Will Thursday Bring the Apocalypse to the Philadelphia Eagles?

On Thursday night, when the Eagles take the field against the New England Patriots for their first preseason game, the sky could come falling down on Philadelphia. Contrarily, their currently derailed Super Bowl dreams could be put back on the fast track to Miami.

The Eagles have an incredibly high ceiling of potential...but if the floor falls out on the team, the backlash could be catastrophic. I don’t know what Philly did to piss the cosmos off, but the Eagles have been the ones paying for it.

Between the passing of longtime defensive coordinator Jim Johnson, shredded ACLs of two players expected to make an impact this season (Stewart Bradley and Cornelius Ingram, we hardly knew ye), an MCL sprain for backup QB Kevin Kolb, a hyperextended knee of WR DeSean Jackson (who by all reports has been the best player in camp), RB Brian Westbrook’s continued rehabilitation and the ongoing saga of the Andrews brothers, Philly fans are waking up each morning simply to wonder, “who’s next?” (answer: Hank Baskett, who hurt his right knee in Tuesday morning’s practice).

(On a side note: Incredibly, Donovan McNabb has remained upright while half his team has gone down around him.)

This leaves Philadelphia at a crossroads for Thursday night. On one hand, it’s the preseason...it doesn’t tend to matter, and let’s be honest—A.J. Feeley will probably be quarterbacking the Eagles for most of the night. On the other hand, season-long trends do start to appear in the preseason. What happens if the Patriots’ first-team offense and defense come out and blitzkrieg the Eagles?

With that said, I’m taking a look at the best and worst case scenarios for Thursday night’s preseason game against New England. These are strictly hypothetical situations, based on what’s happened in preseason so far (and they’re meant to be slightly funny, for good measure).

Best-Case Scenario

The Eagles 2010 dreams of the Super Bowl take new flight on Thursday night as they steamroll the Patriots in their first preseason game, dominating them on both sides of the ball with every string of players.

First, the Birds take the field Thursday night after suffering NO MORE INJURIES in training camp (please?).

QB Donovan McNabb tears up the Patriots first-team defense and marches down the field to an easy score with all of his new offensive weapons. Then he does it again. And again. After three cakewalk scores, head coach Andy Reid (looking a little slimmer these days) gives McNabb a well-deserved rest as A.J. Feeley takes the field...to lead the Birds to three more scores.

With Brian Westbrook still rehabbing his ankle, second-round pick RB LeSean McCoy bears the brunt of the RB duties on his broad shoulders and the rookie does not disappoint, averaging five yards a rush, blocking well, picking up on blitzes and catching a few passes out of the backfield.

Those worried about first-round pick WR Jeremy Maclin’s acclimation to the offense? Worry no more. Maclin comes on like lightning, proving that he can learn the Eagles’ complicated version of the West Coast offense despite coming from the spread at Missouri. Maclin makes Patriots like Brandon Meriweather, Adalius Thomas and Tedy Bruschi look silly as he burns them time and time again with laser-guided strikes from McNabb.

And who remembers the Eagles’ second-round pick a year ago? You know, the guy who set franchise rookie receiving records? Although, you might remember him best from his premature touchdown celebration in Dallas last year?

Well, ESPN’s NFC East blogger Matt Mosley sure didn’t forget about DeSean Jackson. In fact, he has nothing but praise for the speedy wideout:

“It didn't take long to identify the best player in this camp right now. His name is DeSean Jackson, and no one can defend him at this point. He's making All-Pro cornerback Asante Samuel look silly in practice—on a routine basis. Jackson looks bigger than last season, and I don't think he's lost any speed. Seriously. No one in camp can cover him.”

Jackson considers this preseason game his coming out party, as he’s on the receiving end of two of the McNabb touchdowns, including a 60-yard strike after McNabb flipped the ball to Maclin and he reversed it back to the QB.

The offense only gets so far as the offensive line takes them...and luckily for the Eagles, their new, retooled offensive line plays up to the hype. Pro Bowl LT Jason Peters protects McNabb’s blind side all night, giving No. 5 all the time he wants in the pocket. RG Stacy Andrews comes back from rehabbing his ACL injury from last year and overpowers the Pats’ line all night long. While Shawn Andrews continued to be sidelined from his back muscle contusions, the other four offensive lineman begin developing and demonstrating the requisite chemistry that would make the Eagles a Super Bowl contender.

