‘Very Opportunistic’
ITB Live From Radio Row: Louis Riddick on Philadelphia's successful offseason
Adam Caplan, Geoff Mosher, and Andrew DiCecco are joined by special guests on “Inside The Birds Live From Radio Row” for Super Bowl LVII and Philadelphia Eagles coverage.
Louis Riddick
Eagles Roster
Louis Riddick: “Philadelphia probably has the best team in the NFL. You can’t really argue that 1-53 as far as the amount of strength that they have, especially that offensive line. The pass rush, you have eight guys that they just roll them through there. And then offensively, how cool is it to be on an offense to beat you however they want to beat you?”
Offseason Acquisitions
Riddick: “They were very opportunistic. They knew the profile of the player, both in terms of his physical characteristics and maybe his own makeup that they wanted and whether that was going to fit with them. It’s one thing for it to look good and make sense when you’re sitting around in a meeting, but it’s another thing to actually implementing and make it work. That speaks to the culture of the guys that were already there.”
Ryan Leaf
Jalen Hurts
Ryan Leaf: “He’s absolutely the hardest working guy I have ever met. The dude will outwork anybody. When he was drafted by Philadelphia, I said to myself that Carson Wentz was not long for this job because he was just going to outwork him and put pressure on the coaching staff to play him. The ownership loved his work ethic and everybody in the locker room loved him. Look at him at Alabama and how he was still the most beloved player for the Crimson Tide after being benched. I love him to death, I love his mindset, he has his head on right. I don’t know if we can have two better examples for quarterbacks in the future of this league than this game.”
Final Score Prediction
Ryan Leaf: “I have the Eagles by three, 34-31. At first, I thought it was going to be more of a blowout by the Eagles, but the sooner we get to it, Mahomes is going to make it a game. It may come down to who gets the ball last.”
Jason Avant
A.J. Brown
Jason Avant: “Brown is always the primary read. Lately, in the last four to five games, he’s been under 50% completion percentage, which is bad. You can’t be the number one wide receiver catching it at 48% or 49%. Jalen Hurts and A.J. Brown have to get on the same page at some point, and this is the game that they have to. This has to happen in order for them to win this game. He has to win some of those matchups.”
Andy Reid
Avant: “Coach Reid tries to emphasize that you have to be loose. You have to be focused, but you can’t allow this to make you different. One of his biggest things that I hold dear to my heart today is fear nothing and attack everything. Andy is able to coach a lot of big personality people. The reason he is able to do that is he wants you to be yourself as long as you’re not being a distraction. Preparation wise, the Chiefs will be prepared to play this game.”
Brian Baldinger
Haason Reddick
Brian Baldinger: “[Chiefs right tackle] Andrew Wylie hasn’t seen many like Haason. Even on the sixth play of the championship game when Haason hit Brock Purdy, his closing speed is as about as close to Micah Parsons as there is in the league. He has a variety of moves. It’s going to be tough. If they leave him one-on-one, it’s not going to end well. ”
Jerick McKinnon
Baldinger: “He’s their personal protecter. On third down and passing downs, he’s in the backfield next to Mahomes. He’s an excellent pass blocker. They trust him in that. He’s a huge part of the screen game, he’ll be a part of the offense this game.”
Geoff Schwartz
Lane Johnson
Geoff Schwartz: “His consistency is obviously hugely important. He’s a huge human, his arms go down to his knees, so he uses his body. He knows if he gets in front of them, he’s so big and strong that he’s not going to be beat. Lane gets in front of the defensive lineman with that big kick and says he’s not giving you much. The consistency of his pass sets really give defensive linemen nothing to work with.”
Jason Kelce
Schwartz: “Jason will for sure get in the hall of fame…The amount of All-Pros over the year, the consistency, I think he’s surely in.”
Greg Cosell
Patrick Mahomes
Greg Cosell: “Games tend to be won and loss in the trenches, we know that. I look at this a little differently. I think particularly with Mahomes, he is the kind of QB that can potentially camouflage or compensate for some potential weaknesses on your o-line…His movement ability, both within the pocket and outside the pocket, his spatial awareness which may be better than anybody that I’ve ever seen, his ability to see where people are and see where they are going to be I think is may be better than anybody that I’ve ever seen.”
Travis Kelce
Cosell: “The Eagles play a good amount of man coverage, will they continue to do that? C.J. Gardner-Johnson is really the only player who can somewhat matchup to Kelce. So now the question is, if they do play man, is it going to be pure man with Gardner-Johnson or is there some kind of bracket element to it? Because other than Mahomes, this offense runs through Kelce. You don’t want to go into the game with the idea that Kelce’s going to catch 10 balls. There’s going to have to be a specific plan based on down and distance, field location, what personnel the Eagles have on the field, there’s going to have to be a plan for Kelce…It’s very clear that he has such a great feel for reacting to Mahomes’ movement.”
Jalen Hurts
Cosell: “The Eagles offense is about Hurts, not because he’s as good as a passer as Mahomes, he’s not. But the bottom line is the Eagles offense runs through him because of all of the different play elements that can occur with Hurts in the game…While the Eagles run game is obviously terrific, the reality is they’re a pass first team in the first half of games. They come out throwing. Here’s a stat I found out yesterday: Hurts has only thrown 22 passes in the second half this year with the Eagles behind.”
– Benjamin Paul is a staff writer for InsideTheBirds.com
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