount of people there for the biggest game in all of American sports.

While it is probably too late to be able to change anything now, plus the fact that if the locale was changed now the people of Tampa would probably not be too happy about it, this idea will go to waste. However, it is still a possibility for future Super Sundays, just change up the college stadium or pro stadium that would replace Beaver Stadium in my scenario.

Still...an All-PA Super Bowl at Beaver Stadium would be really nice...

What I Learned Today

So I have my first day back at school tomorrow, and what better way to prepare than spending all day watching sports?

I was able to watch the Baltimore Ravens dominate the Miami Dolphins to advance on to the next round of the AFC race, while my Philadelphia Eagles held on and used a late Brian Westbrook touchdown to beat the Minnesota Vikings. I also caught the final ten minutes of Boston College's upset of #1 North Carolina in Chapel Hill.

Now, the Ravens-Dolphins game showed me once again that the Ravens' defense is back and as dominant as it was in their Super Bowl run of 2001. Every year this defense just seemingly reloads with talent, though when Ray Lewis takes his final bow his replacement will have some giant-sized shoes to fill. The game also reminded me how freakishly good Ed Reed is. You will undoubtedly see the highlight of his two picks on the day. Also, the Ravens clearly made the right pick of Joe Flacco. It seems like they finally have a quarterback who can pilot an offense well enough that the defense is no longer the sole means of scoring.

What surprised me with the Eagles-Vikings game was that the Eagles went into halftime with a two point lead thanks to three David Akers field goals and an Asante Samuel pick-six, and did not let that lead shrink anymore. They kept up their solid defense against the run, and did not allow Adrian Peterson any other big plays. The Birds also put more pressure on Tarvaris Jackson, who kept up the trend of young quarterbacks showing great poise thus far in the playoffs, and forced several wild throws and should-be-interceptions. Bravo, Birds, and on to the Meadowlands and the New York Giants.

Finally, I'm still shocked that Boston College knocked off unanimous #1 North Carolina. It will be interesting to see how far the Heels fall, though I do see this as being a "wake up" moment that will spur the Heels on for the rest of the season. The loss, combined with Pitt's drubbing of Georgetown, should ultimately give the Pittsburgh Panthers some much-needed exposure as the new #1.

When Birds Fly: Eagles Trounce Cowboys for Final Playoff Spot

Last week, the city of Philadelphia, myself included, was left wondering whether our Birds actually could fly. That brutal loss to the Washington Redskins didn't exactly help matters. We saw head coach Andy Reid fail to manage the clock properly once again, to the point that we wondered "How many beers would a fan have to have downed to manage the clock WORSE than Andy Reid?". The calls for Andy's head, as well as a trade of our franchise quarterback Donovan McNabb went back to their usual ferocity of the previous weeks.
But all of that changed Sunday, as we watched the stars align across the NFL to give our Birds one last chance to steer themselves into the Playoffs. We prayed that those hapless Oakland Raiders could beat the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, in Tampa Bay. We hoped that those pesky Houston Texans had one last fight in them to beat the Chicago Bears. Finally, we reluctantly hoped that those New York Giants could just beat the Minnesota Vikings in the Metrodome.
30 Minutes before Eagles-Cowboys in Philadelphia, the stands of Lincoln-Financial Field were unusually empty. The mass of fans with tickets were all huddled around various T.V. screens in the parking lots, and in the pub across the street, watching to see if this game would actually mean something or not.
Sure enough, the Oakland Raiders scored 17 points in the fourth quarter to topple the declining Bucs, and the Houston Texans eked out a seven point win over the Chicago Bears, giving our Eagles one last chance for the second straight week to control their destiny.
In case you haven't heard, they took advantage of it by routing the egotistical Dallas Cowboys 44-6.
The game sent the residents of the tri-state area into a frenzy: we got the best of both scenarios, by not only beating the Cowboys but also by keeping them out of the playoff picture and seeing ourselves get in.
It also warmed all of our hearts to see the shots of all of the cliques along the Dalas sideline, with every super-ego shouting at somebody else, blaming them, and then returning to a small group of their buddies to whine even more. Truly, they had nobody to blame but themselves.
They turned the ball over way too many times, and while players like Marion Barber and Jason Witten battled through injuries to give this team a win, we saw Tony Romo once again choke in the late season big game.
We saw this egotistical team of maniacs known as the Dallas Cowboys fumble the ball four times, their starting quarterback threw a lovely pick-six to Sheldon Brown and as sacked three times, and saw their prized mid-season acquisition of Roy Williams look lost out on the football field.
Now, we go from a week's worth of funeral and death related headlines for our Eagles to headlines showcasing destiny, and awakening. Now we get to go to Minnesota and play the Vikings. Now we get another chance to see the Eagles finally win the big game.