Will the Real Philadelphia Eagles Please Stand Up!?

Here is a trivia question: How many NFL teams called the "Eagles" have played in Philadelphia since 2004?

The answer? Two. One amazingly dominant team that knocks off the NFL darling (and molly coddled) New York Giants, which we will call the "Good Eagles," and the other Eagles team?

One sad, underwhelmingly inept team that fights tooth and nail to eek out a tie against one of the worst teams in the NFL. We shall call this Eagles team the "Evil Twin."

This "tale of two teams" in Philadelphia isn't unique to this season alone, mind you. Oh no, this two-headed monster has reared its ugly mug(s) for four-years running.

It just seems that because the Good Eagles win so big, the Evil Twin Eagles seem to go unnoticed. Overrated? Possibly. Underperforming? Definitely. But of course, which team you see each Sunday all depends on which Sunday you choose to watch them play.

I, sadly, try to watch them every week so the great disparity of good and evil is quite apparent to me. Let's recap these last few years to see if we can pick up on a trend.

2005 season

Evil Eagles ruled this season. Win/loss record 6-10. Brad Childress leaves the team at the end of the 2004 season to coach the Vikings. He is replaced by Marty Mourning-wig. Apparently, Andy Reid was so impressed by Marty's 5-27 record with the Lions that he just HAD to get him on board the team to develop a very predictable, inconsistent, and underperforming offensive squad.

Marty really rose the occasion and accomplished all three tasks with amazing quickness. The self-destruction of this season was blamed on Terrell Owens' implosion and attempted suicides etc., but really, he was just a big fat distraction. Not in the way you were told in the sports press: "a distraction to the team, to the coaches" etc.

Rather, he was a smoke and mirrors "scapegoat" to distract the fans, from recognizing the real problem that lay in the fundamental operation of offense. Toward the end of the season, Andy Reid admitted to 'interfering' a bit too much and not allowing Marty to make the play calling.

He promised to turn more of the offense over to Marty. Phew! Thank God! Now we can see Mourning-wig's five-win-27-loss genius in all its glory. A couple other side notes here.

The Eagles were 26th in penalties this year, which is a sure sign of nothing other than poor preparation, and poor preparation is nothing other than poor coaching. And let's not forget,McNabb started the season playing like crap against the Falcons, then fantastic against the 49ers, then a couple games later, like crap against the Cowboys. Then, wouldn't you know it, injured for the final six games.

The truth is, he played like garbage for the four games leading up to this injury. People seemed to overlook that and would give the excuse, "This is just a different team without McNabb." No, it's just as inconsistent without him as it is WITH him. We just win half our games by three points instead of 30.

2006 season

Good Eagles showed up slightly more than the Evil-twin Eagles during this season.

The win/loss record was 10-6. McNabb got off to one of the best statistical seasons of his career, and despite all those wonderful yards and touchdown-to-INT ratios? We were, you guessed it! Five wins and five losses! Then, wouldn't you know it? Injured, out for the rest of the season.

Here come the excuses, "This is just a different team without McNabb." "He is the heart and soul of this offense." All due to his tremendous statistics. In my not-so-humble opinion, keep the yards and stats, give me the wins, which is exactly what McNabb's backup gave us, five wins and one loss.

Yep, we were definitely a different team without McNabb, with Jeff Garcia coming off the bench, we won consistently! Garcia, a good veteran backup came in and saved our bacon.

Garcia led our 5-5 team to a division title and the playoffs. We beat the Giants in the wild card...then lost to the then-NFL darling (and NFL referee favored) Saints, of course, due to inept coaching, clock management, and predictable play calling.

To thank Garcia for his heroics, he was shown the working end of Reid's boot with the door slammed shut behind him. This is more smoke and mirrors, fire the backup QB, not the incompetent Offensive Coordinator.

Now, instead of firing Mourning-twig for a RIDICULOUS offensive scheme, Reid decides to pick up A.J. Feely at the end of the 2006 season! Ol' 19 for 42 1 td 4 int himself.

