Banged-up Birds can’t pull one out in final minutes
LIONS 27, EAGLES 24
PHILADELPHIA – There are two ways to look at what definitely is a personnel crisis for the critically wounded Philadelphia Eagles now after three games.
1. If their vaunted (and perhaps overrated) depth isn’t coming through for them now, it can only be worse by the dogs days of November and December, when the war of attrition traditionally peaks in the NFL.
2. Their depth pieces are young and inexperienced and will eventually come around to collecting rewards after paying all the necessary dues.
The only thing we know now is that this team is a full-blown mess that has no answers for what opponents are throwing at them — or should we say over them.
Sunday’s 27-24 loss to the Detroit Lions, added to their 24-20 loss at Atlanta the week before, and the 32-27 win over Washington in Week 1 has served to expose so many cracks that it’s reasonable to question whether they’ll be able to repair them all in time for the postseason, like they did last year and the year before.
Although these Eagles have too much veteran leadership to implode under the weight of such high exterior and interior expectations, they just may not have the ability anymore to thrive, which is what everyone
thought they would do and what they still believe they will do, even if nobody else does.
For now and until proven otherwise, the players they thought would be ready to help when called upon are not ready to help.
With wide receivers DeSean Jackson and Alshon Jeffery out injured, Nelson Agholor, Mack Hollins and J.J. Arcega-Whiteside have not done enough to help.
With starting cornerback Jalen Mills and key reserve Cre’Von LeBlanc not available, Sidney Jones, Avonte Maddox and the injury-prone Ronald Darby have not lived up to expectations. On top of that, Darby has a hamstring issue now, and raise your hand if you think that’s going to be a problem for the rest of the season.
Drafted in the second round this year to complement Jordan Howard and whoever else might be in the running-back rotation on a given week, Miles Sanders fumbled twice on Sunday, losing one.
Defensive end Vinny Curry, brought back to add depth to their pass rush, looks like he has nothing left in the tank. Fellow defensive end Josh Sweat is still learning the pro game — and not at a very fast pace.
Even some of their stars aren’t getting it done, with defensive tackle Fletcher Cox at the top of the list and Malcolm Jenkins, whose illegal block following a blocked field goal late in the fourth quarter cost them a chance to start their final possession already in field-goal range, not far behind.
And then there’s quarterback Carson Wentz, who came off a game that was far from his best and delivered another one that was far from his best (19for-36, 259 yards, two TDs, three sacks, no interceptions) at times when they needed him most.
Still, his final pass on fourth down with under a minute remaining was good enough to win the game for them. He hit the rookie Arcega-Whiteside in stride at the goal line after scrambling into position to make the throw.
Arcega-Whiteside fought through a lot of contact from Rashaan Melvin — contact that would have been called pass interference for sure if it had been committed against a more accomplished receiver — to get his hands free to make the catch, then couldn’t get his hands on the ball.
Game over.
To his credit, Arcega-Whiteside owned it.
“I haven’t really had a chance to dissect it myself,” he said, “but it’s a contested catch, and those are the catches we pride ourselves on making. So I’ve got to go up there and get it. … These guys trust in me and believe in me and I’ve just got to deliver.”
Because everyone’s fingerprints were all over this latest crime scene, it makes the fix (es) a heck of a lot more complicated.
Sanders wasn’t the only player to lose a fumble.
Agholor did too. And there wasn’t even any contact involved. It came in Detroit territory with the Eagles driving for a possible game-tying score with just under two minutes remaining in the first half, and it led to a Lions field goal instead.
Equally complicit was the coaching staff.
Trailing by just three points, coach Doug Pederson panicked and went for it on fourth-andeight from the Eagles’ 22-yard line with 2:25 remaining, despite having all three timeouts and the two-minute warning in his pocket.
Then again, perhaps by then he had lost all confidence in a defense and a coordinator that had only 10 men on the field, according to the Lions, on a 44-yard reverse by J.D. McKissic that set up a field goal in the first half.
Pederson double-talked his way through the explanation for his fourth-down try.
“Yeah, it was situational right there,” he said. “Just going ahead and going for it. With the three timeouts, I could use them on defense, and we knew they were probably going to run the ball in that situation. Got them to [try] the field goal. It worked in our favor [when it was blocked], but we didn’t capitalize on the other end.”
Because on a day when the offense broke down, the defense and the special teams did too (allowing a 100-yard kickoff return for a touchdown).
The Eagles looked like the furthest thing from a championship team on Sunday.
Just like the week before. And even the week before that.