NFL Daily with Gregg Rosenthal - Commanders-Eagles TNF Recap

Episode Date: November 15, 2024

Gregg Rosenthal is joined by Steven Ruiz of The Ringer to recap the Commanders and Eagles facing off on Thursday Night Football. The guys start off with a discussion about the formula for the 2024 Eagles (02:37), followed by a look at Jayden Daniels and the Commanders offense (10:13), the Eagles defense (15:20), Jalen Hurts and the Eagles offense (19:00), and the outlook for both the Commanders and Eagles the rest of the season (22:22).  Note: time codes approximate. NFL Daily YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/nflpodcastsSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Hey, everybody. Daniel Jeremiah here. And I'm Bucky Brooks. On Move the 6th, we take you inside the game from breaking down college prospects and NFL rookies to evaluating team building philosophies, coaching trends, and how front offices construct winning rosters. We study the tape, talk to decision makers, and give you a perspective you won't find anywhere else.

It's everything you need to understand the why behind what happens on Sunday. Don't miss it. Listen to the Move the Sticks podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hertz under center. He goes with a pitch to Barclay. Barkley. Across the 30. 25, 20, 15, 10. Goodbye. Hello. Hello. Hello. 40 yards. He's unbelievable. He is unbelievable. Saquan, Barkley. running in for a second touchdown on the night. You can hold him down for a while.

You can't hold him down for four quarters. He ends up with 146 yards on the ground with two touchdowns. The Eagles beat the commanders 26, rather, to 18 in Philadelphia. This was a 7-3 game for Washington at halftime, and the Eagles offense got rolling. That was Merrill Reese and Mike Quick on WIP. I'm in the garage, and I'm looking at. my friend, Stephen Ruiz, of the ringer from Washington, D.C. But he's not a Commanders fan,

and so he's probably not heartbroken. They lost this game, like a lot of Commanders fans are, who thought this season's going to be special. And maybe it still will be, but they're at 7 and 4. There are a couple losses now back of an Eagles team, Stephen, that just looked like a little tougher, a little more grown-up, a little more ready for mid-November football than Washington did. Now, the Eagles just look like the more talented.

team, the more solid team. Both of these teams take a unique approach to offense, especially on early downs. They have offenses that don't look like any offenses elsewhere in the NFL. But Washington's to this point has been based on, one, the talent of a rookie quarterback in Jaden Daniels, who's been brilliant, but has run into a bit of a rookie wall this last couple of weeks. And then the scheme of Cliff Kingsbury, I always think there's an expiration date on offenses where you're kind of getting by on smoking mirrors a little bit. And I think with the Eagles where it's like talent base, like we just have better guys than you We have an offensive line that's going to run you over.

We have a running back that's going to take advantage of those holes. And then we have two wide receivers that if you leave them one-on-one on the outside, we're going to do damage to the air. And I think you saw that play out on the field. I love it. You're already planting your flag that the cliff's second half collapse is coming. I love that by you, Stephen. Let's put a pit in that and get to that a little later because that is intriguing.

Jaden Daniels has struggled the last couple of weeks, so that the offense, you know, had moments against Baltimore. Tonight they really didn't. They end up with 264 yards, and that includes a garbage time touchdown drive that they had at the end. They did have a chance with an onside kick under 30 seconds to go. So, you know, it was worth trying for, but most of the night, they really struggled.

I want to give the Eagles their flowers first, because to me this was the classic Eagles game of 2024. If you haven't watched them each and every week, a lot of them have been like this. And by that, I mean, they look kind of disjointed on offense, often. Jalen Hertz sometimes, like, doesn't make the best decisions in the red zone, for instance, you saw tonight. There was a lot of unforced errors. They had a trick play, which killed the drive.

