In 2022, the Philadelphia Eagles won a franchise-record 14 regular-season games and had a 10-point lead at halftime of Super Bowl 57.
However, the Kansas City Chiefs would score on four-straight second-half possessions and would defeat the Eagles 38-35.
Despite the loss, so many great things happened for the Eagles in 2022. Jalen Hurts became a star, the defense sacked the quarterback a lot(78 times), and they had two one-thousand-yard receivers, but unfortunately, it wasn’t enough.
With great success comes changes. The offensive coordinator(Shane Steichen) and defensive coordinator(Jonathan Gannon) took head coaching jobs. They have 20 free agents, including 10 starters, so things will look slightly different in Philadelphia next season.
Much can be learned from a loss, and on Thursday, at the end of the season press conference, Eagles head coach Nick Sirianni discussed the most significant piece of wisdom he learned from the Super Bowl.
“The wisdom is that I think we were there; we were close,” Sirianni said. “And all that does to me is make me hungrier to get back at it; that’s about the last time you’ll hear me say get back because what you’re going to hear me say is we’re going to do it one day at a time one day at a time because that’s the right mindset. But that doesn’t stop you from when you see the red and yellow confetti fall or you have a piece of it stuck on your shirt, that you don’t think to yourself, I have to do everything I can to help our guys get back to this moment.
“Maybe that’s not a wisdom thing, maybe that’s more of my drive, and I know our players’ drive, and I know Howie’s drive to be like, oh, my God, we were there. We talk about climbing the mountain. We climbed the mountain. We’d look one step at a time, one step at a time, one step at a time, and then we slip right before we were able to put our flag at the top of the mountain.
“All that does is make you more determined, driven, to make that climb again, to get back to the top and hopefully stand at the top.
“Like Rocky, before he fought Drago, and he’s yelling out “Drago,” over the top of Moscow — I use too many Rocky analogies, I get it. But that’s the wisdom that happens.
“The other part of it is that half the fun of this thing, half the reason we do this, and a big part of the reason is the journey. So, without getting sentimental here, that is the last time that that group of men will be together.
“So you know you’re going to — like Howie said, not everybody — it’s not going to be the same team. There’s going to be draft picks. Jonathan [Gannon] is gone. Shane [Steichen] is gone. Different things are going to happen. But you look back. You always cherish that journey. It didn’t end the way you wanted it to, but the journey was special.
“The men involved in the journey were special. The relationships that were built will last forever.”
It’s hard to get a Super Bowl and to get one is an accomplishment, but when you don’t get the victory in the big game, it’s tough, but there’s still a lot of talent on this roster, so maybe they can get back to the Super Bowl, but nothing is guaranteed.
The last time the Philadelphia Eagles made it to the NFC title game was in the 2017 season, and in that game, the Eagles routed the Minnesota Vikings 38-7 at Lincoln Financial Field to go to the Super Bowl.
Ultimately, Philadelphia would win the first Super Bowl in franchise history two weeks later against the Patriots.
Eagles defensive coordinator Jonathan Gannon was there when the Eagles faced the Vikings in the NFC title game. At the time, he was Minnesota’s assistant defensive backs coach. On Wednesday, Gannon recalled the energy in the building that day.
“In warmups, a guy that I was coaching, he looked at me with a look in his eye like, whoa. [Minnesota Vikings S] Harrison Smith. I said, whoa, back,” Gannon said. “You could feel the energy, and it’s awesome. This is one of the best atmospheres that you’re going to get in the National Football League, and obviously, being the championship game, it’ll be heightened.
“Yeah, I thought the energy in the building was just phenomenal. Before kickoff, as the game got going, and it’s a tough place to play, and it’s a big advantage for us.”
Playing the Vikings in Minnesota is always challenging, and they have a great fan base. However, according to Gannon, Philly is more electric.
“You know, you kind of think that’s an external factor that you kind of block out, but in ’16 and ’17 in Minnesota when that new facility got built, that new stadium got built, that was a really good atmosphere, too,” he said. “That was the Minnesota miracle, that game, to come here(Philadelphia) to play, and I was like, wow, I don’t know if there will ever be a stadium more electric than that that I’ve been a part of after [former Minnesota Vikings WR Stefon] Diggs has a walk-off. When we were here in warmups, that’s what it was. When we were here in warmups, it was like, whoa, this is as electric — it’s more electric than that place was.
“I always joke about it with Mr. Lurie [Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Jeffrey Lurie] and [Executive Vice President/General Manager] Howie [Roseman]; I’ve always wanted to be a part of a Philly team to play in playoff games at that stadium because that’s how it stood out in my mind.”
San Francisco 49ers rookie quarterback Brock Purdy will experience this environment on Sunday. Will he be ready? We’ll find out soon enough.
