Let me give you a couple of undeniable facts. First of all the Eagles secondary has played their two worst games of the season in the last two weeks. The Cowboys went through them with ease and could have scored over 50 points but they called off the dogs in the 4th quarter.
They showed up like they weren't ready to play. If you wanted to you could easily attribute this to lack of leadership. They blew assignments and played without any passion. You saw Terrell Owens have his best game of the season against the Eagles secondary.
It was much of the same against the Redskins who have an inexperienced quarterback in Jason Campbell who has a quarterback rating beneath 80. He's near the bottom of the league. The Redskins hadn't completed a touchdown pass to a wide receiver in the entire season. That's after eight games. They also were playing without their top receiver because Santana Moss was injured. James Thrash started and 37 year old Keenan McCardell was the third receiver. Thrash caught two touchdowns and had a great game. McCardell who has been on the street for the entire season, hadn't caught a touchdown pass since 2005. The Skins shredded the Eagles secondary. They completed three passes for touchdowns against the Birds.
I sit and read story after story about Brian Dawkins and his great leadership. I will be the first to say that Dawkins has been a Hall Of Fame level safety during his time with the Eagles. Despite that if you wanted to criticize his leadership skills, you could do it based on what has happened in the last two games. He returned to action against the Cowboys and also started against the Skins. If he was such a great leader, you would figure that it would show up in the players who play next to him. I'm not criticizing Dawk because I've always felt that grown men have to take it as their own responsibitly to get themselves ready to play. But clearly the secondary hasn't been ready to play.
Put McNabb in the same situation. Let's say he comes back after being out injured and his part of the team plays poorly after his return, despite having played well when he was out. How would that be covered by the local media? Many of the guys don't look to see what's happening for themselves, they just follow what everybody else says. They are totatlly disregarding the fact that Dawkins returned to action and the secondary''s play went down.
I was at the Nova Care Complex yesterday and saw everybody fawning over Dawk going back into the game and covering a kickoff. According to the articles he was going back in there to make sure the kickoff team didn't give up a big play. What about the secondary he played on for the entire game? He had plenty of time to lead this guys and make sure they didn't give up a big play. If his leadership skills are so great, then how do you explain the way the secondary has played. Remember that secondary was playing like they were lost in the situation where the season on the line. They had played better with Mikell and Considine at safety, with Will James and Sheldon Brown at cornerback. They weren't get shredded by Campbell, Thrash and McCardell.
If McNabb's area of the team had played like Dawkins area in the last two games, eveybody would be talking about what a lousy leader he is. Tell me that praising Dawkins as a great leader after his area of the team has played as bad as they have the last two weeks is fair. I don't have an explanation for it, but the truth is that the secondary played better when he was on the bench.
If the secondary doesn't play better against the Dolphins, Miami is going to get their first win of the season. If they let John Beck go up and down the field, we'll read more stories about how great leader Dawkins is, while the secondary makes Beck look like Dan Marino. This is what you call the a self fulfilling prophesy. If disregard evidence that doesn't prove your theory then your theory will always be right.