They had a holding penalty, which killed the drive. They had another drive, which had a couple of drops. Jake Elliott's missing kicks all over the place, two missed field goals in the first half, a missed extra point. But at a certain point, their offensive. talent seems to just catch up and overwhelm the opponent. And meanwhile, the defense has been money since the buy week. And now this is a better opponent they're going against. They played well against the Bengals as well, which was a good offensive opponent. And to me, they are absolutely legit. And they make you earn everything. And that combination is a winning combination,

because by the fourth quarter of this game, it just felt like the play differential. The Eagles that had about 15 to 20 more plays at halftime ended up being too much for Washington. And the second half drives for Philadelphia, they were leaning on them. Like, you could see when you had the overhead angle. They go field goal, touchdown, touchdown, touchdown, to end the game.

And Saquan with prairies of, you know, acreage to run through. And he hits it. And it's a great formula. As long as they're not turning the ball over, it's tough to be. It feels partly 20, 22, Eagles. formula. When they were struggling with the passing game, they could just go to that run

game and just hammer the same run plays over and over and over again. I remember there was a game against the Giants where I think they ran the same run play out of the same formation eight times in a row, and the Giants couldn't do anything to stop it. It feels like that. The past game isn't quite where it was a couple years ago, but we've also seen highs out of the past game, especially when Jalen Hertz has been pushing it deep outside the numbers to A.J. Brown, to DeVante Smith. I think if they can get that going more consistently, we're going to see this team reach some of the highs they reached when they made that run to the Super Bowl. Yeah, tonight, I think Washington's defense did a good job.

I look, Jalen didn't attempt to throw over 20 yards. And he only completed three over 10 yards. Everything was short. It felt like the two teams were almost in a staring contest. And my colleague, Jordan Rodriguez, the athletic, pointed this out on Twitter that this was clearly Vic Fangio's defensive plan. it kind of always is. Jaden Daniels did not throw well against split safety tonight

according to the next gen, seven of 11 for 32 yards and then the fourth quarter interception that Reed Blankenship picked off. First of all, shout out to Reed Blankenship. He's like the closer. He only catches interceptions

in the fourth quarter and he never drops him. It's kind of an underrated aspect to a defensive back, like a defensive back that never drops interception and suddenly like that ball was just rolling down downhill fast

in the fourth quarter. This was a close game the Eagles didn't even have the lead going into the fourth quarter. They take a touchdown drive that ends with the tush push with Jalen Hertz with like 12 minutes to go. And after that, it was it was all Philadelphia. But I think their defensive plan to like make Jaden Daniels really work down the field slowly and not go to his wide receivers. Washington felt comfortable playing that way. But like they need bigger plays than what they got tonight.

Yeah. And even during their fast start to the season, they weren't getting a lot of like downfield explosive play. plays. A lot of their explosive plays were coming on like yards after catch or Jaden Daniels getting outside the pocket and scrambling for a first down. But like we remember the big throws downfield, especially against Cincinnati, the two throws on Monday night. And then he had some other like Jaden Daniels, I mean, had some other like marquee deep throws. I think he had one against the Ravens. I think he had one against the Steelers down the sideline. But outside of that, there's not a lot of passes going downfield, especially like over the middle of the field. And you saw the Eagles kind of take away those early. early down efficient plays and force them into a dropback game on third down. And this was one of their worst games on third down. I think they were one for nine at one point. I know they might have improved the stats on that garbage time drive. I guess it wasn't garbage time because they cut it to one possession.

But really before that drive, they weren't really moving the ball on third down at all. And that had been such a strength for them. They had such great third down numbers, such great fourth down numbers. We see a fourth down stop on a concept that they, I know some people criticize the play call there. But that's a call they've been using a lot on fourth down and having a lot of success with it. It hasn't been stopped having Jane Daniels do a little play action fake and then roll outside the pocket and either run for it or pass for it. And no team has been able to stop it. But I think it speaks to how much heavy lifting the scheme was doing early on.

And now that teams kind of have all this film and know how they're going to approach games, I think we're going to see them have. They're going to have to come up with plan Bs and playing Cs going forward. I'm glad you brought up that sequence. So after the Eagles touchdown, the score is 12 to 10 because Elliott missed the extra point. And Washington is driving. They actually have a second and one. They're playing fast. They're playing tempo, which is where they've been at their best all season.

