PHLY Philadelphia Eagles Podcast - Fran Duffy’s Philadelphia Eagles review: Tanner McKee’s MVP case

Episode Date: December 31, 2024

Time to review the Eagles’ domination of the Cowboys, which includes great blocking fit Saquon Barkley, Kenny Pickett stepping up, Grant Calcaterra making plays and Tanner McKee dropping dimes. On defense, Jalen Carter’s smarts stood out again while C.J. Gardner-Johnson flew around.Join Fran Duffy, Zach Berman and Bo Wulf for the last PHLY Eagles show of the year! Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

To the PHY Eagles podcast on a Tuesday afternoon, a New Year's Eve edition of the PHLY Eagles podcast presented by Bet365. Download the Bet365 app and use code PHLY365 when you sign up, whatever the moment. It's never ordinary. At Bet365, if you're looking at the screen left to right, you got Bowulf. You got Fran Duffy. You got Zach Berman, all here to talk about the Eagles. How's everybody doing? Ready to ring in the new year.

I'm doing well. Okay. Sorry. Well, when you do the remote, I got a call on you guys. I got you. No problem. That's bad hosting. Fran, go ahead.

Is he frozen? Of course, my connection's already breaking up. So we're off for a roaring start here on the show. Beautiful. Zach, how are you? I'm doing great. I'm excited for the show, eager to hear Fran's thoughts. It's New Year's Eve.

We got Penn State, Boise State tonight. We got college football throughout the day. We got multiple games coming up in the next few days. big games and then you got the eagles in the news a guy story i'm working on got a lot a lot of fun stuff going on so uh this is this is the most wonderful time of the year and we know that tonight is a big night in the burman household long time sickos will know that tonight is the night that round about 1159 a few seconds after that zach is going to wake up his poor wife poker say hey hey let's make this the best year yet we've already discussed new year's resolutions

we've already discussed highlights from 2024 and yeah I have been saying let's make this the best year yet that's that's that needs to be the objective and the question is how did you do in 2024 was this the best year yet uh 2024 was not the best year yet but it was um yeah I think there was some good, some learning experiences. And yeah, it was a good year, but I'm excited for what's ahead. So what's the bar? What's the bar to clear? What was the best year yet?

I want to hear about the film. The best year, yeah, the best year against the next one. The best year against the next one. Oh, come on. You got to, one can never forget the creative heater of 2022. No, 2020. Yeah, 2019 was the creative. 2019.

2019 was a creative heater. Um, 2020, 22 was strong, though. 22, 22, was the great defeater. Interesting. All right.

So, Fran, what are your plans this evening? Uh, we're gonna, we're gonna hang out at home. Meg is starting a, uh,

she's doing a, um, like a brazed short rib and like a red wine. Like, Demigli, she's, uh, she's starting here a little bit.

So, uh, so it's gonna be a, low and slow for a few hours. That's, that's, that's gonna be a good dinner. Uh,

we'll watch, watch some movies. We'll play some games. Our tradition, like when we were growing up, was we would always play like board games and stuff up until midnight. And so we're going to try and carry that through. We'll have Penn State, Boise State on, obviously. And yeah, it'll be fun.

Is Francis going to make it to midnight? We've talked about it. We'll see. We'll see if he's going to make it. Wow. That's the plan, though. Okay. Good for him.

All right. Wait, we should talk about Bo here for a second. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Bo is having a Costanza evening, a Castanza family evening. How so? You don't remember Mrs. Cassanza saying,

what have we going to do with all this paella? You were making paella. Yes, I'm going to make some paella tonight for the family. Yes. That's our plan. I wouldn't call it a Castanza evening, but... When you think of paella, do you think of Mrs. Costanza saying, what are we going to do with all this paella?

Clearly, I do not. Okay, well, I think of that. I thought there were going to be, like, feats of strength or something involved. Yeah. That's Mr. Costanza. That's Frank Costanza, yes. Oh, okay. Spoken like a true Michael Scott.

No, not at all. Let's keep wrong. All right. Let's get to the Eagles. Before we get to the film from the game, Fran, and I don't think we need to dissect this bad boy quite as deeply as we might other games. But let's get to the news first, Zach. What is going on in Eagles world?

What can you tell us? C.J. Garner Johnson won NFC. the player of the week. It's the first time in his career that he's won such an award. The previous Eagle Safeties to win it are, let's see, Brian Dawkins three times, Malcolm Jenkins twice, Kurt Coleman, and Wes Hopkins. I hope I'm not leaving somebody out there. Elsewhere. Big Kurt Coleman hit on the bingo card. Yeah. I hear that, what, that three interception game or four interception games?

Yeah, because Washington. Yep. Elsewhere, if you're into jerseys, which I know Professor Selman is, he keeps the stats. The Eagles are going all black on Sunday. They're closing out the year, bringing in the year, however you want to look at it, in their black uniforms. There are, there's no update on whether Nick Siriani will play the starters or will play some of the starters. is I think as McVanjo said, and this is important to note too, and I heard actually, you know, Jim Harbaugh and Bill Clinton discussing this as well.

There is kind of this misconception sometimes this time of year when you can't sit everybody, right? You know, there's you can only have seven guys inactive, you know, with the two practice squad elevations. So you can't sit everybody. So it's determining who's playing, who's not playing. Anyways, Nick Siriani says he has not made that. decision. He said that in that press conference yesterday. He said it on WIP today. The team, the players were not in yesterday. The players are not in today. Players are going to be in tomorrow. So I imagine Nick Will and with them, we'll let you know if he addresses it with us.

He speaks around noon tomorrow. So we'll get an update then. It's actually kind of a fun problem to solve. Like the gaming of it, of the roster, who can play, who cannot play? If Let's just presume that they're going to sit every, like everybody, they're not going to try to wit, right? They're going to just sit whoever they can sit. On defense, I mean,

you're going to sit, Jalen Carter. Probably going to sit Milton Williams. You think? I mean, he might have to dress. Yeah. But he's not going to,

right, you're going to lean on Booker and a jama as the every down defensive tackles. On the edge, like sweat probably sits just because he's the guy on a pitch count. Sure. Nolan Smith and, Um, uh, uh, jails on Bryce side.

Joe, they're going to have to dress. Uh, and then, you know, Bryce Huff will play. And that's probably where they would elevate a guy. I would think they would use one of the, the elevations on an edge player. Yeah.

