Will The Eagles Get Better?

If you watched the putrid Thursday Night Football game between the Giants and the Redskins last night, there was some solace for Philly fans. Mainly that everyone else in this division is pretty much just as #terrible as the Eagles.

That does leave room for optimism, despite two of the worst Eagles games in recent memory, strung back to back at the start of this season. The truth is that as bad as the Eagles have been, they still can turn things around. The question is whether their awful play so far is the result of fundamental, uncorrectable problems or something more fixable.

The answer to that question is in the eyes of the beholder. The offensive run blocking has been so bad that it's the worst (through two game sample size, of course) of any offensive line I can find in Football Outsiders' history. Their Adjusted Line Yards (aka roughly the yardage that the line is responsible for) is just 1.11 yards. To put that in perspective, last year's poor line was ranked 29th in ALY with 3.52 yards. Ryan over at ChipWagon can give you both the execution and scheme reasons for such failure. 

On one hand, maybe this is a sign that with a historically-bad offensive line and questionable play calling, the Eagles will never get their run game together. On the other hand, we can probably expect the Eagles to revert back at least somewhat to the mean, making the run offense moderately usable at some point. (Optimism!)

Ditto for Sam Bradford. This is a quarterback who has endured very little pressure from defenses (just 23% of the time through two games). The offensive line, for all of its run blocking woes, has allowed just one sack, good for the 3rd-best Adjusted Sack Rate in the NFL of 1.5%. Yet Bradford continues to be unable to throw the ball down the field.

From @PFF, Bradford has attempted just 5 passes (5.6% of att.) of 20+ yards. 0 completions, 2 drops.

— EaglesRewind (@EaglesRewind) September 25, 2015

Bradford has averaged just 6.3 yards per attempt so far, 28th best in the league. To go with that, he's thrown 2 touchdowns against 4 interceptions and has looked out of sync with his receivers the whole time. Maybe Bradford is just bad, and Chip Kelly bet on the wrong quarterback. Maybe Mark Sanchez (barf) is actually the better choice right now. Or maybe Bradford hasn't played much in two years and is still adjusting to a new offense, new personnel, and being hit. Maybe he'll get better.

The defense, meanwhile, has shown promising signs (Malcolm Jenkins, Walter Thurmond, Bennie Logan) and worrisome ones (Byron Maxwell). The stats are slightly above average through the first two games against two potentially decent offenses. The defense certainly isn't good enough to carry an offense this bad, but it isn't the reason the Eagles have lost, either. More tests to come, though.

This weekend's game against the Jets is a must win. You don't go 0-3 and make the playoffs in this league. According to the chart below from FiveThirtyEight, that would leave them with just a 2% chance. But if they go 1-2, that's 25% and a tie for second place in a historically weak division. Then just maybe, there's room for hope...

Five Myths of the 2015 Eagles Offseason

1. The offensive line won't miss Evan Mathis

Outside of Allen Barbre pushing Ryan Mathews into the end zone, the Eagles got some incredibly poor guard play last night. (See Ryan at Chipwagon for all the ugly.) Even Chip gave up on his signature inside zone runs because he didn't trust the inside blocking. Thank your lucky stars that the injury to Jason Peters (who looks pretty much the same as he did at the end of last year) wasn't serious.

Maybe because every time he called an inside run the Falcons threw Philly's guards to the side and blew up the play? https://t.co/ljs64qepqg

— Chris B. Brown (@smartfootball) September 15, 2015

2. 11 new starters won't take time to adjust

Including the guards, the Eagles replaced about half of their offensive and defensive starters this offseason. And despite their sterling offseason work (which was little more than a couple quarters of work against vanilla schemes), this team needs time to gel. Sam Bradford was out of sync with every wide receiver and tight end not named Jordan Matthews. The defense frequently looked confused presnap. While the second half was more promising, this looks like a team that may not put it all together in the first few weeks.

3. Byron Maxwell is a #1 shutdown corner, worth $22 million guaranteed.

@gonzoCSN pic.twitter.com/5PeckWCPAo

— Joseph Kornik (@joekornik) September 15, 2015

The Eagles paid Maxwell like he was a top five NFL cornerback. Hard to look at his performance last night and not think Cary Williams could have done just as poorly for a fraction of the cost. Julio Jones is one of the best receivers in the league, so any corner is going to struggle--but you don't get the the Super Bowl without getting by a few great wideouts. Oh, and old man Roddy White made it look easy against Maxwell too.

4. Nolan Carroll is a starting cornerback.

Chip and company praised Carroll to high heavens this offseason. Now we see he's the same player who could couldn't beat Bradley Fletcher last year. And if he's this bad, what about rookie and supposed instant contributor Eric Rowe? While we're at it, isn't everyone glad that the Eagles traded Brandon Boykin? It frees up playing time for future Pro Bowler Chris Maragos, who completely lost Roddy White in the end zone.

5. DeMeco Ryans isn't washed up.

He's done. 

Two Good Things: Walter Thurmond and Kiko Alonso

One handed. Diving backwards. In the end zone. Kiko Alonso, you gotta be kidding with this INT. #PHIvsATL http://t.co/U9ei4PenNl

— NFL (@NFL) September 14, 2015

Neither played a perfect game, but they were difference makers on a defense that generated little pass rush and couldn't cover. This looks like a boom-or-bust unit that can mostly stop the run but has the same problems on the back end as last year. If that's the case, they'll need turnovers to make up the difference (looking at you, Malcolm Jenkins -- spend some time with the JUGS machine).

One Wait-And-See: Sam Bradford

Bradford was on fire most of the second half, raising his final completion rate (69%). Overall, you'll take that line from him, and the progress he showed in his first regular season game in 23 months. But I'll be interested to see in the All-22 whether he had opportunities deep and didn't take them. You want quarterbacks to take what the defense gives them, but one major concern with Bradford is whether he's willing to throw it long. He ended on Monday night with just 6.46 yards per passing attempt, basically his career average.

Overall Thoughts: no, the sky isn't falling. It's one last minute road loss against a team that could be better than we thought. But if you were predicting Super Bowl for this Eagles group, consider that this first game was remarkably similar to the opener last year--when the team needed a few lucky breaks to win 10 games, and still didn't make the playoffs. There's a long way to go.