It was the first drive of the night where Jaden Daniels just ripped a couple confident throws. He had one to McLaurin, who only had one catch tonight. And that led all wide receivers. Zakias had one, Noah Brown had one, Diami Brown had one, and they totaled just doing some quick math here for 28 yards. That's absolutely outrageous. Their wide receivers got absolutely nothing done.

So it's second and one. Their in-field goal range, and Jalen Carter, to me, makes the play of the night. I was watching on the prime vision view from the overhead camera, which is just awesome. And the way he shed the tackler there and penetrated,

I don't think many defensive tackles, if any, are going to make that play. And so he forces a third and two. They stuff that. It was kind of slow developing. That was a nice play too. That brings up the fourth down that you mentioned. Let's actually take a listen to that.

And then we'll talk about the decision after that. Instead of trying for a game-changing field goal that would give them a one-point lead, they're going to go on fourth and two. Daniels, under his center. Daniels is back. He's being chased. He's running. He's being pushed.

He's knocked out of bounds. The Eagles take over on downs. The Eagles take over on downs. That was a great call there, again, by Mero Reese. And Jalen Carter busted up that play, too, at the beginning. I know they fumbled the snap a little, but that is an incredible sequence. This guy had three quick pressures tonight,

according to next-gen stats. Like, he is having that second-year leap. I don't even know if his raw numbers are that crazy. I honestly don't know. But just by the eye test and the film and everything, he's having that second year leap, like he might be an all pro right now. And that sequence with the fourth downstop, too, which they make a good play on the edge, he started that play.

Yeah, it kind of reminds me of watching like a young Aaron Donald where you didn't even need to see the numbers. You just, you saw 99 just blowing up every play. Every time you watch on like game pass, the condensed version, you'd see 99 breaking into the backfield. And that's kind of how it feels with 98 on the Eagles right now. And there were times when like Washington had a good play call on. Like they had the numbers in the run.

box. They had the blockers there. And then an Eagles defensive lineman, usually Carter would just blow up the play. And that's the difference between these two teams right now. One is a finished product or as close to a finished product as you can get with them kind of like bouncing back after the last year. And then you have Washington, a team that's still trying to learn how to build around this young quarterback who has given them a spark, but I don't know if they're ready for games like this at this point in the season yet. You know what's interesting? I was not expecting to come into tonight and hear some Jaden skepticism from Stephen Ruiz. Where's he at in your QB rankings?

But it kind of makes sense, and I don't disagree with anything you're saying. I do think he was erratic last week, which was like a little concerning. You know, he missed more throws than you would expect it, but there were the big plays. And he's really avoided big mistakes, which I think is really to his credit. And that was true in this game, too. And is impressive for a rookie. But am I fair to pick up on a little bit of Jaden Dan? Daniel's rookie season skepticism.

And where is he in the rankings? Just tell me that too. He's like, I think he's like 18, 17th now. I like to slow play it with the rookies. I don't like to give them too much too soon. Your ranking, to be clear, is kind of like an all-encompassing, like, how good are they at the NFL level. So that's fair.

Guys with seven years of experience is tough to top that. But most of my skepticism has to do with Cliff Kingsbury and the offense. Like, I think like every rookie I'm going to be skeptical that they're going to be able to carry over a hot start to the rookie season to the second half, especially when the schedule gets tougher. But I think Jaden Daniels skills, I don't question those, like the skills that have allowed this offense to operate, like it's operating. And that's like precise accuracy, especially underneath 20 yards, and then his ability to run. Now, we have seen him kind of lose that. I don't know if it's the injury. I don't know if he's hesitant to take some hits now after the

