Tuesday, December 8, 2009

Tuesday Stuff

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My new column is up. Short game review + thoughts on FS and early draft needs.

--LINK--


ROSTER SHUFFLE

We cut OL Greg Isdaner and CB Stoney Woodson from the Practice Squad. We signed OT Gerald Cadogan. I like that move. Cadogan was a good player at Penn State and has NFL potential. Isdaner never did much for me. Cadogan could be a G or RT for us. I'm not sure he's good enough for LT in the pros.

We cut WR Jordan Norwood from the team. He was a band-aid while DeSean was out. Also, Kevin Curtis will be practicing this week. That eliminates the need for Norwood in practice. I don't know what we'll do with the open PS spot. Remember that the PS has 2 roles: 1- player development , 2- bodies for practice .


COMMENTS

RE: Macho's PI call

Tony gets that call because he's Tony friggin' Gonzalez. I can live with that. Star players get calls.


RE: Fiesta Bowl matchup

I'm also not a big fan of TCU and Boise playing each other. I'd like to see them going up against BCS conference teams. This is a meeting of undefeated schools and that's pretty cool, but as Cliff pointed out...we want to see these guys face the "big boys" and not each other. That kind of game would give TCU/Boise a chance to show what they can do against a school with a big rep.


RE: Macho and the future

He could be our #4 CB for a couple of years and then take over in the slot for MmmBop. He could be our #3 S. He could win the starting FS job. I like Macho because of his instincts and the confidence with which he plays. He's not the least bit awed by being a rookie in the NFL. The downside with him is that he's not an ideal fit anywhere. You have to try him in a couple of roles and see where he stands out.


RE: recent playcalling

I am happy with the recent commitment to the running game. We ran late in the game vs WAS and CHI. Both times McCoy/Weaver and the blockers came through. That had to give Andy and Marty a lot of confidence about what we can do.

Andy/Marty will always be passing guys, but they will run the ball more if it is working. When the run game struggles they avoid it like the plague. The flip side is that they will stick with the passing game no matter what. I feel confident they'd be the first guys to call for 50 pass plays in an Ice Tornado game where the starting WRs were out and we had the 5th string LT starting.

I do like the fact we've had long drives in the last few games. We've shown the ability to be methodical. That's critical at this time of the year. The OL has started to really play well. That somewhat fell apart vs ATL when Peters went out and we had to shuffle guys around. It wasn't that we couldn't block, but we didn't have the same kind of blocking as in the other recent games. We need to get Jason back on the field this Sunday so we have our best 5 blockers in place.

One thing that was great vs ATL was seeing long plays come from short passes. 2 of our 3 long passes were short or intermediate throws. I love that. RAC yards are gold in our offense. I do think we'll throw a couple of deep balls vs the G-men. Their secondary is still somewhat of a mess.

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7 comments:

Cliff said...

I'm hoping we get a little of this Sunday night: http://bit.ly/6hiBN5

Cliff said...

Eagles give Reid a three-year extension:
http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=4727113

I foresee a bunch of unnecessary whining, but I'm glad we have him. I'm more interested in what we do with Jason Avant and Kevin Kolb now.

Dollar Brand said...

Haha. That was priceless. I hope we get Celek posing, Reggie in the Salvation Army bucket, DeSean jerkin', and some bow hunter poses from Cole. But I will settle for a nice rout of the Giants on their home field. No mercy shown. As the ruthless leader of the 9th Bearded Infantry said "Those white flags are no match for our muskets!"

Sunset Shazz said...

I've thought about it, and I really don't understand your obsession with the shutout. Typically, your analysis is measured, rational. I don't see why a shutout gets us closer to a SuperBowl win, or helps win further games. Those criteria should be the focus when the game is in hand. Therefore, the correct strategy is to:

1) Rest your starters, in order to protect them from injury.
2) Put in your reserves, in order for them to gain real game rep experience.

Both (1) and (2) are incompatible with pursuing the shutout. I would rather build for the remaining regular season/postseason than keep 7 points off the board in garbage time.

Boyboy said...

I want to whine a little but I know I'm in the minority on this one. Don't get me wrong, I bleed green (primarily Kelly Green) and always hope for the best with this team. It's not that I think Reid is incapable, but I've had my fill of close but no cigar moments.

When you're consistently a playoff team with a top-10 defense and/or a top-10 offense and/or a top-10 QB, and often times all 3, you'd think A.R. would have hit big by now if it's going to happen at all.

I think we're all pretty confident that McNabb won't be back next year. This extension is kinda like saying, it was the QB not the coach. Now we're going to see Reid and Kolb for the next few years. And what if we still don't have a Super Bowl win?

I know so much goes into winning the Super Bowl. And it's not always about the coach or the QB. Sometimes injuries or bad bounces play a factor. Andy is a very good coach. I'll never deny him that. And it's impressive to continue to retool the roster when you're always drafting near the end of the first round.

I guess I'm just the type of person, who after listenting to the same record (remember those?) skip during my favorite song time and time again, will eventually go get a new one.

Cliff said...

Uhh, Boyboy... who exactly is confident McNabb won't be back next season?

Boyboy said...

Haha, not exactly what I thought would be taken from that post...

...but maybe confident was a poor choice of words. But take any of the Eagles beat writers or GCobb, or R-Diddy and they're all fairly certain that #5 won't be back UNLESS they win the SB.

I believe Tommy even has his doubts.