There are, there are enough backup linebackers to get through. You know, you play, uh, it could be just Trotter and Berks or whoever. There's enough guys on the outside and at the cornerback spot to play. Safety,

I guess we have to sit like Sydney Brown should be fine. So you would want to get Sydney Brown a game, probably next to McCollum. And, and Maddox can be the, safety so you're okay on defense and on offense they have enough offensive linemen to get it through but like some of those guys will have to dress even as backups yeah and then you're looking at an offensive like johnny wilson anaya smith and johan dotson yes yeah yeah unless you use again first

off they need will shippley to clear concussion protocol like hey for will shiplickle's health but also for the numbers here i think this is also uh if you kind of wanted to put the numbers together I think this is partly why they put Ian Book on the 53-man roster last week was anticipating not just the week 16 game, the week 17 game, but the week 18 game as well, right? Because you don't want to elevate him two weeks in row. You're going to need that elevation.

I think they were planning on beating the Cowboys in Ian Brooks case because. You don't need to preserve Ian Book's elevations. I think they did it because this allows you to get three guys up. That's what I'm saying. Yeah, yeah. Otherwise, you would have had to elevate him, right? But it wasn't about preserving his elevation. It was about being able to be.

No, no, yeah. Preserving, I'm sorry, preserving the elevations. Got it. Preserving the elevations, putting him on the 53 for that reason. So, yeah, if Will Shipley's healthy, you'll see a lot of Shipley, a lot of gain well. Or, yeah, you'll see Gainwell Shipley. They're obviously fine a tight end. It's also why they won't bring in or where they won't bring up Dallas Goddard this week.

It wouldn't surprise me if they start the Alaskillard's practice window. but they're not going to sign him to the 53 yet because they need those roster spots. And then do you presume it'll be our cover boy getting the start? Like they're not going to play Pickett with these busted ribs, right? Well, yeah, that's, yeah. I got to think that Pickett's injury is enough that it'll be McKee and Book. And my guess is Pickett will be the third quarterback. What will be the emergency quarterback will be inactive as the emergency quarterback.

That would make sense. Now, of course, this is under the idea that they're going to sit everybody, which we do not know yet. Do you think that we will find out tomorrow's act? Do you think Nick will come clean? Or do you think he'll give you a Jake Elliott kickoff answer? I got to say, like Nick doesn't even tell you who's playing in the preseason games. So, you know, a third preseason game, he's like, we'll see, we'll see, we'll see.

So I would hope, I mean, Sean McVeigh was pretty clear about it today. You know, I think that first off, it's hard to keep, it's hard to keep quiet. I imagine the players are going to be informed, number one. But there's such intrigue here in this specific case about Sagan-Barkley. It is a rare circumstance. I think this is a situation where it's not competitive advantage. Like, we understand, Nick, that there are certain players who are going to have to dress who might not need to play, but they'll need to go in in emergency situations.

You can only have X amount of players inactive. We get all that, you know. So I think you should come out and say, Sequin's not playing. AJ's not playing. Lane's not playing. Jalen's not playing. Jalen's not playing.

And we'll see about everyone. We'll see about some other guys. He should at least be clear about Seekwan. I think it's a disservice to the general public if you leave the Sequan thing up in the air. What do you smile at that, Fran? Just the gravity of it being a disservice to the entire population. Although, I got to think, like, sports talk radio probably doesn't want him to say.

I mean, it's, it's, you know, the more they can keep this debate up, this is just free content all week long. It's like, there's like not, not telling the world about what, whether Sequin Barker's going to play or not, and then like trying to get rid of the measles vaccine, like both equally. You know what I mean. You know what I mean. All right. Let's get to the film review, Fran. I know that you have been working hard. We got this story on all p.hly.com for the diehard.

It's a good overview of the big takeaways from this game for you. Let's just start there. Big takeaway. What was the most interesting thing to you that maybe you weren't expecting or was extra interesting after what you thought you saw live and then you watched the film? Yeah, I mean, I was most interested to see what the run game looked like. You know, we talked at halftime of the game during the watch.

along that hey you know what like sequine barclay only has 40 rushing yards more of the same of what we saw on the back end of the the loss against washington where they're just not hitting those those big gains those chunk gains that we've come to expect from this rushing attack and from this offense so what changed in the second half and so i was guys i was flabbergasted by mike zimmer's approach in the second half of this game where uh the eagles come out and they're playing heavy personnel you've got tanner macki in you're trying to get saquan barkley to the ral to the ralckiard record. You're ahead in the game. Very clearly, like the Eagles are trying to milk this clock, get out of the game, like run the football. And the Cowboys were like, yeah, we're just going to

play nickel. We're going to have five DBSs on the field. We're not, we're not going to adjust to anything you guys are doing offensively. They would have six offensive linemen on the field. And you'd still have like Jordan Lewis down, like lined up across from Tyler Steen. Like, it was honestly like wild that that was the, that was the approach there in that game for one way I would assume that Dallas is going in like with the way that they've played. that, oh, they're trying to compete. They're trying to win the game. You know, they were perfectly fine with the Eagles going downfield, you know,

and marching the football with the run game. I mean, Tanner McKee threw four passes in this game. And he played the majority of the second half. The Eagles were fine just turning around and hanging the ball off to Sequin, to gain well, and then eventually to TDP. Each one of them, a dot. Almost, almost each one. But he was a Tanner McKee.

We'll get into some of the things we saw from him as well. But that was honestly, though, the biggest thing I wanted to see was what did the execution look like up front? I think in the first half, you saw that some of the same issues that plagued them in the Washington game where some blown blocks in the tight end. You know, Mackay Beckton has looked just okay in the run game these last couple of weeks. But then as you got into the second half, I think they kind of wore them down and they were able to get some of those chunk gains. Now, obviously, I noticed this when you broke down the play that Sequin had to top 2000, the, blocking that was done in that play, including by E.J. Jenkins. So I'm curious, Fran. Would you, would you trust moving forward E.J. Jenkins as a better blocker than C.J.

Usama. As was pointed out by, by D.F.op Keith on blue sky. E.J. Jenkins managed to block somebody on that play without actually making contact, which was, which was really, he threw the shoulder. I mean, what's better than that? Saving his body for future blocks. It was an outstanding savvy move. there from E.J. Jenkins. But yeah, I think at the end of the day, getting Dallas Goddard back into the lineup. And I know that we've been asked a lot on Twitter. Zach, I don't know if you've got any insight there. If they're definitely expecting Dallas back, obviously it won't be for this week.

They have no reason to activate them now. But for Wild Card Week, you would envision 88 back in the lineup? It would surprise me if he's not back out there, Wild Card Week. Yeah. Yes. if we can move on from Sequin here. I know that there's a lot of excitement. Is that the first time we've said that all year? That is the first time I've said that all year.

Yes, I mean, trust me. It pains me to say that because we can do an entire Sequan show. Let's get back to New Year's resolutions. There's some fun Sequan content coming up on all p.gly.com. But I know there's going to be a lot of tantamicky questions. Before we get there, we should know Kenny Pickett started the game, played the majority of the game. And there were two plays that I was particularly curious about your perspective on.

