Eagles/Panthers Postgame Pod: We Got Three Weeks To Save The Season

You are listening to the Go Birds Podcast. Hey, hello, it is the Go Birds Podcast, sponsored by Ashley, the number one furniture mattress store in America. We love Ashley, certainly a lot more than we loved that game. Like such a, just annoying game. Look, the Panthers are better, you know, certainly offensively, and they deserve to win the game. I mean, they had like 8,000 penalties and still won handily, but it was just annoying because it felt like the game at times was there to be had and, you know, mistakes, you know, bad snaps, this and that, penalties, dejean, all these things that we'll get into. And then, you know, you look around, the Giants lost today at home to the Saints. And it's like, I don't expect to win the division or anything like that, certainly, but it's just a frustrating one to get, especially after the last two weeks, you know, where you, you know, understandably, but you lost those two games at the end. And then to just like, kind of like, again, they didn't deserve to win, but it felt like a game that had a chance. And the fourth quarter was even like not, you know, early fourth quarter was like there, after that Devontae touchdown and the stop and all that. But yeah, just frustrating. Look, they're not good enough. And I definitely didn't have the same angst I normally do in these spots, just kind of like being like, feels seasoned from Helly and we'll get to all the injuries again. But, you know, just frustrating. How are you doing? Yeah, you look awesome. Thank you. Good lighting, right? I feel like this looks good. Just what everybody is worried about. I need it. I need to see your face a little, you know, treat. So all right, I got I got two main things. I'm going to I'm going to start with this one. And like, it's time to call the defense out. I mean, at what point do we have to look the Eagles go into this game? No Jalen, right? They're missing offensive lineman. Devontae is on a pitch count. They have basically no running back. And the offense obviously... Yeah, literally, and it would just pierce at this right now. Like, they have nothing. And the defense has everybody. They have Quinian, they have Cooper, they have Jalen Carter. Now, they end up losing Nolan Smith. They don't have Jalex Hunt. That's obviously part of it. They were undermanned at edge. But they have their linebackers. They have, you know what people say, a lot of people feel is the best coach on the staff in Vic Fangio. And what did that get them today? Almost 400 yards of offense. If the Panthers wanted to, they could have had 32 points. They didn't slow the Panthers down at all. The Panthers came into this basically, and they got all their averages, right? It was the penalties. Penalties killed the Panthers more than the Eagles did. Yeah, exactly. So I understand that in past weeks, we've been able to sit here and go, yeah, the defense gave up points late, but the offense is, you know, they're not doing anything in the second half. The defense is on the field so much. I get it, but to be fair, we hold Jalen Hurts to an extremely high standard. We hold Nick Sirianni to an extremely high standard. These past few weeks, when they've lost games, where they have been competitive in them, and really shouldn't have been, when you consider the lines and all they were missing, the opponents, the Rams and Jacks are way better. We have torched Nick and Jalen over the past few weeks. At what point are we going to step up here and go, this defense is not playing well enough. All these guys that we thought were going to have monster years, all these guys were like, well, they're going to be the highest paid in this position, and Cooper had a bad game again today. He's had a bad year so far, right? Yeah, he has, dude. He's had... He's had tackling. Yeah. I mean, how many Chubba Hubbard broken tackles were there today? 8,000? It's crazy. He's had moments this season, but for the most part, he's been really bad. Jalen Carter, unbelievable last week. Pretty invisible today. Probably a few moments when I rewatch it, but pretty invisible. And you have the Panthers at third and eight backed up in their own goal line. You give up a 32-yard play, you allow a 95-yard touchdown, and then the offense, like you have a little bit of life, right? The offense scores, you pull it to within, I think it was one possession. Six. Yeah, pull it to within six. 19-13. Now, the offense holds blame. There's a bad snap. The special teams puts them in a bad spot because the punts block. A couple of bad snaps. Yeah, a couple of bad snaps, but the punts block, so the Panthers get a short field. But what happens? They end up scoring a touchdown where the guy is wide open in the end zone. Cooper DeGene, like... For the second time, he had two wide open, their tight end tremble was like wide open. To the point where Ross