And new fullback Leonard Weaver, who came to the Eagles in free agency from the Seattle Seahawks, provides the extra ingredient to the running game that the Eagles have missed since their Super Bowl season five years ago.

Defensively, despite all the injuries, the Birds shut down Tom Brady, Randy Moss and the Patriots’ high powered offense in three drives before both teams begin rotating in second-stringers. Joe Mays and Omar Gaither display no hesitancy in filling in Bradley’s open MLB spot, CBs Asante Samuel and Ellis Hobbs make the Patriots regret ever letting either player go to the Eagles, and Quintin Mikell assumes the leadership of the defense so convincingly that Philadelphians began to move on from the Brian Dawkins era (who couldn’t avoid the Eagles injury bug, as he went down in Denver with a broken hand expected to sideline him for two weeks).

Worst-Case Scenario

The Eagles’ 2010 Super Bowl dreams come crashing to the ground as flaming wreckage on Thursday night, as the Patriots overwhelm the Eagles’ new personnel and unravel the Eagles’ preseason faster than a DeSean Jackson 40-yard-sprint.

Before the game even starts, the Eagles announce injuries to TE Brent Celek, McCoy, CB Sheldon Brown and new S Sean Jones. All four sit the game out. The Eagles also remain cautious with Jackson, Peters, Westbrook and the Andrews brothers and keep them on the bench. That leaves McNabb with Lorenzo Booker as the Eagles' starting RB, Maclin alongside Kevin Curtis and Jason Avant at receiver, and former Purdue D-end Eugene Bright as the starting TE.

Bright, after having played TE for about all of four weeks, gets absolutely manhandled. Much like Jarvis Moss from Denver, who thought his time playing football might be prematurely up, Bright takes the rest of the preseason off, away from the Eagles, to mull his potential retirement...four weeks into his professional football career.

The receiving core gets completely shut down, with McNabb completing only four passes to receivers in the entire first half. Maclin gets the worst of it, going down with a pinkie injury after catching a slant from McNabb. Maclin is due to miss the rest of the preseason as well.

Shawn Andrews remains on the sideline, feeding RT Winston Justice to the bears on the Patriots defensive line. Justice, who still remains scarred from Osi Umenyiora’s performance two years where he abused Justice all night for six sacks (the Giants registered 12 that game!), turns into a revolving door on the offensive line once more, allowing the Pats to pressure and sack McNabb all night.

Coach Andy Reid, not recognizing the how porous his offensive line had become, leaves McNabb in shark-infested waters for the entire first half. Reid’s decision could end up being extremely costly for the Eagles this season, as McNabb breaks his leg on the fourth play from scrimmage but insisted on remaining in the game (well, don’t say there’s no precedent for that).

He returns for the Eagles’ second drive, only to get taken out of the game again after a vicious Derrick Burgess sack (a player the Eagles were recently trying to acquire before the Patriots signed him). Much like Bernard Pollard’s freak hit on Tom Brady last season, Burgess ends up rolling into McNabb strangely and tore both of the quarterback’s ACLs. McNabb will be sidelined for the rest of the season, and this could be the end of a long, illustrious career for No. 5.

With Kevin Kolb out with a knee injury, that leaves A.J. Feeley to scrape together some kind of magic, much like he managed when McNabb went down with that ankle injury in 2002. Unfortunately for Eagles’ fans, history would not be repeating itself again, as Feeley gets hit from every angle en route to throwing three picks during the game. He is taken out in the fourth quarter with brain hemorrhaging and his regular season is now in jeopardy.

That leaves the Eagles with just two potentially healthy QBs on the roster—Kolb and Matt Nagy, a 31-year-old Delaware graduate who led two teams to the ArenaBowl championship in the now-defunct AFL. Unless Kolb heals in the next three weeks, Nagy is slated as the Eagles’ opening day starter.

Immediately following the post game press conference, Reid announces, "to hell with dieting, I'm going to Chickie and Pete's" and puts on all the weight (75 pounds!) he lost during the offseason. 

It’s not a huge risk to say reality will most likely fall somewhere in between these two scenarios. When watching the Eagles play the Pats on Thursday night, Eagles fans, just remind yourself about what could be.