rib injury. But he's not making guys miss in the open field as much as he did early on. I mean, we'll see how that goes going forward after he gets healthy. But that would be my one concern with with like him individually, but I think the more that teams are able to like sit on some of these concepts that Washington has had a lot of success with and they start to figure out how they're using the no huddle in the second half. I think it's just going to get a little bit harder. I don't think like they're going to go away. I don't think this offense is a complete fluke. And I think Jaden Daniels is going to end up winning rookie of the year and we're still going to feel good about him at the end of the year. I just don't think it's going to be that,

oh, he's a top five quarterback based on production and maybe even an MVP candidate by the end of it. Yes, I was saying two weeks ago, I thought he was an MVP candidate just because the offense is based around him and he transformed a team that just wasn't there and it was hard to argue with the efficiency. I think it's just the schedule. You played two of the better defenses right now in the league. I'm comfortable putting Philadelphia there as a top eight defense, whatever the number is. Certainly Pittsburgh is there too. And so you play some better defenses and they won more than they lost. They weren't disasters on offense this last two weeks. They didn't make huge critical mistakes. They put up some points against Pittsburgh, but it was a lot

of failed drives. Let's talk about the fourth down decision, because as you heard on that call, Merrill Reese is a little surprise. They could have attempted a kick there with their backup kicker, Zane Gonzalez, to take a 13 to 12 lead. What do you think about the decision by Dan Quinn there? I mean, I think it's fine. I know it was a low scoring game and you want all the points you can get, but the Eagles were moving the ball even in the first half. Like they missed the field goals. Jake Elliott misses two field goals. They missed the extra point.

So I think the score was being suppressed a little bit and it wasn't actually indicative of how the Eagles were moving the ball. And then Washington has been money on fourth down all year long. They've been going forward on fourth and short all year long to stop doing that to go against your identity in the biggest

game of the season. I think that sends the wrong message to your locker room. And it says if Dan Quinn does that and I was in that lacquerade go, oh, he was scared of the moment. Like, he does it against the bucks. He's not going to do it against the Eagles in prime time. I would question him after that. Yes, I love that.

I agree with all that. And I give, maybe I'm giving Dan Quinn too much credit. What I hate about coaches sometimes is when they don't feel like they have a flow of the game or they know where their strengths are. They know where their weaknesses are in a certain game or in a season in general. Sean McVeigh is like that sometimes with his fourth down decisions. And the way this game was going, I think Dan Quinn knew the burst was about to break with his defense. He had just given up a drive where they

got absolutely gashed. The play disparity, as I was saying, was pretty massive. And a field goal was not going to win this game. I think he felt the way that game was going. They needed to stay on the field longer. They needed to try to get seven if they can. And if they can't pick up one yard over a three-play sequence, it's like, bully to you. You're better than us today. Like, we need to be able to prove that we can do this because everyone honking about not going for that field goal, oh, would it change the momentum of the game? It's like Philadelphia was going to keep scoring. They probably were going to score a touchdown or two more, which they did. Not that Dan Quinn is thinking we're about to give up like two massive big gains, but I think he knew they

probably needed a touchdown to possibly win this game. And they didn't get it. And you got to give him credit, Zach Bonn on that play on the outside, Reed Blankenship on the outside. Their defense has really been special. No one is older than 27 years old on their starting defense, which is just crazy. They had wanted Vic Fangio in Philadelphia for a few years, and they got him, and I just was wondering if it was going to work, because Fangio's defenses over the last handful of years haven't been amazing, and the first month of the season, they're figuring out, and now you see how great Quinnian Mitchell has been. He was against Terry McLaurin tonight, and Cooper DeGine comes in, you're getting much better play out in Nikobi Dean and Nolan Smith has a big sack

tonight. Josh Sweat, you know, is doing his normal thing. It's like, this is a pretty good defense and that Fangio hire like looks like one of the better coaching hires of the offseason. Yeah, this is a big bounce back year for Vic Fangio and really the Vic Fangio tree, which had been like so in vogue a couple years ago and then fell out of favor. And then Vic Vanjo was, I think Jalen Ramsey criticized him in Miami last year. I think because they weren't playing enough man coverage. And then he goes to Philadelphia and he gets man corners and they're playing man coverage. They're majoring in man coverage.

