For at least two quarters of the week one game of the Philadelphia Eagles vs the St. Louis Rams at the Edward Jones Dome it was a nail biter, watching it on gamecast on CBS I teetered on the bow of the mighty over reaction. Every long run, every penalty, every long pass a reason that this player was useless or that needed to be benched. For the offense it was even worse anger when I didn't see madden like bars hitting the screen as players whom I could control with such perfection and have scoring points in bunches appeared in real life not to know how easy the process was.
After the second quarter fumble return and that last minute field goal I calmed down a little and then when Michael Vick and Desean Jackson combined on a few critical pass plays before Djax's 6 yard td grab in the end zone while I did not exhale a 24-10 lead is pretty easy to manage deep into the 3rd quarter. The defense had a great goal line stand in the 3rd that allowed the Rams to only score a field goal after a (what by some Eagles fans online was called a questionable) Pass Interference call which had given them 1st and Goal on the 1. The Eagles didn't have a good goal line D last year. Giving up way more points inside the 20 then most fans could stomach, it's cost former Defensive Coordinator Sean McDermott his job, and gave us another quick playoff exit. That was last year though, this year the new Wide 9 style got us 5 sacks and a decent amount of stiffening on the goal line. While it wasn't Jim Johnson's Blitz happy style and our safeties and line backers were a little overwhelmed for a while our corner backs and down lineman handle their parts quite well.
And then as if lightning had struck and Andy Reid had finally heard the cries of fans for years and years he RAN THE BALL in the fourth quarter, Lesean McCoy racked up 95 yards in the fourth quarter including a 49 yard scamper into the endzone to make the score 31-13 and basically iced the game as well as gave him 122 for the game. Star second year quarterback Sam Bradford did not last much longer into the fourth quarter injuring the index finger on his throwing hand. Neither Vick nor Bradford broke the 200 yard passing mark today though Vick did throw for 2 touchdowns and ran for 98 yards(100 before 2 kneel downs at the end) giving us a little old with the new. 6 Receivers in all caught passes from Vick though none came close to Jackson's total for the day, and all 3 running backs attacked the Rams defense, they weren't exactly the 3 headed monster we had many years ago but it did show that not only was Reid willing to run the ball more, but we had running backs who could well handle the job. McCoy got the majority of the carries but as it was only 15 carries he shouldn't be too worn down.
So we start the season of 1-0, one game down, 15 to go and then the playoffs. We have a tough Game next week inside another Dome against the Atlanta Falcons who just got spanked by the Chicago Bears Week One. The Falcons were the top seed in the NFC last year with a Record of 13-3, while they lost against the eventual champion(who subsequently beat the Bears before going to the superbowl so it was sort of a dance of runners up) that they took such a shellacking on the road in Chicago means most likely that when they get home some serious revenge is on the menu and here we are next on the list. Hey claw versus claw I will always take an Eagle, plus we have a pretty good record versus the Falcons as of late.
Seasons started, things are off to rocky start but then again it's things don't always start out great before a magical season they just start, last year it was a wild card team that won the title, a few years ago an undefeated team lost in the final game. Like anyone else I have one more week to talk about we are perfect and nobody can beat us(until next Sunday)
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