As enjoyable as the Eagles 33-27 overtime win over the Cowboys on Sunday night was, there was a potential hangover looming on Monday when it came to the injury news regarding rookie linebacker Jordan Hicks.
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This is what Chip Kelly means when he talks about wanting players with a growth mindset. But that was before the Eagles’ inside linebacking corps was ravaged by injuries. That catch set up a 6-yard touchdown run by Ryan Matthews.
It isn’t hard to imagine that an 8-7 Eagles team could still win the NFC East by beating the Giants, if NY is 9-6 or 8-7 itself.
The chances of the Cowboys making it to the playoffs appear to be a long-shot at this time, although a win versus Tampa Bay would keep them in the race – barely. More on that later. Cowboys returner Lucky Whitehead took the ensuing kickoff 3 yards deep in the end zone and raced 79 yards. Key among those were a pair of pass interference calls on Dallas’ final drive.
Adam Vinatieri kicked a tie-breaking 55-yard field goal with 6:13 to play to help the Indianapolis Colts to a 27-24 victory over Denver Broncos. I guess it’s good considering the Cowboys are a division opponent, but I’m not going to act like this team is ready for prime time either.
Facing the Saints in Week 4, the Cowboys never really got anything going offensively, but were not only in the game, they were winning it midway through the third quarter.
But coaches say the poor stats are a product of him getting acclimated to a new offense while also recovering from two operations on his left ACL that sidelined him since October 2013. Witten had six receptions for 43 yards in the loss to the Eagles. “You sink to your level of training and he trained at a really high level last week and played at a really high level last night”.
If Bradford plays less than half of the snaps in 2015 (or essentially eight games), the Eagles get the Rams’ 2016 NFL Draft 4th-round pick. The game careened into overtime, the Eagles’ first trip into extra innings since 2012, against Detroit.
This time they out-did themselves.
The Dallas Cowboys aren’t far from a winning team, and they are improving each week. Only the Eagles could make those two stiffs look Canton-esque. The Miami Dolphins are next and it would seem that the Eagles have a few winnable games on the horizon. Then Eagles standout DeSean Jackson, the only healthy receiver who could get open, was jawing with receivers coach Bob Bicknell, whose current crop of receivers not only cannot get open but can’t catch the ball. There’s been plenty of bad to go along with the good, so each of those reasons comes a caveat, one that will likely leave you questioning your resolve in this team going forward.
Bryant, of course, was uncoverable until coordinator Billy Davis wised-up and doubled him.
The Eagles were beating themselves in the second quarter until they strung together a couple of first downs and let their up-tempo offense take over.
“Me and Byron had been competing all game”, said Matthews, who had nine catches for 133 yards. The run blocking was outstanding. “He’s started a lot of games”. Dallas backups Brandon Weeden and Matt Cassel have delivered that in five of their six games.
It was a march in which the Eagles overcame adversity starting with Johnson, the left tackle, gutting out an injury, Murray finally separating from his old team on a wheel route and the Birds capitalizing on the home team’s loss of inside linebacker Sean Lee, who suffered yet another head injury.
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Oh, and Greg Hardy wasn’t a factor.