And I think that was a big reason why they matched up so well with Washington today. And really, if you could play man coverage, you can match up with any offense. The man coverage is like the catch-all solution to any offensive or any problem an offense can present. So I don't think that's going away. I think these corners are legit. And I think that's the big difference between last year and this year. You have more synergy between the pass rush, the defensive line, which is playing. better, granted. But you're also getting better coverage on the back end. So those guys have a little

bit more time to get after the passer. And we're seeing the fruits of that. Yeah. And it's crazy. They really didn't one off season. They were smart to keep Slay. I never thought they were going to get rid of him anyways. But he's having a good year. Chaunty Gardner Johnson hasn't really worked out. He's probably the one guy they're not thrilled with in the back end, although he had a decent game tonight. But then the two rookies, what do you think of Reed Blankenship and Cooper DeGine showing up to the stadium tonight wearing exciting whites t-shirt. I think that's officially the nickname,

Exciting Whites. I mean, that's a good sign. The vibes are good. The vibes haven't been this good in Philadelphia since the 2020 season or maybe even the 2017 season when they're wearing the underdog masks in the playoffs.

But yeah, they are exciting whites. Like Cooper DeGine. I mean, I guess a lot of people like want to call him a gimmick because he's a white quarterback, but he can play. He's a good player. And Quinn and Mitchell is,

the type of player who can transform a secondary and allows you to do different stuff on the back end. Like, I think if they're not getting the years, they're getting out of Cooper Dijin and out of Quinn and Mitchell, this defense looks a lot different. Like how Vic Vanje was calling the defense looks a lot different. And I think this game tonight would have looked a lot different. Yeah. And Zach Bond with a couple of nice plays earlier, a past deflection. He's been awesome. And Nacobi Dean's been rock solid.

I had someone in Philadelphia was interesting because Quinnian Mitchell was playing slot corner in training camp. And actually the beat reporters were, like, wondering, hey, what's going on here? Like, is this going well? They seemed uncertain. And someone, you know, within the organization told me, like, very early on, they're, like, they were so excited about Quinn Imich. And they're like, oh, man, we got this one right. Like, this is, like, try to keep a lid on it, but just feeling internally like, man, this guy is going to be really good.

And I was like, oh, that's interesting. That's different than what we've heard. and the confidence has been absolutely borne out. And, yeah, like, maybe Hertz can be a little skittish here and there, and maybe it doesn't matter if it's a run-first offense. It really is kind of a run-first offense. They were so patient. He was 15 for 56 in the first half of this game, Saquan.

Like, they weren't getting a lot of push. Like, they're getting three, four yards. They weren't unsuccessful runs, but they weren't busted it open. But they stayed patient. And then late in the game, Beckton's making blocks. Myelada's out there. The Juergens had one crazy block where he just lifted a guy in the air, like Goddard is pumping his fist after one of his seal blocks, I think, on a Sequin play.

It's just, it's all kind of cohesive and it looks cool. Yeah, it feels like the opposite of last year. That's what it feels like. And yeah, there are concerns about Hertz. I've been a little, I've been skeptical of Jalen Hertz in the past couple years. And you can have your criticism about him holding onto the ball in the pocket. And I think he did that a couple times tonight. He missed some open receivers.

But I think all of those criticisms were true in 2022. And that didn't stop them from rolling over the NFC. Like he wasn't that great in the pocket that year. Just didn't matter. And I think they have the same ecosystem once. Yeah, but that Super Bowl, man. That Super Bowl was beautiful. Yeah.

If you get him to the Super Bowl, he's capable of producing a performance like that. You could beat anybody. You can almost beat Patrick Mahomes. But Patrick Mahomes was just perfect on that night. Right. Yeah, I mean, I'm not going to say they're, going to win the NFC, but I would not be surprised if they're in the NFC championship. And if you would have asked me about this team ceiling a month ago, I would not have said that.