Tucker, you wouldn't hear the broadcast, Ross Tucker's being like, look at that play design. It's crazy, right? So, like, here's the deal. We will talk about the offense. We will talk about the state of the team as a whole. But today, the Eagles needed their defense, their first round pick defense, their expensive defense, their Hall of Fame coordinator defense, to help them. And they didn't help them at all. In fact, they were bad. Like, again, they could have easily allowed 30 plus points if the Panthers wanted to score at the end. Right when the Eagles offense got a little bit of life. They wanted to, you're right. What did the defense do? They do what they always did. Like, again, against the Rams, we gave them grace because the fact offense didn't score in the second half. They allowed 14 points on the final two drives to lose that game, right? Against the Bears, they get absolutely torched by a backup quarterback in Chicago. Last week, right, they again give up a game-winning drive. And I know that it was an incredible catch by Parker Washington. And I know it's tough coverage, blah, blah, blah. Like, where's the specialness? We say all the time, when's Jalen going to be special? When's Nick going to be special? What's the advantage Nick gives them? What's the... Where's... What about the defense? We just assume they're good. And so they get off the hook all the time. My biggest takeaway on the field today is this defense is not good enough. They're not playing up to their potential. And the only way this team is going to turn the season around is if somebody starts to show something. And there's a better chance of that happening on defense because they should have more talent there. But they're not showing it. And so, yes, they lost today. I think another thing is, to your point, if they would have won those very, in-their-hand games against the Rams and the Jags, you look at this and you go, you know what, it is what it is. Jalen, you found out in a short week. But you didn't win those games. And now for the first time ever, you've lost four straight. So I leave this just thinking, when in the world is this... Me and you talked about this hyperbolically, but obviously not that crazy. Could this be the best defense in Eagles history? Could this be the best defense in the NFL? Could this be the best secondary ever? They don't tackle, they don't make big plays, right? I know the Quinion one-interception thing is... Those guys were open. Coker and Mnigdon. They're wide open over the middle, Alex Young. But wide open these guys. They're wide open. So I know that people... And Bryce Young's good, by the way. Bryce Young's good. And we'll talk about the offense, and we are an offense pod, or at least I am. I talk about offense more than I do defense. But that is not the story of this game. The story of this game is that defense, that how many times has Howie said, all your favorite players, jerseys, you're going to end up keeping them. Okay, are we sure they should give Cooper a ton of money? Quinion's awesome. And the one intersection thing, I'll say this about Quinion, it stopped being cute. They need Quinion to get the ball back for them. They need Jaylen Carden to go get the ball. Quinion, I think, is the least blamed of all of us. Yeah, Quinion's awesome. I agree. I get your point. At a certain point, they need some of these guys. Jonathan Grenard. Jonathan Grenard, we're six games into the season. Grenard's made one play, and it was against the Rams in a game where he left early for injury. He's a complete non-factor. You look at the off-season moves they made. Right, they did nothing at safety. The safeties aren't great. Grenard has been a complete disappointment. Jordan Davis has not had a good year after they made him a team. Jahad Campbell. And this is the other thing, too. I understand that you're not getting great linebacker play, but these rotations are crazy. Guess what? It's a one-person job. That's how the linebacker position works. The safety position, it's a one-person job. That's how the safety positions work. We're not rotating running backs and edges and stuff. Like, you need them to be in there. And look, Vic knows more about defense than I do. But I think it's like a little comical and a little embarrassing that they are rotating their linebackers at this point. Like, six weeks into the season, Jahad Campbell's a first-round pick, and he has made, what, one notable play in his entire Eagles career, that interception against the Buccaneers. So again, we'll get to the offense, we'll get to Nick Sirianni, people will be mad at him again. But sooner or later, the defense has to catch some heat. And I think today, like, was the pit, was like the rock bottom of a unit that was supposed to be amazing, and is just far from it right now. Yeah, dude, preach. I fully agree. And look, again, in a macro sense, I know people of the