Eagles at Redskins: Will The Last Man Standing Turn Off The Lights

Philadelphia Eagles (3-2) vs. Washington Redskins (2-4)
8:30 p.m. FedEx Field
Well, it will be fun for the Redskins to play a franchise almost as dysfunctional as themselves at the current moment. No, the Eagles don’t have a quarterback controversy (at least not yet). Their coach’s hot seat is warm, but not boiling (at least not yet). Their disgusting fan base is angry, but not enraged (we’ll see what happens after the Phillies lose the World Series). However, they did just lose to Oakland. And it didn’t look any better than the boxscore indicated.

The Redskins problems are out there in the open. They’ve been the big story everywhere this week. Something tells me that ESPN is only covering the Jim Zorn fiasco because the Skins happen to be playing on their network. If this game was a 1:00 FOX game, I don’t think ESPN would have focused much on the Redskins. They haven’t focused on the team all season, even when they hired Sherm Lewis two weeks ago. How convenient that they start covering the team this week. I caught one of their roundtable discussions on Wednesday, when they were talking about poor Jim Zorn and how much Dan Snyder and Vinny Cerrato are idiots for not giving him a vote of confidence. Then I caught another one on Friday night, after Cerrato issued the vote of confidence, and the same talking heads were blabbering on about how Zorn should be fired. Just goes to reaffirm my belief that ESPN is more interested in creating their own news rather than covering the actual news. It’s enough to make your head spin. But I digress.

Is Jim Zorn still coaching, or does he have no power? Will Jason Campbell start or not start? Will he seem to care or not care? Who is actually going to be calling the plays? Is Cerrato actually crazy, or does he continue to make moves and statements that aren’t rational because he still doesn’t know how crazy he sounds? His bug-eyes aren’t helping any of us determine to answer to that. At this point, does it really matter? Probably not. True, the Redskins have a history of beating teams they shouldn’t and then playing down to inferior competition. We’ve already seen the latter part of that this season, and this will be the first week that we get to see the Skins test the former.

The Eagles, as you might imagine, are overhyped. It happens every year. They are part of the Holy Quintet (Eagles, Giants, Cowboys, Patriots & whatever team Brett Favre is on). They are always supposed to be better than record indicates if you listen to ESPN or other sports outlets. Their three wins are against Tampa, Carolina and Kansas City. Their losses are to New Orleans and Oakland. Neither of those were pretty. There’s obviously no shame losing to the Saints, but the Eagles were blown out. The Saints made it clear that Philadelphia is a second-tier NFC team. The loss to the Raiders, which is embarrassing, proved that fact. At 3-2, the Eagles are probably much worse than their record indicates.

Part of the problem has been injuries, but the majority of the problem is coaching and execution. The Eagles linebackers and secondary have been depleted because of the injury bug. I said in the preseason that it was stupid to allow Brian Dawkins to walk in his free agency year. I guaranteed that he had at least two more good seasons left in him. Not only that, but he was the one constant in Philly’s ever-revolving-door in the secondary and he was a team leader. But they let Dawkins go to Denver, where he has played extremely well. Meanwhile, the Eagles back seven have been very vulnerable.

The coaching staff is another issue. It started with the death of defensive coordinator Jim Johnson in the off-season. I’ve long said that he was the best coach the Eagles had during the last ten years, and that includes the current coach and father-of-the-decade candidate Andy Reid. The defense, against decent offenses, hasn’t looked the same. They’re still blitzing, but they are not as effective. And remember, they haven’t faced the Cowboys or Giants yet. They still have to play the Broncos and Chargers. They still have to play Matt Ryan and the Falcons. Other than the Saints, who completely embarrassed the defense, they haven’t faced a lot of great offenses yet. This is a problem that’s only going to get worse. Reid is just a lousy coach, and Johnson’s replacement has yet to fill the void on Reid’s staff.

Offensively, it’s the same old story. Donovan McNabb is great one week and bad the next. McNabb still can’t stay healthy either. Brian Westbrook continues his career-long bout with the injury bug as well. Despite having two talented running backs and a decent offensive line, Reid and his brilliant offensive assistants continue to throw the ball more than just about every team in the league. And this year, they’ve even hired Michael Vick. Considering his past, there’s no more perfect city for Vick to call home than Philadelphia. He fits right in with the other criminals that reside there. However, it doesn’t appear that Vick fits in with the Eagles, since his impact has been almost non-existent.

Look, this game is going to probably be pretty ugly. If the Redskins somehow turn a minor miracle and win this game, I think it would be the upset of the season so far. Even more surprising than Philly’s loss last week. But with the Eagles penchant to blitz, and the Redskins MASH unit on the offensive line, there’s no way the Skins offense is going to do better this week than in the last few Sundays. And even if things are open downfield, what’s the likelihood that Campbell’s going to make plays? The Skins defense will keep them in the game, but the offense will probably let the team down again.