One, I know the Discord wanted to know about, which was the Grand Calcutara play, which Kellyn Moore was especially a few of his praise about today. But also the Devante Smith touchdown, which I thought was both a good play by Kenny Pickett and a good play for Kenney for Kellyn Moore. Yeah, well, it's better for Kenny Gainwell. Let's start with the Calcutara. just because I feel like that was the play that kind of got things rolling for Kenny Pickett. And Brinna will go with Grant Ketch, number one for the screen grab there.

Mortal Wombat, by the way, outstanding username there from the Discord, asked for this play specifically. And look, at the end of the day, like this was a scramble drill play. Kenny Pickett rolling out to his right, rolling out of the pocket, outside of structure, finding Calcutera down the field. But what really stood out to me in this play was the past protection. And I thought that the execution really upfront the entire game. Look, minimal pass attempts. So that led, that was part of it.

But even on the pure dropbacks in this game, I thought the pass protection really held up well. I thought Calcutara did a nice job at pass pro. And the running backs were outstanding against those Mike Zimmer pressures. And this was a really good example of that. There were a lot of layers to it. So what you see here on this play, it's third and long. And Dallas slides Micah Parsons inside. He's standing up over Cam Juergens.

You could see over to Parsons left to our right. Number 24 there, Israel Mukuamu. he's lined up over Lane Johnson. He's a big nickel, like backup safety for them. So it looks like it's going to be a pressure look to the right. And so, Brenna, if you go to the next shot, Cam Jergens, they're going to slide over to the right side. And so it's going to be a three-man slide there. So Jurgens, Bechton, Lane Johnson, they're sliding in the direction of Parsons and Mukuamu. Now, unfortunately, for the Eagles and unfortunately for Pickett, their blitz is not coming from that direction. They're blitzing actually

from the opposite way. And so, all right, the pressure wins. really well-disguised pressure there from the Dallas Cowboys, where the Blitz has actually come, Brina, if you go to the next shot, is going to be from the linebacker, from Eric Kendricks, and then also from the DB, Donovan Wilson, off the left side.

And so if you've got the three-man slide going away, you do the simple math. You look, you got Jordan Milotta, and Dickerson and Saquan Barkley to take on four Dallas Cowboys. And so the numbers are in the advantage right now for Dallas. But if you go to the next shot, Brenna, you can see. Opposite the slide, you've got Sequin Barclay, man to man.

He's got eyes on Eric Kendricks. That's the most dangerous threat because you've got the two offensive linemen there, Milata and Dickerson, they're handling the two defensive linemen. So it'll be up to Sequan Barclay to pick up this linebacker and it'll be up to Kenny Pickett. He's got to make sure the ball gets out before Donovan Wilson, the safety comes clean off the edge. Brina, if you go to the next shot, Cam Jurgens does a great job here of what's called looking for work. Once his guy, Michael Parsons leaves and bales out into coverage, Jurgens instinctively knows, all right, well, if the blitz isn't coming from this way, I've got to get my eyes back the other direction. And so he instantly gets his eyes back the other way.

And Dallas, because they're blitzing guys from the second level, they are doing a slant on the inside. And so Dickerson, he does a great job. Brennan, if you go to the next shot, Dickerson passes off his man to Jurgens. Jurgens has his eyes in the right spot. And so that that pass off goes well. Now Dickerson, since he's passing off the detackle, Brina, if you go to the next shot, he now picks up Eric Kendricks. And so he gets his eyes on Eric Kendricks. Now, this would be a situation where, oh, man, like Sequan,

Barclay and Dickerson, they're going to block the same guy, and the DB is going to come in clean, except Barkley does an outstanding job. Brennan, if you go to the next shot, Barkley does a great job of picking up the extra blitzer. And you can see that how quickly those guys deciphered what Dallas was doing. The execution was outstanding. This is a really clean pocket here for Kenny. Pickett. And look,

Pickett got a little bit skittish. I think by the fact that he knew he was fooled by the Blitz and that there was probably an extra body coming. He was a little bit quick to bail here. And he ends up rolling to his right. And he finds Calcutara down the field. Brina, if you go to the final shot, this was an outstanding catch from Calcutara,

falling down to the ground, one-handed, leaping catch. He had a great celebration after the play as well. But really good execution from the entire offensive front, from the entire protection scheme there on that play and it turned into an explosive play down the field for Calcutera. Well, let the record state that I told you Calcutara was going to be more involved this week.

I don't know if this is Bose Wi-Fi or this is just classic Bo. Anyway. Yes, and that play was sort of, you know, it was described after the game as like the play that got them going. That's how Kellan Moore described it today. Did you feel like that? I mean, that was the first positive play they had. Yeah, I mean, it was three.

It was three and out the previous two drives. And so look, I think when you look at Kenny Pickett and Zach, you talked about how they wanted to create some, you know, high probability throws, get the ball out fast. The problem is that Pickett, like he's, he is, we talked about this post game. He is more similar to Jay on Hertz in terms of play style. He is not like a, uh, within structure, get the ball out.

Like naturally, that's not his, the way that he likes to play. He is much closer to Jalen in terms of he wants to kind of run around. He wants to hold onto the football and scramble and find something downfield. he's more of a big game hunter in that way. And so, you know, it is, you kind of have to force the issue if you want him to play that way. And I thought that this play really kind of served as a spark plug for them. And then it was a couple of plays later when he found Devante Smith on the touchdown. Brina, we can do that one next.

It's the Smith Bash one. It's Bash, because that's the name of this concept here for at least how I know it in terms of what they're running. But basically what you have here. Yes, it's a good timing. there on that one. So, Brenna, this will be Smith Bash 1. And basically what you're going to get on this play is 11 personnel. So you've got one running back, one tight end on the field, three receivers all to the left side of the formation. And basically it's a three-man route concept to that side, where you're going to have two quick in-breaking routes on the outside. And then you have DeVante

Smith lined up in the slot running a deep corner route. And so on this play, it looks like it's going to be man-to-man coverage early on just by the by the pre-snap look. There's no safety deep in the middle of the field. You've got a pressure look. Dallas is sugar in the A-gaps here on this play. And so right off the bat, Kenny Pickett, no. I'm going to get man-to-man coverage here on this play. And so that immediately should be a signal that he's going to have Devante Smith.

As long as he has time to deliver this throw, he should have Devante deep down the field. And what I love here on this play, and we talked about this briefly in post-game, Bo, was I thought Jamie, I was glad that he brought it up because I had forgotten about it. And he had brought this up as we talked about it in post game. The pass protection from Kenny Gainwell on that play because it was that that double a gap look where you've got those two linebackers. We talked about this so often last week against Washington, the issues that the Eagles had in picking up some of those blitzes.