Apparently Reid was REALLY impressed with Feely's 61.7 passer rating at Miami and just HAD to get this clown back on the roster, get rid of Garcia, promote Mr. 19 for 42 1 td 4 int up to No. 2 QB on the squad. Whose call was this? 

Mornhinweg or Reid?

Some side notes, again: The Eagles were 30th in the league for penalties this season, not to repeat myself but, penalties equal bad coaching plain and simple.

2007 season

The Battle of the Evil Twins put the win/loss record at 8-8. This season was the best representation of what the Eagles have been over the last four seasons—a perfect .500 record. 

This was a season where the Evil Eagles and the Good Eagles would alternate showing up from week to week with blowouts one game, and then amazingly BLOWN out the next game.

Again, this is starting to be typical of 5-27 Mourning-ball. McNabb was healthy this entire year, but would throw for 381 yards in one game, then the Evil Eagles would show up and he would throw for 158 yds.

Sound familiar? It should, it is EXACTLY what has happened all year in 2008! Never mind the inconsistent play, coaching, etc, here come some more excuses: "Rust" - McNabb has been out so long!, "Recovery"- it sometimes takes 100 years to recover from a blown ACL, and/or "Receivers" (lack thereof).

Never mind the fact that McNabb is throwing passes into the dirt and eating sack after sack because our receivers couldn't get open, and when they could, McNabb couldn't find them.

Nope, none of that taken into consideration, it was all due to rust, recovery, and receivers. One excuse after the other. When, in reality, there were never any adjustments made on the part of our offense to counteract things that defenses threw at us this year. 

There were still horrendous moments of clock mismanagement and a very predictable offensive scheme. Please remember, the Evil Eagles had us at five wins and eight losses after 13 games, the Good Eagles had to show up and FIGHT to win the last three games of this season just to get us back to...you guessed it! .500!

In all fairness, we went from 30th in penalties in 2006 to 18th in 2007, nothing to write home about, but an honest improvement (we really couldn't have done worse in this area than we did in '06). 

2008 season

8-7-1. Like the previous seasons, we started out with a BLOWOUT of St. Louis (one of the worst teams in the league) and then went on to lose three of our next four games. In the area of penalties, we slipped back to 25th (as of Week 16) and judging from how sloppy this team played against the Redskins this week, they will probably slip even further.

After making progress in 2007, we are now back to where we were in 2005, with regards to being one of the most undisciplined teams in the league. Two full years of a healthy Donovan McNabb and yet, still we have won as many games as we've lost.

Where are the excuses now?

There aren't any. We have the talent, we just don't have the leadership. So today, I watched my beloved Eagles eliminated from the playoffs by a VASTLY inferior team in the Washington Redskins (inferior fans as well).

So what do we do now? Do we trade away our first-round draft pick for the third year in a row? Or do we keep it and draft a Defensive Tackle that amounts to nothing? Announcers, and football fans that I've talked to, are "surprised" by the inconsistent play of the Eagles and of McNabb.

But as I've pointed out, there are no surprises here. In fact, there are no changes here in the mediocrity of our offense over the last four years.

As I've mentioned before, keep the statistics and points scored, none of that matters, its about wins and losses and sadly, because on any given Sunday (a very horrible movie), the Evil Eagles or the Good Eagles can show up, and the result is a demon-possessed team that has lost as many games as it has won over the last four years: 6-10, 10-6, 8-8, 8-7-1.

What is the answer?

Fire Mornhinweg and get a good offensive coordinator. The window isn't closing on the Eagles; it has shut. Begin the rebuild, and keep an eye on Andy Reid, if all he can produce is a .500 squad with the best players in the league, then maybe it will be time for a change.

Even Holmgren reached a place where he could only do so much with his teams. Reid was one of the best we ever had, but something desperate has to be done for him to maintain his respect and reputation among Eagles fans.