And I think one of the big difference is the receivers are back. And that stretch without those receivers kind of poisoned our perception of them, I think. I think it made me a little bit too low on them and what they could be. And now that I've seen that receiving core back and what Sequon can do with them around and with that offensive line, how it's rolling. Like, yeah, this offense could be like a top five unit at its best. Yeah, and they're cross your fingers, like, quite healthy right now. They get my lot of back, and Goddard is a very important player for them.

So, yeah, when they're missing Goddard and Brown at the same time, and they're undefeated with AJ Brown, especially if you watch those first games that Brown was back. Like, he just was the whole passing game. I mean, they just spam him on a slant whenever they need it or a go ball, and Jalen throws those well, and AJ Brown's that good. I mean, tonight it doesn't pop off the screen. He's five for 65, but I would just say in terms of valid. to his team, he is as valuable as any wide receiver in the league.

I'm not going to say he's ahead of Jefferson or Chase, but I think it's right there. Like, I think he's as valuable to the Eagles as any wide receiver is to their team. And, like, you've heard the criticism about this offensive scheme. It's been, like, one of the most criticized schemes over the last two years, whereas, like, Justin Jefferson is getting a lot of scheme help in Kevin O'Connell. Whereas the Eagles, like, scheme is just, like, AJ Brown running a straight line, Adrian Brown take two steps in a slant. And like you said, it's open every time.

Like, it's easy money. I know they missed on a couple throws today, but that's the exception to the rule. Usually that go ball outside the numbers has been money for them. And especially against this opponent. So I am kind of impressed with what Washington did, especially in the secondary in this game, because they've had trouble defending this offense when it's rolling, especially those two guys on the outside. The last couple of years, those guys have went wild on their secondary. It didn't happen tonight.

Take a quick break, and we'll be back in just a second. Hey, this is Matt Jones. Now I'm Drew Franklin. And this is NFL cover zero. We're just here to try to give you an NFL perspective a little bit different. Did you see the Colts pretzel? That was my other big takeaway from that game. What was that?

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Daniel Jeremiah here. And I'm Bucky Brooks. On Move the Sticks, we take you inside the game from Scouting Reports and player developers. To team building philosophies, coaching trends in how front offices construct winning rosters. Every week, we study the tape, talk to decision makers, and share the insights you won't find anywhere else. It's the kind of conversation that connects the dots, from college football prospects to the NFL stars of tomorrow. We break down the draft, analyze matchups, and evaluate how teams put it all together on game day. Plus, we dig in the coaching strategies, roster construction, and the trends that shape the league year after year.

Whether you're a die-hard fan or just love understanding the game on a deeper level, we give you the full picture. If you want insight that goes beyond the box score, this podcast is for you. Don't miss it. Listen to the Move the Six podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. So your family are Commander's fans? Yes. Okay. First of all, how is that?

You grew up in a Washington household, and then you become a Panthers fan, and then how has it been this transition to Commanderland with Jane Daniels for them and everything? Yeah, they're excited. My mom texted me on a Sunday, and she texted it. It was like a month ago, and she just texted me the number 23 with a question mark,

and I had no idea what it meant. I was like, what does that mean? And that's what I had Jane and Daniels ranked at the time, And she was questioning my rank. She was texting me on a Sunday to yell at me about my rankings. And then two weeks ago, I think, no, no, it was right before the, it was right before the bear's Hail Mary. She calls me and she's just like talking about the commanders to me.

I'm like, mom, I'm writing. I have to podcast. Like, this is my busiest day of the week. Why are you calling me right now? And then I hung up the phone. And then literally like five seconds later, Jaden Daniels throws that touchdown for the win. That is incredible. And yeah, I want to speak to the commanders.

fans out there because, man, they're a group that's hungry. They have so many fans and they're out here in Los Angeles too and I know a couple of them. And I think they're like heartbroken and they're like, they're like mad. I think they're going to be mad after this game that they did not look quite in the same class of Philadelphia. And I'm just thinking like, enjoy this journey here. Because here's what's going to happen. You're seven and four. Let's look a little big picture. They're going to make the playoffs. Their next two games. They're next two games. games are against Dallas and against Tennessee. Then they have a buy.