Well, it comes on the center and the running back to make those plays. Kenny Gainwell did a great job of blocking not just one, but two guys on that play. he and Juergens did a great job of passing off a stunt, kind of a cross dog pressure there between those two linebackers. So Gainwell steps up. He hits the guy, the first player that was Kendrick's kind of pinning inside. And then he picked up the looping linebacker on the backside of it, kept the pocket really clean. Pickett did a great job of stepping up against edge pressure and then delivering that down

the field. And he just threw to Devante who beat man-to-man coverage. So this was a couple of plays after the Calcutera play. It was another third and long. So good execution there on third down. against a pressure look, and the Eagles come away with a touchdown against man-to-man coverage. How good is Fran? He's outstanding.

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That's exactly what I love to see. Okay. All right, Fran. Let's move on here. Do you want to talk about the AJ touchdown from Pickett as the last player, or do you want to get into the Devante play? No, let's get into the, let's do the AJ play. just because I think it does kind of go off of that Devante touchdown. This one was the first touchdown for Tanner McKee,

so a legendary play in its own right, obviously. But what I liked about the Devante Smith touchdown was, again, the pre-snap, the quarterback, Kenny Pickett, he's got a good idea that's going to be man-coverage. I thought the Eagles did a good job of identifying man-to-man coverage early on in this game and a lot of these passes. That was one of my notes, I know, going into the first Cowboys game back in week 10, And early on in the season, this Cowboys secondary had given up so many explosives down the field. And you could tell that teams just got them into man-to-man coverage and exploited them,

just took advantage of those matchups. And it wasn't, I put the notes, some of the numbers in my piece that's up on all-phi.com. But Dallas, over the course of the season, they've been middle of the road, 14th, 15th, 16th in terms of how often they play man-to-man. But they're in the bottom six, bottom seven in terms of explosive plays allowed, touchdowns allowed, completion percentage allowed. when they've been in man-and-man, they have not been a good man-and-man coverage team, which that was their identity for under Dan Quinn for a long time.

But here this year, whether you have injuries, loss of depth, there's a lot of different factors there. This team just has been not been able to hang in man-and-man coverage situations. And this was another good example. Brina, if you want to pull up AJT-D-1, that you're going to come out. Sorry to cut you off. But if we're going to talk about my key here, let's do it through the prism of the Ace Hardware temperature check.

because as Tanner McKee is heating up, it's time for our Ace Hardware Temperature Check. Visit Ace Hardware Home Services online at www. www.com to get started on your nest project. Away you go. Well, I might have to do a Bow Wolf temperature check as this play unfolds. I mean, I am sweating over here. There's no doubt about it.

At least you're in the comfort of your own home. When you're looking at the Eagles here, they come out in that empty set, and we know, we're talking about empty over the course of the year, one of the big positives you get from playing in empty, which means that Jalen, the quarterback is by himself in the backfield, is that you can get some coverage identification by,

you know, in terms of how you deploy your pass catchers. That's Kenny Gainwell up at the top of the screen. And across from him is a linebacker. Brenna, if you go to the next shot, that's a linebacker Maris Louisville, they're across from him.

So when Tanner McKee takes the snap, he knows, all right, it's man-to-man coverage. Because if they were playing some kind of zone, if they're playing cover three, if they're playing cover four, that would be a corner out there across from the running back, not a linebacker.

So the fact that it's a linebacker out wide immediately tells you it's man-to-man coverage. And so often when you get man-to-man and Brinna, you can go to the next shot, one way, if you don't have like a route concept that is a good man-to-man beater, like that bash play I showed you on the Devante Smith touchdown, another thing you do is you go to your best matchup or you go to your best players. And so you've got A.J. Brown one-on-one against Duran Bland, running a slot fade where you're basically just going to throw this to the back shoulder. And there's plenty of room outside the numbers to be able to throw this.

Brenna, if you go to the last shot, you could see that, you know, Tanner McKee just puts this on the back shoulder. Daron Blan's got no shot. He gets beat for the touchdown there. And then A.J. Brown chucks this up into Section 110 that we discussed on the Post. Driscoll, our man. Our guy comes through with the big catch there in the stands and the rest is history. but an outstanding use of the empty sets to identify man-to-man coverage and then take advantage there for a touchdown here for Tanner McKee. So it's, you know, it's half a bit, but I mean, I do believe it.

I'm curious what you think, Fran, after. And it's only only made four throws and the game was out of hand. But how did you view the Tanner McKee experience vis-a-vis the Kenny Pickett experience? Who would you feel better as the backup heading into the playoffs? I mean, honestly, I don't know that it matters like how I think because I think it's going to be Pickett regardless. But I think I do. Look, it's a small sample. We'll get a we will likely get a larger sample on Sunday. I think when you look at Tanner McKee versus Pickett over what we've seen over the larger sample and it's still not a huge sample, but what we've seen in practice, what we saw in the preseason. I think that, you know, again, Pickett is a certain type of quarterback. McKee is a little bit different.

He's not going to give you as much creativity in the backfield. But he is going to get the ball out. faster. I think the accuracy is a little bit better. I think the arm talent is probably a little bit better. So I know, I would be excited to see what it would look like. Look, he'll be shorthanded if he is the starter here this week and he's not going to have the full complement of weapons. But I'm excited to see him operate the offense. I think that he could do some good things back there, especially if they're going to lean into, we can play a little bit more under center. The ball's going to come out a little bit faster. It'll be a different feel for the offense, certainly, if he's going to be the guy at quarterback. Part of the reason that that that that I do believe it,

McKee would be better off is because of the the construction of this team, because you have AJ Brown and Devante Smith on the outside, if you don't have Jalen Hertz a quarterback and what he brings to the table as a as a playmaking quarterback, you want the guy who's going to get the ball out to those guys. And that's like that's part of the reason that that I really like Tanner McKee is he's so decisive to get the ball to those guys. And so yeah, it may not look the same when he's throwing to Johnny Wilson and Jahan Dotson, but like just for a small sample of him getting to play with AJ Brown and Devante Smith, it was nice to watch. Yeah, I mean, it's go ahead. Now go ahead, Zach.

