The Chip Wagon

A Debut to Remember

Well that was fun, huh? I must admit, I didn't think Carson Wentz's debut was going to be as bad as many of the national media were suggesting, but I wasn't expecting anything like that. Carson Wentz had a terrific debut on Sunday showing amazing poise and confidence throughout the day and making numerous WOW throws along with some fascinating changes at the line of scrimmage. Much will be dissected of the all the things Wentz did great on Sunday along with areas of improvement but what I was really fascinated to see was how Doug Pederson would structure and scheme the offense around him. What was very encouraging on Sunday was that this was not a basic attack. I don't think Pederson really held back too much of the playbook from Wentz and as we saw particularly in the second half, Pederson was happy to let Wentz push the ball down the field. 

However, the major theme I pulled out of this game after re-watching is how much Doug Pederson and Frank Reich utilized familiar spread concepts to help Wentz settle into his first career start. The gameplan implemented simple concepts and RPOs to maximize a number of Wentz's first read opportunities. We know that the one area where Wentz will require some development is going through progressions. The coaching staff did a fantastic job with quick step drops and packaged plays to ensure that more often than not, Wentz's first read was open  Let's have a look. 

Execution and the 3-Headed Monster

Sorry for the lack of posting the last 2 weeks. Hectic few weeks at work that kept me from posting anything. After 4 very tough weeks where the Eagles struggled to find a rhythm and get the running game going Sunday against the Saints was a breath of fresh air. Even though the Eagles appeared to run the ball better against the Jets and Redskins, I thought those games were a bit of a false positive for the offensive line. In those games, the Eagles running backs, especially Sproles and Mathews, made defenders miss in the backfield. The Saints game was a different story. People were getting sick of the word "execution" but it really was the difference on Sunday along with some familiar wrinkles from Chip Kelly who I felt brought his best gameplan of the year. Let's dive in. 

The Eagles Ground Game: From Hot Mess to Work in Progress

Needless to say, the Eagles really needed to get the ground game working if we were to expect to see any improvements on the offensive side of the ball. Fortunately, we saw that on Sunday against a tough New York Jets front. Fran Duffy over at Philadelphiaeagles.com did a great job outlining how the Eagles game-planned against that Jets defensive front with a heavy dose of outside running to avoid the interior of the Jets DL. Certainly, after reviewing the All-22 we saw some major improvements in the execution of the run game, but Chip also did an excellent job of moving away from the inside zone and sweep play and introduced a bit more diversity in the run game. In this post, we'll talk a little bit about how Chip mixed up formations and used a heavy dose of outside zone to attack the Jets with some decent success. That said, the Eagles only averaged 3.2 yards per carry on Sunday, and even against a strong Jets front, that is a number that needs to improve moving forward. As you'll see in this post, this group is still a work in progress who now faces another challenge in dealing with Andrew Gardner's season-ending injury. 

The Eagles Run Game is a Hot Mess

Another week, another unexpected disappointment from the Eagles offense. I did not expect that. It was certainly one of the poorest offensive performances I've seen from an Eagles offense in a long, long time. Very little encouragement to take out of this one. 

We all know Chip Kelly's Eagles as a run-first team. That's the way it's been since he's been here. So it shouldn't be surprising that when the Eagles can't get the running game going, it bogs the whole offense down. As I suggested on the weekend, I expected Chip to mix things up in the running game a bit more, but unfortunately, we did not see that on Sunday. Once again, it was a ground game based mostly on inside zone and sweep. He did run a bit more from under center this week presumably to try disguise the direction of the run play. It didn't work against the Cowboys but it was mostly because of poor run blocking up front. Now this doesn't excuse the play of Sam Bradford and the WRs, more on that later, but for now the Eagles have a ton of issues along the offensive line with the run game and they must get it sorted out. I wish I could just lay the blame on the two biggest question marks of the offseason like I did last week, but Andrew Gardner and Allen Barbre were hardly the biggest culprits on Sunday. I'm afraid this game is going to look even uglier when the All-22 comes out, but a number of blocking issues could be seen miles away on the TV feed. 

Odds and Ends from Preseason Weeks 1 & 2

Sorry I haven't been posting much through the first few weeks of preseason. I am in the middle of changing jobs and things have been pretty hectic. I'd been working on this post bit by bit over the last few weeks but didn't get around to posting it so it's basically a hodgepodge of thoughts through 2 games. Many of these plays have already been covered elsewhere (if you somehow haven't seen Fran Duffy's piece on PE.com yet, check it out here).