Things started well for the Philadelphia Eagles on Sunday in Las Vegas against the Raiders. Philadelphia went on an eight-play, 67-yard scoring drive on the team’s opening possession, resulting in a 13-yard TD pass from Jalen Hurts to Kenneth Gainwell to take an early 7-0 lead.
Philadelphia committed to the running game on that series, and Miles Sanders rushed for 25 yards on five attempts.
However, it was all downhill from there. The Raiders would score 30 consecutive points and take a 30-7 lead into the fourth quarter. Philadelphia would score two meaningless touchdowns in the fourth and would fall to the Raiders 33-22.
Philadelphia had a difficult time stopping the Raiders’ offense. Las Vegas quarterback Derek Carr was 31/34 for 323 yards and two touchdowns, interception. The Raiders had 442 yards of total offense.
Following the game, Eagles DT Fletcher Cox, who was notably frustrated during the game, appeared to take a shot at Eagles DC Jonathan Gannon after he was asked about a screen play.
“I don’t get paid to play screens,” Cox said after the game. “I get paid to sack the quarterback, play in the backfield, tackle. I don’t get paid to play screens. We get screened all the time. Get out of stack and run to the football.”
On Monday, Eagles head coach Nick Sirianni addressed Cox’s comments.
“You know what, frustration, everyone has frustration after you lose,” Sirianni said. “As players, coaches, everybody is going to have frustration. We’ll talk about everything. We’ll talk through it. We’re going to address anything that we need to address as a team. But I’ll keep those conversations private that we’ll have there.
“I understand Fletch’s frustration. I’m frustrated. He’s frustrated. We just got to do everything we can do to get the ship righted.”
Not many expected the Eagles to be very good in 2021. Plus, the early part of their schedule was challenging. After winning their first game on opening day, Philadelphia has lost two straight and five of its last six games, but the next ten games should be manageable for the Eagles starting next week on the road against the Lions. In those ten games, Philadelphia plays three teams who are currently above .500.
However, none of that matters for the Eagles if they don’t play better on both sides of the ball. Defensively, the question becomes, is it Gannon’s game plan, or is it the players? The linebackers are below average, the secondary is below average, and the defensive line is average. They are not getting after the quarterback with their front four, and they’re not blitzing, so the secondary is getting exposed. Also, they are not stopping the run. Philadelphia is 28th against the run, so teams are doing anything they want against this Eagles’ defense.
According to Sirianni, he has had conversations with Gannon about making changes to the defensive schemes.
“Well, with our conversations, Jonathan and I’s conversations, it is just mixing up the coverages. He did that a little bit more yesterday. Still, it didn’t, obviously, work in the sense that [Raiders QB Derek] Carr was 31-of-34.
“We just talked a lot – we know we can get home with our four defensive linemen when they’re there. We just talked a lot about tightening it up as far as the way we’re mixing in some man-to-man, the way we’re mixing in some of the zones with the man-to-man. Just different ways to challenge on the perimeter and get our hands on balls and get in the throwing lane. That’s been the main discussion. It’s been more about to be able to mix a little bit more man-to-man in there…
“I love this roster; I love our defensive roster. I got a lot of faith in them. Again, we’re working like crazy to get it fixed.”
In terms of the offense, they have to be more consistent there as well. Hurts is young, so we should expect struggles, but they can run the ball more and just have a little bit more imagination on offense.
The Eagles are a bad team right now, but it does appear the coaches could do a better job of putting the players in a position to succeed.
Flacco to the Jets
Eagles have acquired a 2022 conditional sixth-round draft pick from the Jets in exchange for QB Joe Flacco, the team announced on Monday. Flacco, who signed with the Eagles in the offseason, played with New York last season.
“Joe(Flacco) is just a great person to be around, great pro to be around,” Sirianni said. “Had a phenomenal preseason and was really good for our room. The opportunity arose for him to go and be able to contribute somewhere else. Then also, obviously, us get a pick for that.
“But our time with Joe Flacco was really good. We really appreciated him and everything that he did. He’s a great pro. You can see why he won so many games when he was in Baltimore and all the other places he’s been.”
Update on Sanders:
Sanders left the game in the first quarter after injuring his ankle. Sirianni gave an update on Sanders:
“Miles will probably be down. Actually, we are week-to-week with him, pardon me. It’s a stretch for him to be up this week, but we’re not ruling anything out yet.”
The first two weeks of the season, the Philadelphia Eagles defense was playing excellent football. In Week 1 against the Falcons, Philadelphia held Atlanta to six points, and in Week 2 versus the 49ers, the Eagles held San Francisco to 17 points.