pitch, works out for Nick, and he hasn't had the best year, even though I think, you know, he had his team fighting in those spots, but I get it. The whole Jalen thing is a mess, both organizationally, and I'm sure we'll get into the whole, like, you know, all the IR stuff and all. There's so much, like, just, like, it does feel like a season from hell, both on the field in terms of the injury regression, back to the mean, like, you know, you expect when you have, I was talking to Emily about, like, you know, you have 43 of 44 starters in two Super Bowls is miraculous. I mean, the first time when it was 22, it never happened. And then they do, and then Kobe got hurt in the playoffs. So it was like, they have been so, and it's part design, part work, but also, you know, block plays a massive role in that. And it feels like all of it at once has just come back the other way. And obviously, Jordan Davis, the end there gets hurt. Nolan Smith looked like he was playing really well until the concussion happens. And, you know, a Jomo is in and out, Grenard in and out. You know, obviously, I mean, and to your point, like, if I'm like, if I'm like Devontae Smith out there on the offense, like, looking around and seeing Damian Pierce playing like 98% of the snaps or wherever the other guy had to play and like doing his best, like, he's just not that great, but he was all right, you know, like he did his best. And, you know, Tanner, you know, doing okay. Like he wasn't great, but like getting bombarded and bad snaps and like some, some nice throws, but not great. But like you're looking around at the offensive line, you're playing on that and you're like battling and you're coming back from injury and making these plays. And then you look at the defense with all the dudes. I agree. Like get a fricking stop, make a fricking play for me. Like what are you doing? I mean, where's the defensive plays? Like, you know, and, and look, and, and I think you're seeing the deficiency in the roster, both to your point defensively, which I think they still have enough guys where they should be better, but also on, on special teams, like the special teams have been the worst. I mean, the returns, all that stuff have been the worst they've been. We saw obviously the Jags game just, and it's cause they're just down guys. Like they don't have like the depth of guys, the black pun, they don't have the depth of guys. And again, they are on like, what, three-fifths of their starting offensive line is different. You know, the, it just, it cascades down. And when you lose guys and lose guys and lose guys, you have guys who just are not capable of being put in these spots, both certainly in offense events, but then in special teams especially, we've seen it. So yeah, it just feels like, it feels like they are deficient. Obviously, both deficient roster is coming into the season, and then all these injuries have made them just incredibly talent-deficient. But to your point, when you look at the, just the freaking cavalcade of guys, they've lost on offense, including the franchise quarterback to a freaking blood clot, like all indefinitely, like all these things, like there's so much like disaster. The Lady Johnson freaking retired on the, like you would hope, you would expect that this Super Bowl champion defense that was good last year, too, like it wasn't like it was their fault last year. Like it's like, step the hell up. I'm so with you, dude. I'm not like, again, I was resigned to losing today, and I'm resigned to kind of the season it's going to be like, we'll see what happens. And I don't think I'm in the vision. I hope they fight and all that. But like, I'm not like, I'm not as like angry as I, as I normally would be in this situation. But like you, I'm worked up about the defense, hearing you talk and thinking about you're dead right. Like, and I thought about, but like not to the, they really do deserve the headline today. And it's rare, it's like this is on the defense. I mean, look, the offense is broken. Like the offense is broken. It is what you have. Literally, physically and metaphorically. So like, honestly, I almost view the offense on such a curve today, where it's like, hey, they scored a touchdown on the second half. I thought Tanner made some nice plays. Like Damon Pierce ran really hard. That touchdown throw to Devontae was a legit dot. One of the best throws of the year by anybody. It was a great throw, right? But that being said, like 14 points, the fact it's gotten to this, like Zach Ertz, we talked about him when they signed him, like, oh, he's going to be a good receiving tight end. He'll come in, blah, blah. He was a healthy scratch today, right? And again, I do think, and people will come with the pitchforks for next, that's how it works. He's the head coach. He was all right. But again, they don't have Jalen Hurts. They find out on short notice they don't