I think they're going to win those games. They've really shown they're able to beat bad teams, and those are really bad teams right now. So they can be nine and four. They can head into the buy. They have two games left all season against teams with winning records. One of them is the Falcons. That's a very winnable game. One of the worst probably teams with a winning record in the league.

Like certainly that's a coin flip game at one. worse. And the other game is the week before it, and that's home for Philadelphia in week 16. I posit that home game against Philadelphia in week 16, which, you know, Philadelphia showed tonight. They're probably a better team. But I think Washington could beat them in a given day. I still think that'll be for the division lead at that point, because the Eagles are eight and two. They have to play another game. They have another buy. They're at the Rams. That's tricky. At Baltimore, they have the Panthers, so that's a layup. Then they're home for Pittsburgh. That's all before that commanders rematch. Those are three tough games in there. I think the commanders

are going to hang in this thing. The Eagles will probably have three losses, like at best, going into that game. And you'll have a chance to get a spot for first place in freaking week 16 a year after what everything that happened last year. And like, worst case scenario, you lose that game to Philly, you don't win the division, you finish the season with the Falcons and the Cowboys, you're probably getting to 10 or 11 wins and you're probably going to the playoffs. So, like, it's house money. And I also think, like, you're going to be playing big time games like the week of Christmas this year. So this loss does not feel like overly devastating to me. Philadelphia, to me, had to kind of get this game in hand, considering the schedule that's

coming up. Yeah. And even when, like, this team has made the playoffs, which hasn't happened much in the last two decades but every time they've kind of had a rally at the end of the year to make it like even in 2012 with RG3 I think they were like three and five at at one point maybe even a worse record than that and they really had to win down the stretch Kirk cousins had to come in and win a couple a game or two to just get them into the wild card 2005 I think that's when Sean Taylor was killed and they had a rally then with Joe Gibbs when Tyler Henneke when they played the bucks in the in the playoffs a couple years ago like they weren't they didn't look like a playoff team until like the last week of the year and I think they won with some like ungodly

record. This year they're actually like winning wire to wire and this feels like a race that you can pay attention to every week. Like I'm with you. I think no matter how this ends, you should be happy because this is the first time you've been able to follow a team like this for, I don't know, maybe before the turn of the century. Right. So the only game I didn't mention by the way on the schedule was a game against the Saints. So I mean, you got two games against the Cowboys, the Saints and the Titans. If you just can win those games, you're at 11 wins. right there without even beating another good team. And, yeah, that 2005 team, I sneaky enjoyed that team.

That was like the Mark Brunel team, right? And then did we have a Chris Sims appearance at one point? They beat Chris Sims in the wild card round, I believe. And then they lost to Seattle, and then Seattle beat Carolina. I was really rooting for Washington to win that game because I knew Carolina was going to get washed by Seattle and in Seattle. And that's exactly what happened. Yeah.

So big winners tonight. Eagles fans, they can enjoy beating Josh Harris, the commander's owner, at a time where they are not happy with their 76ers. And just before we go, I just have to give a shout out to Joe Shane because, like, whatever he thought, the Giants GM, I should preface, you know, that famously in Hard Knocks saying that, like, we didn't give our quarterback $40 million to handoff to a $12 million running back, whatever he thought could have been the worst possible, worst case scenario, and whatever was in John Mara, the owner's mind when he, you know, was saying he hopes that it wouldn't go to Philly.