Yeah, I think that one thing that the coaches in the front office consider is your experience in big games and high leverage, you know, or big moments, things like that. Not just as Tanner McKee never started in the NFL, not just was that his first snap. Tanner McKee's never played in a bowl game before. Tender McKee's never played in meaningful. No, he's, he's, he's never played in in meaningful November football before. Uh, he in, I mean, I'm serious. In college, he never had a win past October 22nd. Um, so I, I think that there's, you, you've been doing opo research on Tams. I was a real step. Yeah. Yeah, that's a real stat. I mean, this is one of, like, the reason why Tanner McKee, the, no, the, the, the reason why Tanner McKee was available late in the draft with the amount of

talent he had is that he was not on a particularly good college team that the the college film was inconsistent and I think that the if I think that there's say what you want about Kenny Pickett. Kenny Pickett has started games in the NFL. He started like meaningful games in the NFL. And I think that is something that that factors into into their thinking. I think they, I believe they'll go into next season with Tanner McKee as the backup quarterback, but I don't believe they would make this change in the postseason. Yeah, of course I don't think they're going to change it midway through based on. But that's how you frame the question. I was answering the question. Yeah.

You weren't answering the question. You were, you were just trying to shove dirt on a guy. I was not saying, do you think they're going to change it midway through? Of course, they're not going to do that. We know how stubborn coaches are. But I'm asking Fran, now that he's seen them both play, what would he do? Brand's answering your question literally was it's not worth discussing this. They're not going to do it, right? So that they. It's so consistent with like the entire worldview of, well, if he's never done it before,

he can't be trusted to do it. Well, this guy is a first round pick. You got to go for him. Like, I mean, you think outside the box. That is such conflation right there that it's not even worth justifying that He never played in a bowl game. Give me a break. I think, look, when you look at what you would want McKee to be in this offense,

if he were pressed into duty to your point, though, like, you want him to be like what Brock Purdy did early in his career. You wanted to be what Jared Goff was early in his career, where you're going to point and shoot, the scheme is going to work for you, the talent is going to win out for you. Basically, don't mess it up. We're going to put you behind the wheel and don't mess it up. I do think he's capable of being that guy. I think that he has shown in small spurts over the course of his first two years that he can do that he is worthy of that trust.

But obviously, time will tell. All right. That'll close the book on the Ace Hardware temperature check. Anything else? Anything else from the offense, Fran, before we move to the defense? No, I think that's all the plays I pulled. So, yeah, no, I think we're good to move to defense. Zach, there were a couple interesting things from Vic Vanj.

in today's press conference about the defense, specifically Avante Maddox, admitting that he has leapfrogged as to the number three safety? Yeah, the way Vic Fangio framed it is that, is that Avanti Maddox has shown good things in practice. I would think it's more Tristan McCollum didn't show enough good things in games. I got to think that's more of what it was,

that they trust Avanti Maddox out there more. There was too much inconsistency. from Tristan McCollum. He said, I actually thought it was an interesting answer regarding Orrin Burke's Jeremiah Trotter Jr. He said neither one has played a lot of snaps of snaps to season number one. But they also both had their special teams duties. Like with Warren Berks starting, he wasn't going to be pulled back on special teams. So they thought it made sense to rotate them.

He thought that he said Bryce Huff was Russie. Rusty, but showed, you know, hopefully something to build on going forward, as we've discussed, that they, that they need Bryce Huff. I asked like a layup question about how C.J. Garner Johnson has grown or evolved throughout the year. And he was like, well, he definitely grew from last week by being on the field. You realize what was more important. Yeah. Yeah. So he was, it certainly seems that talking to that C.J. Gardner Johnson, received came from Vic Van or I would imagine came from Vic Fangio.

Well, it was interesting, Fran, because he also said that on both of those interceptions, C.J. Grono Johnson was in the right place. He did not freelance. So tell us what you saw in the film. Yeah, let's go to the first one, the pick six. And that will be CJTD, Brenna. So we'll go CJTD. This is obviously the opening drive. And this actually comes off a question from M.J. Logan, 42, in the Discord, become a diehard so you can go to the Discord. Let me start with this part of it. at this point, that the defense seems extremely beatable in the first couple drives, then locked down an opponent for the rest of the game. Obviously, that was not the case against Washington, but it has been the case for most of this year. I'm going to be honest, after going

through, even like going through some numbers. Well, I was going through their first two drives. I mean, their eighth in EPA per play, their 17th to success rate. They've had 32 drives, like in the first two drives. I was 16 games. So you have 32 drive sample. Seven touchdowns allowed. That's tied for ninth best. Eleven total scoring drives. That's tied for seventh best. four turnovers that's tied for third most. Like they've been pretty good on the first two drives as well. I think it's just because they've been so good afterwards. Maybe it feels a little bit out of character when they do give up some yardage early on.

But I didn't think it was like it's definitely not as dire, obviously, as the offensive slow starts, right? You know, so I to me like I didn't pick up on that as like a resounding theme. Okay. That said, the Cowboys are moving the football. They cross midfield. they're about into scoring range. And we get this pick six from C.J. Gardner Johnson. Now, the way that I described this on the postgame show, I was very, to me, like,

it looked like, okay, he passed it off. And we'll go, let's go to the next shot here, Brina, because I think you could get a good view of this from the end zone angle. You can see that C.J. Gardner Johnson's lined up across from the tight end, Jake Ferguson. Zach Bonn is lined up inside him. He's lined up inside the defensive end. And so the way I envisioned this was that, okay, Ferguson's going to run inside.

Brenna, if you go to the next shot, Ferguson's going to run inside and C.J. Gardner Johnson passes him off to Bon. Bonn picks him up. And now C.J. Gardner Johnson replaces Bonn as the whole player and then he makes the interception. Or it could be like a version of in and out coverage. We talked about like the banjo coverage on the goal line that other teams can run, right? Where, okay, if Ferguson runs outside or vertical, I've got him. If he runs inside, Bon, you've got him. But as I'm watching this play over and over again, I said, okay, well, why does Bonn Don do this. So go to the next clip here, Brina. And right at the snap, Bonn immediately goes to Ferguson. Like, doesn't wait for him to come to him. He's not reading the route. He immediately goes to step in front of Ferguson and play over him. So now I actually don't think that he was, that CJ was passing him off.

I think that that was a deliberate disguise there from Fangio and from the Eagles where they weren't playing, you know, straight like cover one man free, that they were playing cover one robber. Where cover one robber is man-to-man coverage where your second safety. comes down to play in the middle of the field to rob the middle of the field from the quarterback. Now, last week against Tampa, we talked about how the Dallas did such a good job of defeating the Todd Bowles Blitz and Cooper Rush was really peppering the middle of the field. It was like the highest amount of middle of the field throws he had made over the course of this season. And so it would make sense that you'd play some robber coverage with a ball hawking

safety like CJ Gardner Johnson to take some of that away. They disguised it perfectly here. And then if you just go to the next shot here, Brenna, You can see that as Cooper Rush steps back to make this throw, he's thinking, okay, I'm going to make this throw in rhythm. CJ Gardner Johnson's lined up over the tight end. He's going to go inside. The linebacker's not going to get into this throwing lane. I'm just going to whizzer right past his earhole. But as Vaughn picks up the tight end, CJ Gardner Johnson's right there and it ends up being a pick six.

