Anyone else watching this sunday night slugfest? Who do you think will win? Who do you think comes up big? I have a feeling the Eagles will win. Here's why. They're notorious the last several years to start heating up in nov/dec. This is when "andy reid" football starts happening - they're on a three game win streak already. McNutley (mcnabb) is healthy and can move around a bit more. Westbrook is back healthy(ish). I think that either Mikell steps up big or their LBing corps on defense. Their line is built to handle teams in the NFC East and can give the Giants a run for their money (Maybe not on the RG spot since andrews isn't playing and jean-gilles is). I also think on offense it'll be jackson/brown/westbrook and not necessarily in that order. I think NY has a decent chance, obviously. It's kinda hard to key on westbrook now because (although he's a rookie) desean jackson has been the deep threat the eagles have needed since TO left. However if they can pressure mcnabb into throwing INTs (and they can) and force them to be one dimensional in either the run or the pass philly's defense would have to step up pretty big.. It could really go either way. If it's NYG winning I'll say Jacobs/Burress/Boss on O and Tuck/Ross on D.
This game will be won or lost in the trenches in my opinion. The Giants have an outstanding pass rush that includes speed and power. The Eagles offensive line isn't a very strong one and I think in order to win this game, the gameplan will have to include a lot of rollouts and movement from McNabb. Get him out of the pocket because if they don't, this one will be ugly and McNabb will spend sixty minutes laying on his back. One advantage for the Quarterbacks is that they basically know these defenses. Spaugnulo learned from Jim Johnson and a lot of blitz packages are similar to the Eagles ones. Either way, I think the Giants have to get to McNabb and Manning can't make those bad throws that he tends to make. I like the Giants in this game.
I thought the best part of it was Madden's comments after it. He said that if any one should be running the Wildcat, it should be DeSean Jackson because he's a KR and PR and because of that, he knows how to operate with open field. I thought it was a great point and made me think about the Dolphins involving Ginn in it.. Also, its a real pleasure watching two good defensive ends, Justin Tuck and Trent Cole, play. Cole has a tremendous bulrush and uses his hands well against Tackles. He got into a little slap-fest at the 10:35 mark in the second quarter and sacked Manning. Tuck just sniffed out the screen. He dropped into coverage, taking about three or so steps back, and saw Westbrook coming out of the backfield. Jammed Westbrook and then McNabb was forced to throw it into the ground.
Yeah, I've been waiting to see Ginn in the formation for the past few weeks. He's showing a newfound maturity out there, now might be the time. That said, this new version worked pretty well today, so I can't complain too much. Seems like there's several teams out there running this now, I still don't think there's any that do it better than we do. Heck, we scored 2 TDs on it today.
Very good game. I'm somewhat surprised by the points allowed by both teams but I'm kind of not if that makes sense. I expected some points because these Quarterbacks know the defenses so well due to the coaching tree. However, these defenses are very good. The Eagles offensive line hasn't played with power tonight, not in run blocking at least. Westbrook hasn't had a big day, averaging about two and a half yards per carry. The misdirections and end arounds have been successful though because the Giants over-pursued on both plays. On one, Kiwanuka made DeSean Jackson go deeper into his backfield and they didn't allow much yards but Sam Madison had a dumb penalty that cost them 15 yards. I've been impressed by the Eagles OT's though. They've done a very good job on Tuck and Kiwanuka. This games not over yet though, despite the fourth down stop that just happened. I think that failed fourth down conversion goes back to the lack of power along the offensive line. They didn't get a good push on the strong Giants defensive line.
I don't understand the last two plays. They hadn't run on them all game. I don't understand after the one play around 6/7 minutes when the clock didn't stop moving when he got out of bounds. They wasted about 2 minutes there, too.
I may have missed the wasted time in the middle of the quarter. One time when they let some seconds go by was about 15 seconds before the 2 minute warning. I thought they should have ran a play there but McNabb was too tired.
Andy Reid is terrible with challenges. Cant wait to see Easterbrook and Simmons rip him up again for it, they do it all the time!
Coughlin has morphed into a top flight coach, its crazy. All of a sudden hes got fantastic clock management skills, makes great challenges (best % in the league) etc etc. Crazy. Reid on the other hand is the exact opposite. Hes horrible with challenges, cant manage a clock to save his life, makes bad calls at bad times etc etc. I wonder how long he can will be the coach there. Most overrated one in the league maybe.
