The key to the game last night was the play of the Eagles defensive front. The defense held an outstanding Chicago offense to only 11 points because the guys in the midnight green seemed to want the win more than the Bears. The Birds defensive front dominated the battle with the Chicago offensive line and put a pounding on Bears quarterback Jay Cutler, who lacks the toughness and competitiveness to a be a premiere NFL quarterback.
Once Trent Cole, Mychal Kendricks, Cedric Thornton and company got finished with him, Cutler had quit. He seemed disinterested and started sulking and complaining about the play of his offensive line. The guy plays the game without the fight and heart of a winner, when is hit.
It was a dominating performance by the entire Eagles defense. Cole played like a man on a mission as he contributed three sacks and his outstanding effort was the key. On one of the sacks, he ran over Chicago running back Matt Forte. On another he beat the tackle then hurled himself over Thornton to trip up Cutler.
Kendricks was just as driven as he contributed two quarterback sacks and five total tackles. He did a great job of shuffling behind the defensive line and attacking the ball carriers before they could get going. He’s learning how to use his quickness to be the big play linebacker they need him to be.
The strong-armed Bears quarterback was sacked five times and picked off once by nickel back Brandon Boykin, who took the interception back 54 yards for a touchdown. He completed 20 of 35 throws for 222 yards and one touchdown pass. Chicago converted only 5 out of 14 3rd down opportunities and most of those were on their one scoring drive.
Running back Matt Forte gained only 29 yards on nine carries for only 3.2 yards per carry. He was tripped up by Thornton in the end zone for a safety in the second half, which is an embarrassment to Forte and his offensive line. The Bears rushed for a total of only 61 yards.
The Birds cornerbacks Bradley Fletcher and Cary Williams showed their attitude first last night on the kickoff team, when Fletcher ripped the football out of Devin Hester’s arms and Williams recovered to help put the Eagles up by two touchdowns before the Bears offense even got onto the field. The cornerbacks had been challenged by the defensive coaching staff to move up in press technique and cover the Bears outstanding wide receiver combination of Brandon Marshall and Alshon Jeffery. They took them out of the game. Marshall caught four passes for only 36 yards and Jeffery caught six passes for 76 yards. They out-physicalled the biggest set of receivers in the NFL.
The talented wide outs were jammed at the line of scrimmage and harassed as they went downfield. Fletcher led the team with seven tackles and Williams had four stops with two pass breakups.
This is all great but if they can’t come up with a similar performance against Dallas, they will go home next week. This great, dominating defensive effort will only mean something, if they show with just as much fire against the Cowboys.
What a play by Thornton on the safety! Shady spinning away from Peppers! Pressure all game from a mutlittude of guys. Stuffing the run. And the secondary. Holy eff. Those guys came to play. Nice all around game.
Chicago ddin’t look like they knew what hit them. Before they blinked it was 21-0. Hopefully the Birds can play that loose next week and they should win. The Cowboys D is very suspect too.
This is the new level we should now expect our Defense to play at…its clutch time…and if our Defense plays at the level that we played at last night…the Eagles are unstoppable!
Yeah, I hope that they let Fletcher and Williams play physical next week too. Those guys are way better on the ball then playing off.
absolutely bugsy….safety support over the top may be what had caused Davis to change things up.
Good point Green. This is the formula for beating the Cowboys too. They don’t have to be as dominant, but they just have to make some plays, because I expect the offense to score 30+ on the Cowboys putrid defense.
We need to get pressure on Romo…our defense line has to dominate again…if we get the pressure we can rest assured that Romo is going to throw us the ball a few times…he will cough it up for us!
Is it just me, or is Trent Cole playing like he is 5 years younger? The whole defense stunk in Minn, but during the previous games and now last night against the Bears, the guy is playing with a spark. I was not convinced that he would be able to make a jump to OLB, but he has been doing a great job of getting pressure in the QB. Ced Thorton is also really stepping up.
Do you mean the Trent cole that the negative nitwits have buried on this site? The guy is a true professional and deserves a shitload of credit for his transformation!
It really is a credit to the man. To make that type of position change at this point in his career is really amazing. On top of it, he is playing with an energy level that is crazy for game 15 of the season. I am really impressed and give him all of the credit. I will admit I did not think we would be seeing this type of production out of him at this point in the season…..how great it is to be wrong!!!
I agree Green. He used to seem to wear down towards the end of season. Come out like gangbusters and then fade. I think that it took him a while to learn how to be play in this system and Billy Davis had to learn how to use him too.
As horrible as the Redskins Defense looked yesterday, they almost pulled out a win against Dallas. Tony Romo was not that great he capitalized on their mistakes. Im sure Dez Bryant will probably make some plays. However if the Defense can play half as good as it did last night, they should have no problem handling the Cowboys.