Okay, well our opening day started off with a loss unfortunately. The Philadelphia Eagles defeated our Houston Texans 24-10. I thought we cam out fired up and ready to play, as we should have, as it was the season opener and our home opener with a new look on both sides of the ball. We drove right down the field and put up 7 on our first drive. On the defense's first outing we came away with an interception off of D. McNabb. I felt that was great start and really got us fans into it, but Philadelphia finall got going tied it up, we were able to answer with a FG, and really from then on it was all Eagles. I thought the Eagles out-excecuted us. They moved the ball very well down the filed for most of the game. They had a pretty good run game going, and their pass game was defintely in sync today. Our defense did not look great today. It was our first regular season game with the new 4-3 however, and we did have some rookies starting. All excuses aside, we had a bad performance defesively today. On plays we blitzed McNabb we sometimes would not get to him, other times he just had way to much time to sit back in the pocket. This is an area where we need to improve- getting more pressure on the QB. With the offense, we firstly need to establish more of a run game. I said Thursday this was a key to having success this game. Wali Lundy just never got going, nor did Morency. Offensively, this is obviously an area we need to improve. Another area is reducing the sacks on David Carr. They got to him quite a few times today, and we need to fix this problem. We did have a rookie starting on the line with Charles Spencer, and a new C with Mike Flanagan. This may have just been that there was some different players up there on the O-Line and it may take some time to get used to playing together. I think we will improve running the ball in the future, Wali Lundy is a good football player. I also think we will reduce the number of sacks on Carr. This is a better football team than last year I think, it will just take a little time to get used to a new offensive system. Special teams Kris Brown hit a FG attempt, Chad Stanley got off 2 nice punts, 1 not so nice. Kick returns and punt returns were average. We had different guys taking the returns thru the game. Phillip Buchanon got a little banged up on that first return. Overall, we were just out-played, the better team won today. I think we will improve. I'm excited about this season ahead of us, we still have 15 games. It starts with preparing for a good Indianapolis team next week. We still have a good season ahead of us I feel, continue to cheer us on, Go Texans
I think the two halfs of this game were pretty much night and day. In the first half Westbrook had 20 rushing yards and 10 receiving...he almost doubled his totals in one drive in the 3rd. I have already said this multiple times, but I think if we could have scored a TD before the half instead of having to settle for a FG, it would have been a differant game. I doubt the Eagles would have scored before the half, differant ball game. Anyway, if we can replicate the first 27 minutes of the game consistantly, particularly on D, we should start getting some W's. PS-Mario, show us something, please
I will say he looked pretty good....... I saw both recievers open on several occasions, when David did have time, but chose not to throw the deep route. But overall, he looked pretty good, and was definitely not a part of our problems on offense.
"With the offense, we firstly need to establish more of a run game. I said Thursday this was a key to having success this game. Wali Lundy just never got going, nor did Morency. Offensively, this is obviously an area we need to improve." It's great to want to try and establish 'something' but when it's not working (like today), you've got to make adjustments. We did not do that today. The Eagles came to win, not to 'establish' anything. Capers, too. spent 4 yrs tring to establish the run and never succeeded. Kubiak promised to do whatever it took to win but that didn't happen today. If teams think our primary focus every game is to establish the run, they'll stop it like the Eagles did today. If what were doing is working-great--if it ain't, then we need to make some 'timely' changes. IMO, sticking to any game plan or 'philosophy' that's not working, gives you what we got today--defeat. I don't want us 'hanging our hat' after 16 games on the notion that --'yeah, we lost again, but we got to establish that run.'
