Behind the Collapse

An embarrassing end of season collapse turned the Philadelphia Eagles from Super Bowl contenders to a first round playoff exit.

On the latest episode of “Inside The Birds,” Adam Caplan and Geoff Mosher looked into what was behind the team’s 1-6 finish to the 2023 season and the biggest issues facing the organization heading into the offseason. 

GETTY IMAGES: Replacing Sean Desai with Matt Patricia at defensive play calling sent the Eagles into a downward spiral.

Secondary

Geoff Mosher: “The biggest issue is the overall lack of athleticism, dynamic play, speed, quickness. Even when they don’t mess up as far as running into each other or blowing a coverage, they don’t close cushions very fast, pursue fast, don’t tackle well. They are always out-athleted by the other set of wide receivers/tight ends or running backs that burst into the second level.”

Adam Caplan: “The scheme was so bad. This was the way someone explained it to me: when they made the decision to give (Matt) Patricia the playcalling, we saw he crowbarred a lot of his Belichick concepts, you can’t do that. The crap that he ran, it looked like a high school defense.”

Matt Patricia

Mosher: “The move from (Sean) Desai to Patricia was not only a bad move but a catalyst to them losing their complete identity. They weren’t going to win a Super Bowl with Desai, but they stopped being competitive. I don’t think they would have completely fell off the face of the Earth the way they did had they not made that switch.”

Nick Sirianni

Caplan: “If you are a fan that thinks Sirianni deserves to get fired, you can start talking about it for that Cardinals game. You can’t lose to the least talented team to the National Football League. And then the stupidity of not taking the Giants game seriously, having a lot of starters start. Either you are benching guys or you are playing everybody. That was a bad tactical error by Sirianni. He is culpable here.”

Cam Jurgens

Caplan: “(Jason) Kelce got them out of so many bad plays. We talked to a player about a year ago that said with Jurgens, he is going to have to learn because he is new at offensive line. This is a learning experience and this why having (Jeff) Stoutland, a great offensive line coach, is so important.”

Free Agency

Mosher: “It will be interesting what they decide to do with (Fletcher) Cox and (Brandon) Graham because of their legacies here but they are not central to what they need to do defensively. I have no problem bringing them back, but as big of names they are, they are not pivotal at this moment as much as it is figuring out what you are doing on the backend from linebacker to corner to safety and how to reshape this offense to get better for next year.”

Caplan: “Fletch was a vocal leader this season and you would love to have him back, but the young guys have to step up.”

– Benjamin Paul is a staff writer for InsideTheBirds.com.