So this is why I always like whenever we do the breakdowns on game down, like, yeah, I want to see the film to confirm. And I still honestly, like I'm not 100%, but I feel pretty good that this was a cover. one robber look and that it was a really well-discised coverage there from the Eagles and it turned it to a turnover. It was really good coaching. So Jeff McLean did ask Vic about this play and framed it was like, was it robber, was he just passing him off? And Vic said that he was passing him off, but like not in like a way that he was explaining the play. He would just like, yeah, he was just passed him off. So like, I don't know that he was talking about either way. Interesting. Yeah, I'll, that'll be one that, you know, maybe I'll do some asking around.

on the back end and see if we can get an answer. But either way, like, obviously a great play and a much needed play gets the Eagles on the board. And the second interception is where you were convinced that he was in the wrong place. And even then, Fangio says he was not. Yeah. And so this one I thought was interesting, you know,

going back and watching, you know, because look, this is when, when you play the amount of too high and cover four base looks that the Eagles play, teams are going to, obviously, they're going to call plays that are, that attack those. coverages, right? There's no perfect coverage. There are route concepts that are really good against certain coverage looks. And so over time, we've seen that our teams are going to dial up similar types of plays to go against the Eagles. And so, Brenna, if you go to CJI-N-T-1, this actually also goes with an interesting question from Josh Katz on the Discord who said

this is not a singular play, but more of a general theme. The Eagles have 12 picks this year. Ten of them come from the safeties, zero from the corners. Is that just a weird quirk or something about Fangio's defense that encourages this. And I think that to a certain extent, like, it's probably a little bit of both. Yeah, it's the corners have had opportunities to pick some passes off. But I think he puts so much on these safeties for reasons that we've discussed. I mean, we've seen how often the safeties have been in really good position, you know, read Blankenship, jumping routes and passing things off and how tight coverages.

A lot is put on the nickel corner and on the safeties in this scheme. And so I do think it's a little bit of both. But as you can see here on this play, you've got a three-level stretch where you're going to have a deep post from the outside, an intermediate kind of a sail route from the number two receiver, and then a flat route. And this is something that basically every NFL team runs versions of this play, but it's really good against multiple different zone coverage looks, but it can be really tricky for cover four teams because you're putting a lot on those safeties and on those middle-to-field defenders to kind

to pass things off and make sure everyone's in the right spot or else you're putting stress on them and they can miss some of these plays. Bernie, if you go to the next shot, the play that stood out to me, because I remember the Eagles made an interception on this, basically the same exact play concept. This is week 11 against Washington, where same kind of coverage look, same kind of route concept. This one was an interception from Reed Blanketship where he steps in front of the intermediate route and picks it off.

It was late in the game. Now, what happens in quarters coverage on this play, Brinna, if you go to the next shot, the corner on the outside, the corners are all going to play what is called outside leverage. So you're funneling everything into your help on the inside. And the safety, you've got two safeties there. That's your safety helps.

That's why the corner is going to play that outside in. He's going to try and funnel it to the safeties. The sickos in the chat will remember the John Brown play, 2014, 2014. 2014 out in Arizona, right? John Brown late in the game, two-minute trail, deep post over the top. That's what this play was, right?

That's a deep post over the top. Carrie Williams passes off the John Brown, the deep post, but there's no safety there, and he's pissed because there's no say, where's the safety help? Where's the safety help? Well, what happens often is that when teams know that you're going to be running quarters coverage,

they're going to try and isolate the safety because what happens in, and this is just the rules of the coverage. Brina, if you go to the next shot, if the number two receiver works at a certain depth, he gets vertical enough. Usually it's like eight yards. Some teams do it like 10, but anywhere eight to 10 yards. If he gets to a certain depth, now this becomes man to man for that safety.

And he has to attack that route. So now he's not available to pick it to help that corner. And now it's going to be the responsibility of the opposite safety on the other side to recognize what's happening and get over the top to help out that corner. So to help out Quinnion Mitchell. So on this play, Reed Blanketship steps in front of the intermediate route. C.J. Gardner Johnson, he's there to pick things up for if you go to the next shot, Brina. C.J. Gardner Johnson, if this ball did go to the deep post of Terry McLaren who's lined up with Quinyon Mitchell, that would be C.J. Gardner Johnson's opportunity to try and pick that ball off.

But like I said, Reed Blanketship steps in front of the intermediate route and it becomes an interception. Let's go back to this play. If you go Brin it to the next shot, read Blankett chip, he's the backside safety on this one. and he's immediately calling it out. Like there's a couple, a couple seconds into the play, a second into the play, and he immediately is pointing things. All right, guys,

this is what's coming. And this should be the same idea where, all right, you got the deep post, blanket ship's going to cover that over the top. By a certain depth, my understanding is that C.J. Gardner Johnson should be triggering

on that intermediate route, that route that's right around the top of the eagle wing there at like the 48 yard line. So he should be trying to take that route away. Now, as we could see, Cooper Rush has not even, He's like just started to take his hand off the football to start to cock to throw.

If we go to the next shot, Brenna, again, this is the route that I think that C.J. Gardner Johnson is supposed to trigger on. If that ball's thrown here to this receiver and C.J. Gardner Johnson's deep down the field, again, my understanding would be that's on C.J. Like, that's how I would put that in my nose. But as the ball is starting to be thrown, Brennan, if you go to the next shot here, you can see that Cooper Rush is starting to step into this throw. So Gardner Johnson is still back there waiting and he's reading it. And he's like, yeah, he's going deep.

He's going over the top here. And so he does not go on the intermediate route. And he instead, so now from Fangio standpoint, he may be looking at it as, hey, he read this out. He did not have to get down on that intermediate route as quickly. You know, so he was fine. How he played this was perfectly fine. But I think that's what Dallas was thinking was, all right, this route concept. We're going to dial this up.

The near safety, he's going to trigger on that intermediate. route and we're going to hit the deep post. The problem is the post was, was very much overthrown. And it was kind of comical. If we can go to the last shot, Brenna, three eagles are closer to this than the Dallas receiver. You know, this could have been a pick for Quinnion Mitchell. Certainly, obviously, CJ comes away with it, blanket chips right there in the area as well. So it was a, it's one of those plays where the player that I came to, I started to think about was Asante Samuel. You know, going back and watching a lot of Asante Samuel's big plays and some of the

the interceptions that he would make. I remember plays against Eli Manning in the flat. You know, the crossers coming from the opposite side. And Sante's Samu was supposed to be running with a vertical route. But he's sitting there. He's expecting that that route's coming from the opposite side of the field. And he bails on that player because he knows, he just,

I mean, from tape study, from tendencies, he knows like, that that's what our coverage is, then you know where the ball has to go. And I know where the ball has to go. So I can break off what my responsibilities are and I can get you that way.