However, the last two weeks have not been very memorable for Philly’s defense. They have given up 77 points in the previous two weeks, including 42 against the Chiefs last Sunday. Additionally, they have had a difficult time stopping the run. In the last two weeks, the Eagles have given up 360 yards on the ground. Currently, Philly is 31st against the run.
When the defense falters, fingers get pointed at the defensive coordinator, which is Jonathan Gannon,
“Yeah, I would think — we always first look at the coaches,” Gannon said at a press conference on Tuesday. “You know, when we come in on Monday, critically, how can we help our players a little bit more to put them in better position to win the game.
“I think we’re all pissed off about the last two games. We haven’t played great on defense. That’s evident. And that starts with me and starts with the coaches.
“So it always comes down to self-evaluation, ‘Hey, what can we do to help our players? What did we say the three things are to win this game? Did we get those three things done?'”
According to Gannon, he’s running out of patience with himself.
“My level of patience, it’s wearing thin on myself,” he said. “‘Hey, Jonathan, let’s get them in better position, so we give our team a chance to win the game.’ It’s not really towards getting irritated at the players. That’s how I’ll always roll; that’s how the coaches roll. So, when we came in here on Monday and sat down, I talked to the head coach on Sunday, on Monday morning, and then we’ll talk to him tonight.
“And the patience for me is wearing thin, ‘Hey, let’s get competitive. Let’s get in a game.’ Because right now, we haven’t been in a game — I know we were in that game, but from a defensive standpoint, like, we got to keep the points down, keep the yards down, get off the field to give our team a chance to win.
So, where I’m most non-cool, calm, and collected right now is not with the players; it’s with myself.”
Gannon is taking the blame, but it’s deeper than him. It’s a talent issue. The linebackers are very average; the secondary is not much better, and the defensive line is missing a big piece in Brandon Graham. The defense is probably not as bad as we’ve seen in the last two weeks, but it’s probably not as good as we’ve seen in Weeks 1 and 2.
Gannon and company have a lot of work to do to get this defense turned around.
On Sunday, in the Eagles’ loss to the 49ers, Philadelphia lost the heart and soul of their defense and the team in defensive end Brandon Graham, who is out for the season after he ruptured his Achilles tendon.
Before this injury, the 33-year-old Graham had missed only one regular-season game in the last five seasons with the Eagles.
Now, it’s next man up for the Eagles, and fortunately for them, Philadelphia has decent depth on the defensive line. They have Josh Sweat, Ryan Kerrigan, and Tarron Jackson, who will have to step up in Graham’s absence. However, replacing a Pro Bowl defensive end is never easy.
On Wednesday, Eagles defense coordinator Jonathan Gannon discussed the loss of Graham.
“Yeah, I talked to our guys yesterday about the void that has taken place with [DE] Brandon [Graham],” Gannon said. And, obviously, not being able to play with us the rest of this year.
“You know, from a leadership and a character, and an attitude standpoint, I think collectively we have to – everyone has to, you know, try to fill that void collectively because not one guy is going to be able to do that. We do feel good with the leaders that we still have within the defense, really good about the leaders that we have.
“And from the standpoint of him, the roles that he was playing, you know, other guys are going to have to step in and fill where he was playing at, and we feel good about the guys that are going to do that.”
Tough break for the Eagles, and hopefully for Graham, he can make a full recovery.
After two series, it appeared that the Atlanta Falcons offense was poised to score a lot of points against the Eagles on Sunday.
Atlanta had drives of 72 and 74 yards, but Philadelphia kept them from scoring touchdowns. The Falcons would not score again after their second scoring drive, and Philadelphia would defeat Atlanta on the road 32-6.
The Eagles allowed 260 yards of total offense(102 total yards in the second half) and sacked Matt Ryan three times. Philadelphia allowed only 114 yards after the Falcons’ first two offensive drives.
On Tuesday, Eagles defensive coordinator Jonathan Gannon discussed the team’s adjustments on defense after the first two drives.
“I think the main two things that changed were we cleaned some technique issues up after the first couple series there,” Gannon said. “I think guys settled in a little bit better and started trusting their keys. We talk about alignment, assignment, key, technique. If you don’t have those, if one of those four things is wrong, it’s hard to play good team defense.
“I think really it’s a credit to our players; they settled down and just started getting back to the basics of that. That’s really pre-snap that we can control everything. The technique part is post-snap. But alignment, assignment, where they put their eyes, that’s all pre-snap. I think we kind of settled down and did a better job of that.
“We got to some different things we had in our back pocket that we knew we were going to run and got to some of those calls. They executed well.”
Give Philly’s defense a lot of credit. They played very well on Sunday and deserve just as much recognition as the offense for the Eagles defeating the Falcons on Sunday.
Let’s see if the defense can keep it going against the 49ers on Sunday at Lincoln Financial Field.