Whatever the worst case scenario is, this is so much worse. It's so much worse. Like, plenty of GMs have let players walk and have lived to regret it, but none of them, literally none of them, have had HBO come in and document the mistake in their building. Right, but have, how many, though, have let go the franchise's best player at the time in his prime and he goes to a division rival who's much better and he has like an offensive player of the year type of season like I don't know how many times that's happened my rule in the NFL is always like teams never let players that

they want to keep go like it's pretty easy to like if a player leaves in the middle of their prime it's usually because, like, they kind of wanted him to leave, which was true here. They did want Sequin Barclay to leave. It just was, it just could not have worked out any worse or better for the Eagles. And for us, because if he was in New York, like, this wouldn't be happening. So I might be talking from the biased viewpoint of a Sequin Barclay fantasy owner that's like always mad when he goes down at the one, but it always works down, it works out in the end. Where are you at an offensive player of the year?

Are you someone that says no quarterback can win offensive player of the year? It's only going to a non-quarterback. Now, yes. I just used to refuse to acknowledge it. I hated it because quarterbacks kept getting it, and I just thought it was stupid. It was the dumbest protest in the history of protests was NFL.com's editors would send us to fill out all the awards,

and I just would skip offensive players. No one else knew other than them that I was protested. I was just so stupid. But now non-quarterback should get awards. So they should have a non-quarterback award. And then they should have an offensive lineman award, too. So yes. So I would say yes.

So you would think right now, who would it be? It would be Sequin. It would be Derek Henry. It would be Chase maybe, you know, that I guess in the mix. I would give it to Sequin. Like what I would really do is give it to Lamar. I know you hate giving it to quarterback. but, like, I feel like he has at least like a dual threat impact on that offense.

Like, he is the focal point of the run game and the passing game. So he wins both. Yeah, but if you're not going to give it to Lamar, I would give it to Seaquin over Derek Henry. And my reasoning is simple. I'm not voting an offensive player of the year who's not the best player on his own offense. And I think Seq. Barclay has been far in a way the best player on his offense. And that's only really because A.J. Brown has been hurt. I think if AJ Brown's in there, you can make a debate about that.

but Saquan has just been like everything for this team. And when they've gone bad on offense, they've just been like, let's press the Saquan button over and over and over again. And eventually something good's going to happen. And it has. It has literally every time they've won. It's been Saquan having a great game.

Right. I'm looking at the numbers. He was at 1150 yards from scrimmage before this game and then adds, what, almost 200 tonight? Like he's maybe over six yards per carry still on the season, which is crazy. They need to work, you know, be a little careful. with his usage he is he is on pace for like a monster workload but I like that I don't like the

Lamar thing just because I never really understood some of the years when the quarterback the same quarterback would win offensive player of the year and MVP it like it didn't really have any rhyme or reason it wasn't like super duper years they get both it was more just like there wasn't good candidates or votes got split it just if the awards that vague I don't like it and yes I think if offensive lineman can't possibly win any awards then we we should come up with an award for an offensive lineman. That's a good call. I'm with that.

The Brian Baldwin Award. Stephen Ruiz, you can check him out at the Ringer. The Ringer football show. He has a cat. What's his or her name? Her name is Rhonda. Shout out to Rhonda. Shout out to your mom.

Did she send you any text tonight? I'm actually kind of concerned she didn't text me tonight. I'll call her tomorrow morning. It was a late night, and, yeah, it was a long week here. This is one of those weeks. How did I actually went to a concert? I'm feeling it at my age. So I am glad we are done with Thursday night football.

The PICS show that we do every week will be on Friday afternoon. Me and Cynthia Freeland, I'm on a heater there, six straight wins on that. So check that out Friday afternoon. Until then, for Stephen Ruiz. Yeah, when Saquan Barkley is just. Making that crowd at the link go crazy. You know football is back. See you, friend.

Hey, everybody. Daniel Jeremiah here. And I'm Bucky Brooks. On Move to Six, we take you inside the game from breaking down college prospects and NFL rookies to evaluating team-building philosophies, coaching trends, and how front offices construct winning rosters.

We study the tape, talk to decision-makers, and give you a perspective you won't find anywhere else. It's everything you need to understand the why behind what happens on Sunday. Don't miss it. Listen to the Move the Sticks podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is an IHeart podcast.