Exactly. And so, like, that's, to me, like that is CJ, one of CJ's superpowers, right? Like we talk about his competitiveness and his toughness. And like that,

that's a part of it. That ball hawking nature, like that's one of his superpower. So if that means that, hey, you know what? Like he's going to take some chances, but he's going to make plays like that. I think you that I didn't, and I didn't mean for it to come off that way on Sunday. I was like, oh, man, like this was bad by CJ.

But it was just more like, it was, that's why it was all I could do was laugh. Like, it's just really funny that they were hoping to kind of get him out of position. And instead, I mean, he just, he sat back there and was able to make the play. Right. almost like, well, I mean, maybe if it's a different quarterback and he respects the arm strength a little more than he wants to break on that crossing route sooner. But yeah, I mean, you can just see the way that where reblankenship is. Like, of course, of course, CJ is not supposed to be there

because then what would, you know, what would reblankenship's responsibility be? Yeah. But interesting. All right. A quick break before we close up shop. Game time is focused on togetherness this holiday season. That means when you bring people together at live events, the experience is that much better. Game time. has a new feature called GameTime Picks that makes getting tickets for a lot of events even easier. Game Time Picks filters out the fluff to show you only incredible deals on great seats, so you don't have to waste time searching through thousands of tickets. We talk about Game Time all the time, you know why?

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Zach, I want you and Fran to do an impromptu college football playoffs draft right now. I have the four spreads for these games ahead of me. Okay, so Penn State, according to Bet365, 11.5 point favorites against Boise State. Texas, 12.5 point favorites against Arizona State. Ohio State, two and a half point favorites over Oregon and Georgia, a one point favorite over Notre Dame. I'm going to give you first pick, pick which of those spreads you would be most willing to lay some hooch on. You've muted yourself.

Texas. Cool. Wow. I didn't see you. Why would you like to explain? I'm trying to give you. Yeah, I just think, I mean, I respect what Kenny, what Kenning, Delingham is done at Arizona State. but I just think there's such a clear talent differential between Texas and Arizona State.

I think these are two teams that are worlds apart on the field. I think Texas can score. And I think Texas is outstanding. So, yeah, I'm going to Texas here. Okay. Fran, over to you? I would say Penn State. And then we'll snake it, yeah.

Yeah, after that, probably Ohio State. Oh, Ohio State with the two and a half. Yeah, I think so. The Georgia Notre Dame game is going to be really fun. That's going to be a good one tomorrow. Honestly, all three games. I'm really excited about tomorrow.

But to me, I think I have more trouble. I go back and forth more on Georgia and Notre Dame than I have with Ohio State, Oregon. So let's go with Ohio State and Penn State. Okay. And Zach, you get to make the pick on Georgia, Notre Dame. Yeah, this is the hardest game of the weekend for me, or the week, I should say, because I like this Notre Dame team.

I think this Notre Dame team is tough. And Georgia's obviously a machine. I don't know yet about, you know, the new quarterback, Gunner Stockton. And I, but I just, I think Georgia is the better team. I just, I mean, Notre Dame is built like an SEC team. I was really hoping I wouldn't have to pick this game. So what did you say the line was, one and a half? By one.

Yeah, so you're basically picking the winner here. Yeah, it's Gunner Stockton, right? Cunner Stockton, yeah. I was going to ask, you could have inserted any name there, and Bo wouldn't have blinked. It would have been. Okay, yeah. Absolutely not.

So I am going, I guess I'll go Georgia, just because it's Georgia, but, I mean, I really like, like what Marcus Freeman's built here at Notre Dame. All right, there we go. You know, I'll go with the fighting out, Goldens. I'll go with the Irish there. There you go.

Well, you get them. You get them. Yeah. Regardless. Taking Georgia. Yeah. What were you going to say, Zach? I didn't want to put you in a bad spot.

I didn't want to put you in a bad spot. Me? Yeah. I was going to ask you like genuinely if you can name anyone in that Georgia, Texas game. Oh, I'm sorry, that Georgia Notre Dame game, rather. Yeah, I think. Besides Gunner Stockton. Okay, good.

Stay tuned on Thursday to find out who it is that I can have. Okay. It is, I mean, it's, it's going to be a fun day of football tomorrow. I will be at Novacare, but we have a big gap in between Nick Siriani speaking and going to practice. And so the TV, right. But actually the computer screen in front of me, I will have those games on. I think it's, I think Bo is like very easy to kind of decipher and turn. Like, if I'm watching a game and I know like, all, Bo, Bo knows nothing about Georgia.

and Notre Dame. I could go through the key characters on both sides and be like, all right, Bo would hate this guy, Bo would love this guy, Bo would commercially just crush this player. I would never do that to a young man. Yeah,

Bo would love Marcus Freeman, Zach. Like, do you think that's fair? Like, is he's handsome? Yeah, because he's handsome. You know what, though? I actually don't think he would like Marcus. I don't think he would like Marcus Freeman's in-game decision-making. I think he would get,

I think if Marcus Freeman, if his looks didn't appeal to Bo, then he would, he would, then Bo would be more critical of him. A snack for sure. But, man, he has, he has built a team. Like, if Brian Kelly. And by the way, if you're watching this live on Fast and you want to catch the rest of this episode to get the stack rank of the hottest eight coaches left in the college football playoff go to l pheo way dot i'll say bo would like notre dame for for this reason if you thought like

brian kelly hit a ceiling and at at notre dame and then there was like the school thought like well you know you'll really appreciate him when he's gone marcus freeman has taken that to to a higher level like he's brought in better talent and they are just yeah they and they and he's also he's he's he's manipulate i don't want to say manipulated the system he's um He's mastered the system basically where I don't think Notre Dame, I could be wrong here, but I just think they're going to keep getting the best quarterback available in the portal every year. He's basically looked at this like he'll recruit elsewhere on the roster and he'll get your senior quarterback from a good academic institution. Wake Forest two years ago, Duke last year.

We'll see who it is next year. I mean, they have a good quarterback depth chart, but my guess is next year, he'll get one of the top quarterbacks on the portal. A matter of fact, he might be getting Texas's starting quarterback next year. We'll see because, like, Texas is this weird program where, like, everyone wants to back up to be the quarterback already. And I think as as intriguing as Quinn yours might be, I. I think they're going to be like, please go elsewhere next year because Arch Manning is going to be the quarterback. You see the report, Zach, that apparently Quinn Ewers is getting offered like $6 million from schools to, uh, to, to, to, to, to play. I mean, like, no brainer. He should go back for another year and take that, take that money.