have him. Their offensive line is a bit of a disaster right now, obviously. And like, it can't. Well, what's funny is like they... Yeah, I guess they didn't have Drew Kendall. Yeah. So you really just have my lot and Steen out there. But the other thing, like it is hard to be an offensive team. You're talking about Drew Kendall, like he wasn't even a starter for the season. No, I agree. Yeah, I know. It was funny. I think it was Drew from Westchester actually said something like, you know, ma'am, I really want Kendall back. And I'm like, that could be the yearbook quote for this year. That's so funny. And by the way, shout out to Drew from Westchester, because he is the person who's been banging this. Vic Fangio and the defense have to be better for him, and he's been dead right. But here's what I'll say, when you can't run the ball because you're missing so many people, it's just really hard to have a good offense. They have no running backs basically, so it's really hard to run the ball. So that would be... Like you said, basically at the end there, and I'm like, no, not basically. They have no running backs. They literally only have one. Well, Jayden Blue, I guess today, but I don't know if... So my other big picture takeaway would be being here. I don't know how it came across on TV, but I really wonder what Jeffrey Lurie was thinking sitting in his box. It was dead silent the entire game, short of a few moments where they had energy. The thing with the ref and stuff. I'm not even ripping to fans because I understand why you wouldn't feel any hope, but it was a bad atmosphere today. People were leaving with six, seven minutes to go. It was non-competitive. By the way, week six. It reminded me of two times. It reminded me when I first started covering the team in 2012, and I was here at the end of the Andy thing. I think it was maybe a Bengals or Cardinals game, and I looked out and thought, man, this is a bad product right now. It reminded me of 2020. Now, 2020, obviously different because the fan situation with COVID. But what I'm trying to say is we can justify why Nick is maybe not on Nick's fault. We can justify all the injuries. Jeffrey Lurie could be well within his right to view it that way. But at the end of the day, the Eagles are an entertainment product. The Eagles are a business that needs people to believe in them and buy things from them. And right now, if you're an Eagles fan, why are you buying tickets to Monday Night Football against the Cowboys? Think about this. Jeffrey Lurie is going to get- It's because of the Cowboys, but I get your point. Jeffrey Lurie is going to get inducted into the Eagles Hall of Fame next week in prime time and halftime. It could come after his team loses four straight, they get flexed out of Sunday Night Football against Washington. And be losing at halftime. I don't think he'll get booed, but if you're Jeffrey, think about your moment that you might have wasted right now by all this. And so we talk about Nick, but I'd be mad at Howie if I was Jeffrey. This product right now is lifeless. When it was 10-0, it felt like they had no hope of winning this game. So when I look at this team right now, and we can look at it big picture and say, it's over, it's not a special year, but we get all that. Internally, they can't. They still have, what, 13 more games? But they would have 11 more games. So to your point, the Giants got smoked today. They play the Cowboys. 11 and only 11 is my guess. But what's crazy enough is, I think Tanner McKee was okay today. I think with eight days to prepare. The vision's wide open. I said to me, dude, it's insane. The Giants freaking lost to the Saints at home today. Washington is gonna lose it on Monday night, most likely to San Francisco. Dallas plays a tough Packers team tonight. It's wide open. It's crazy. And I think that's the thing where the last two weeks, I think the decision against the Jaguars at the end backfiring so much, I think influenced the post-game pod. But after the Rams game, we didn't crush them. We weren't like, the Jag game, a brutal ending, but they fought hard in that game. Today, it felt lifeless for the first time. And it can spiral quickly. I was there in 2020, right? I was there when- 2023! 