‘It Was Ugly’

The Philadelphia Eagles enter the bye week at an NFL-best 8-1 despite some tough battles and close calls, most recently in a 28-23 win over the NFC East rival Dallas Cowboys.

On the latest episode of “Q&A” on “Inside The Birds,” former Eagles standouts Jason Avant and Quintin Mikell discussed the team’s win over Dallas and identified areas that need improvement.

The Philadelphia Eagles secondary struggled to contain CeeDee Lamb

Slot Defenders

Quintin Mikell: “It was ugly. CeeDee Lamb put on a clinic against our inside backers, safeties, and nickels, it didn’t matter who was lined up on him…Eli Ricks yep, Nic Morrow yep, Kevin Byard yep, James Bradberry yep, everybody took a turn. That is a huge low point in the defense and Dallas attacked across the board.”

Jason Avant: “I’m watching CeeDee Lamb, he is running routes on air and he is running lines. Not many times did he give a great move, but just deep crosses and slants, basic things…All of his routes were basic: run up the field, make a left or make a right. There was not much resistance when it came to stopping or impeding process. I saw a few dudes backpedaling, the backpedaling didn’t even look right. This is bad right now.”

Sean Desai

Mikell: “In certain situations, he does a phenomenal job making adjustments, but this week he got outcoached a little bit in those key situations.”

Avant: “As a coach, I am not going to fault you for playing with lesser personnel, but I can fault you for what you think their ability is. You are calling like they are elite…there were times where Desai called a perfect defense and it still didn’t work.”

Dallas Goedert

Avant: “I don’t think that we drop off anything, it is actually easier to run the football. One of the problems we have with running the football is that we can’t satisfy everybody. When we run the football, DeVonta Smith doesn’t get his catches and A.J. Brown may get frustrated, Goedert may get frustrated, so we tend to pass towards our money. Now we don’t have to worry about feeding Goedert, so now we have to feed A.J. Brown, DeVonta Smith, and the third person should be the run game.”

Jalen Hurts

Avant: “He did what he needed to do to in order win the ball game, had some great throws. That throw to DeVonta Smith, you can’t throw a better ball than that. There are a couple of throws he could have had back, but as far as him toughing it out through injuries and getting hit directly on the knee, that next drive they put him on a read option in order to get the first down. That’s grit, that’s toughness. To see that is a positive sign going forward. He didn’t turn the football over.”

Run Game

Avant: “They are not giving the running backs enough touches in the first half of the game. The numbers don’t lie, Cam Jurgens being in there is a direct correlation. Once he went out, the run game got bad. Once Jalen got hurt, the running game got bad. Jurgens being back in there is going to help us.”

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