Nobody saw this one coming. I’m still in shock. I mean the Philadelphia Phillies scored more points than the Eagles did. Wow. So what went wrong?

Well it starts with the play calling. As I discussed in my previous post, the Eagles running game hasn’t been too explosive. But maybe that’s because they aren’t getting enough chances. Westbrook and McCoy are two incredibly versatile backs that can really contribute in the passing game but they are running backs by trade first. They are great in space and the Eagles focused on the offensive line a lot in the off season to open the holes that those backs would need. So why did Reid only call 14 running plays and 46 passes when the Raiders were blocking the deep ball all day? Reid has always been obsessed with passing the ball and been stubborn in his play calling but grabbing Jason Peters in the off season and drafting LeSean McCoy in the 2nd round showed signs of change. It looks like those signs were false.

Then again, Jason Peters isn’t of much use to the Eagles on the bench. Peters suffered a knee contusion and sprained ankle during the Raiders game and his presence was certainly missed. Second year tackle King Dunlap did his best impression of Winston Justice two years ago against Osi Umenyiora as the Eagles O-Line allowed six sacks to Umenyiora alone.

I checked out some of the post game interview footage and, when asked about their performance, each offensive lineman had the same thing to say. “They blitzed more than they thought we would. That wasn’t something we saw from them on tape.” Well let’s see. First of all, if your best tackle goes down and your backup is about as effective as putting a bag of groceries on the line, I think it’s safe to say that any team is going to be blitzing a little more. Secondly, have these guys never seen a blitz before? They might have been caught off guard in the 1st quarter but you would think that they would catch on for the remaining 45 minutes of the game. No team ever looks at its own tapes from previous games and says “Let’s do everything the exact same way to make things easier for the opponent.” That is just a pathetic excuse. The Eagles starting front is pretty good but the second one of them goes down McNabb is going to get destroyed. I think Andy Reid and the Eagles coaching staff are aware of the issue but it looks like they need to work a bit harder to develop that young talent or stop being so patient with busts like Winston “How Did I Come From USC” Justice.

I’ve been talking a lot about the offense but the defense isn’t off the hook. Sure they held the Raiders to 13 points but then again Oakland was averaging just over 9 points per game coming into Sunday’s match-up. The defense had some injuries of their own as Victor Abiamiri and more importantly Omar Gaither had to come out of the game. Gaither, who was set to replace Stewart Bradley at middle linebacker after he was lost for the season, lost the job with Jeremiah Trotter’s return to the team. Trotter was brought in because he is a better run blocker but once Gaither went down, the Raiders exploited passing match-ups against Trotter all day. Quintin Mikell intercepted JaMarcus Russell and Asante Samuel notched his fourth pick of the year but the Eagles couldn’t score touchdowns off of those turnovers and the turnovers themselves weren’t enough to make up for Samuel’s other mistakes on the field.

I’m talking mainly about the ridiculous 86 yard touchdown pass from JaMarcus Russell to tight end Zach Miller. Or should I say the 5 yard dump pass that the Eagles missed 86 tackles on. All of the commentators throughout the day were saying stuff like “Zach Miller made a huge play on this 86 yard touchdown. He’s a special talent. Great job by JaMarcus Russell!” Did they even see the play? Miller is usually a good tight end but he is not known for his speed. He probably runs a 12.32 forty. The man is slow as molasses. The Eagles looked like blind pigeons on that play. Asante Samuel is apparently scared of Miller and dove out of his way about a second before they would’ve collided. You don’t have to meet the guy head-on but at least wrap your arms around his legs to slow him down until help can arrive. That play was atrocious. And sure enough the Eagles lost by four. Had anyone decided to even try and tackle Miller on that play, the Eagles probably would have won. Unbelievable.

Andy Reid told reporters today that he is confident Peters will return for the Monday night match-up. Donovan McNabb promised after the game that “this will never happen again”. Eagles fans had better pray that both Reid and McNabb are right because the Eagles’ next three games are against the NFC East and division rivals don’t give you as many chances to get back into the game as the Oakland Raiders do.