2023, like- That playoff game was like, you want to talk about no life. I mean, that playoff game 2023 was like, they were just nothing. How long has it been since we watched an Eagles game? I guess it would be end of 2023 and part of 2020, where you're sitting there and going, how are they going to lose this game? 2023. First, even the Rams and Jags game, I never was like, they're definitely losing this game all. They were up against the Rams. I was sure they were losing it. I know. No, but even not just going into it, I mean during the game. I know what you mean. They were only down one possession, the majority of this game. So it just felt so much more hopeless than it really was. Now, at the end, the Jags pull away because the defense was no good. But what really strikes me about this team now is how hopeless it feels, how lifeless it feels, and it doesn't have to be that way. They can still do something. And the player that was in the toughest spot today, Tanner, I actually think, again, wasn't bad, made some good throws. He had a short week of practice to prepare. So I think about what this season could be. And I hope that they feel and can find a way to feel the same level of investment that the people who are investing their money will feel. Because it could be easy to chalk this up. They probably know internally how long Jalen is going to be out. They know Nolan has a concussion now, Jordan Davis is hurt. All those things, right? But the bottom line is, they still have this whole thing in front of them. And we're just gonna find out if they want to fight or not. And I'll tell you this, if they don't, people will go. Like Cooper, that huge contract you thought you were gonna get, you'll get paid a lot of money, but you're not gonna be the highest paid nickel in the NFL. Just keep, the people, Jalex Hunt, now he's hurt, so you feel bad. But that'd be money to, right. Zach Vaughn, who knows? Nick Sirianni, might not have a job. Vic Fangio, Jalen, Sean Mann, all these people. So like we can just kind of like. It can be a real changeover. You're right. But I just mean like from the outside, like we can just go, well, it's just not their year. But guess what? Like people are gonna pay the price of that. So that product that was out there, they have got to find a way to put a better product on the field. Yeah. And look, you feel okay organizationally, because again, I know Howie has had a bad year, but like you still believe in Howie. I think I do, especially because we've seen Howie do it multiple times where he has torn his body or so. He has, but you know what he's always done? At least the last two times when he's had bad years, he's built it back up. You know, so like, so you know, and he does have a ton of draft capital already. And I think that's what's going to be really fascinating about these next games, especially its division opponents. Like we're like, you're right, season jobs are on the line. And I think that the trade deadline is November 10th. That's three weeks away. That's basically, you know, you got the three division games coming up. Like I don't know if it will be before or after the last one. But like the point is like, like Howie, it's going to be fascinating for Howie too, because like the division is on the table and all that stuff. And we don't know about Jalen long term, what his prognosis is, and when he could be back. But like, point being that, like to your point, guys like Saquon or Goddard or whoever, you know, whether, Rick Woolin, like there are guys who like, if they are not going to, likely won't be back on the team. And if Howie can get value for those guys and have picks, especially with this big 2027 draft coming up, it does seem like if you're going to have a bad year, at least lead into a draft where it seems like there's a ton of talent. But yeah, I'm with you. And I know you got to go to the locker room because it's going to be interesting to see how they are. Can I guess how the locker room is going to be empty and lifeless? Yeah, but you know what, though, like Nick and how these guys seem after the game, after this. I agree with you, I think it will be empty and lifeless, but it's also a moment to this point for those guys. Forgetting, we can talk about Howie and trades and being fans, we're not going anywhere. But for these guys whose jobs potentially, time here, all these things are on the line, this is a real, for lack of a better phrase, nut-check moment where they have to band together and figure this out and try and fight these few days. Because again, I think they have three weeks, essentially, till Howie does something one way or the other. A hundred percent, and we're going to find out. We're going to find out. All right, get down to the locker room. We'll be back later in the week, Tuesday. Whatever, something like that, to talk more. And again, there is so much to hurt stuff. There's so many things to get into. And Tuesday, by the way, we might have sold our Philadelphia Soul for it, but LeBron does play as a sixer. Yeah, that's right. We'll see how that turns out. Yeah. Turn into a lot of sixers talk as a pocket note. I know. All right. So look, so much to get into. We'll be back after that. And try and enjoy the weekend. Again, look forward to LeBron. There's not much else right now. And again, it is an interesting moment. It's a moment right now for this group and for the franchise. It's going to be fascinating. All right. We'll be back later in the week. Thank you to Tucker Bagley as always, just crashing in. Until then, it's Adam James.