Eagles First Half Review

The first half of the 2009 NFL season is in the books and the Eagles are currently sitting in second place in the NFC East at 5-3, one game in back of Dallas who is now 6-2 after their victory over Philly on Sunday night, and a 1/2 game ahead of New York who at 5-4 already have a game in the loss column for their second half.

If you had to sum the Bird's first half with a grade I would give them a B-. With the exception of their second half against the 8-0 New Orleans Saints they had a good chance to win the two games they lost and were in firm control of the five games they won.

The high point of the season so far was their dominating 40-17 win over the N.Y Giants in a game that they jumped on the G-Men from the very start and never let up.

The low point is undoubtedly their 13-9 loss to one of the worse teams in the league, the Oakland Raiders. I am still trying to figure out what happened in that mess. While I know that getting away from the basics and throwing the ball 80% of the time was the wrong game plan, the whole team seemed to be sleep walking through this game as if they thought that all they had to was get off the plane and the Raiders were going to concede the game.

The most disappointing game of the first half was last week's loss to the Cowboys. I honestly think they made Dallas look much better than they really are. The game was close and winnable almost to the end, but the haunting inability to get a short yardage first down when they needed the most brings visions of last season's close losses to Chicago and Washington for the exact same reason. This is a problem that must be corrected in they are going to have any chance to make a championship run in the second half.

The biggest under estimation on my part so far this season was the loss of defensive coordinator Jim Johnson, who died of cancer earlier this year and S Brian Dawkins who left via free agency. Dawkins who was thought to be past his prime has shown he has more than enough gas left in the tank helping his new team, the Denver Broncos have one of the top ranked defenses in the league. Under the circumstances I think Sean McDermott has done a great job taking over for Johnson, but his lack of experience in pivotal situations where his predecessor knew exactly what to do has hurt at times this year. The same could be said about Dawkins. While the defense has certainly created a fair amount of big plays and turnovers, they haven't been able to recreate Dawkins' ability to pull off the big play when they need it the most and seem to be lacking the intensity he helped to instill.

The biggest surprise of the first half is the Eagles big play ability. I knew DeSean Jackson was a stud, but he is rapidly establishing himself as the premier big play wide receiver in the NFL. Rookie WR Jeremy Maclin got off to a slow start, but he is coming on as a solid number two receiver to compliment Jackson. TE Brent Celek is the first impact player at that position for the Eagles in quite a number of years. Rookie RD LeSean McCoy has shown flashes of brilliance and should only get better as the season progresses. If the Eagles can get any production out of Brian Westbrook this year they will have one of the most dynamic offenses in the league. All this offensive firepower still revolves around one man, Donovan McNabb. His ability to consistently play at a high level, which has not always been the case in the first half of the season will ultimately determine how far this team goes in the second half.

Given the level of competition in the NFC with New Orleans and Minnesota playing at a high level along with teams like Dallas, Atlanta, and New York still lurking out there, a B- is not going to get it done this year. They will need to pull a solid A over the next eight weeks if they have any hope of winning that all expenses paid trip to Miami in early February.