Yeah, like, I, I really think for, for a lot of these college players, um, staying is, is an intriguing option, especially if, if you're not going to, if you're a quarterback and you're not going to be a first round pick, uh, or you're kind of on the, borderline to be a first drop pick, you should absolutely, you know, the going rate for a starting quarterback in college football is pretty high. The player, Duke, I mean, and again, these are, these are not confirmed figures, right? It's worse than like agent reporting. But, but Duke just got Tulane's quarterback for like a huge number. And so, yeah, it's, it's, it's pretty interesting to see. Like, I, I know you're, you're not a, a Kyle McCourt fan, okay? Even though he looked awesome in the holiday bowl and he broke the ACC records. And he's from South Jersey.

But Kyle McCord's like football, he's pushing to get this extra year. And it makes sense for him because he's a fringe NFL player at this point. But he is, if he comes back to Syracuse, they're like a bona fide contender in the ACC. So I do think that the quarterback market is particularly interesting. I just saw that. I didn't see that. They're paying them at Duke. They're paying Mensa, the quarterback from Tulane,

$8 million over two years. Yes. Yeah. I've actually never seen that where they spread it out over to basically said, yeah, we're going to do it for two years. That's the first time that's happened. Yeah, because I said this on the show a few weeks ago, that the challenging college football now is,

if there's no term, if you just sign, I know, it's like worse than free agency because the guys can just, they can just take the money and then leave the next year because you're going to start a bidding war every year basically. There you go. Let's close with some. I did have a quick. I did have a quick Eagles question for you guys.

This ties into the start of the conversation here, which is you can't play everybody. And if you're Nixiriani, and let's take Seeklon Barkley's record out of this year, or Seekwant Barkley gone for the record, he's obviously, he's one of your elite players. But if you have certain players who are like, wait, no, I want to play because I'm going to be a free agent and stats or, you know, if you're, if you're Josh Sweat and curious if I mean, there might be somebody with an incentive. Yeah, or yeah, that type of thing. You know, I saw like Zach Ertz got a lot, you know, CJ Gardner Johnson just got a lot of money from the incentives, uh,

in his deal. But if you're, if you're Josh Sweat and you're sitting at eight sacks and you have an inviting matchup against the Giants this weekend. And also you want to show. that you can play 17 games. You want to try to get to maybe 10 sacks, right? Like, it might be who of you to try to play for a half or something like that? You're already down depth at that position. If you're Zach Bonn and you're pending free agent, you're at, you know, 150 tackles, five plus four fumbles, like all this stuff that this is, this, I know teams look at the tape,

but they also rationalize things based on numbers too. Or you want more of a sample size. You want more stats. Devante is not at that point where he's too far from a thousand yard season so it doesn't make sense there he would need like 170 yards but point being if

a guy wants to play and you're Nick Siriani are you willing to have that conversation it completely depends on who it is like I would not let Josh Schwett play but I think if there are guys who are like super close to an incentive now you might also have

if it's an incentive deal, Harry Roseman can call down and say we're going to pay that anyway if it's that close. But I think you got to make the decision based on what's best for the team and make your playing time decisions from there. Agreed. Yeah. No notes.

Very quickly, a friend, a couple of things. How did Trotter Jr. look to you? I thought he was solid. Yeah, look, there were times where he can get stuck on blocks, but he also had a couple times where I thought there was a play

early on. I think it was his first series where he and Zach Bond both at the same time, like took on the block, got off and met and met at the ball carrier. Like he had some nice moments. You know, nothing to the point where I'm like, oh, like, they should start mixing him in more. But I would say like probably the brightest spot I've seen from him this season would be in this game. Okay. Well, less about mixing him in and more about now, Warren Berks is worth the fumble. But if a guy goes down in the playoffs, Berks or Trotter Jr., who would you trust? I think you would probably still go Burke's. just because the, and going, this goes back to the Kenny Pickett thing, he's been there, done that.

And I think at this point, at that position especially, I think you'd probably lean in more into the guy that that's done a little bit. Just because Trotter has just played so little this year, I feel like you would, you'd probably want to lean into the, you know, the experience that Oren Berks does have. You were asked in the Discord about a lot of open, wide receivers on defense, which not necessarily tracked with what you thought, but you had something to add here. Yeah, Brenna, if you just pull up open wider, see, this is a quick one. So, yeah, so I was asked from the Discord, can you break down why it seems to Eagle's

secondary is leaving guys wide opening coverage? I mean, there were four catches. There were five catches of over 10 yards in the game, none over 20. Actually, no, there was one for over 20. It was a double move from Brandon Cooks. Brandon Cooks got open for two catches. One was an outstanding route on the opening drive against Slay, went for 16. another was a double move against Slay where Slay slipped and grabbed them.

That was the penalty that they ended up not enforcing. Quingham Mitchell gave up two catches on like stop routes. And that's kind of what I wanted to show here. We've talked about what the Eagles like to do, especially on third down. Well, they'll play cover six where, Brina, if you go to the next shot, where in cover six, you're going to basically rotate coverage where the safety on the one side is going to start looking over the other way and you leave the corner on the backside isolated. and it's basically one-on-one for that corner.

In this situation, it's Quinyon Mitchell. And basically, if you're that corner, you are trying to prevent, you're playing inside out. So you're preventing in-breaking routes. You don't want to play, you're trying to protect over the top so you don't get beat deep. If you go to the next shot, there's only one spot, there's only really one route that's going to beat you,

and it's like a stop or a comeback route. I mean, Quinion Mitchell's in perfect position here on this play. He does not, he's hip-to-hip with the receiver. The ball is thrown at this point. You can see that Cooper Rush has already let go of the football. And I think this was, yeah, this was Jalen Brooks, did a good job of just kind of throwing the brakes on last minute. He climbs the ladder and makes a great catch along the sideline.

Goes for 12 yards in a first down. He gave him up another one to Jonathan Mingo. It was on the same exact situation, same coverage, same idea. That's the catch you're going to give up. There is no perfect coverage. And so, you know, I think we've gotten a little spoiled in terms of what, you know, what wide open looks like and guys are guys looking open uh the eagles have been one of the best this year at preventing these chunk plays and in the you know in this game they didn't give up explosives like we saw

a week ago uh they they gave up a handful of catches that went for you know 15 yards for the 12 yards okay now uh we can say fran we're excited that uh this week based on the suggestion we had earlier instead of breaking down the giants for the opponent preview you're going to break down the eagles yeah so it's uh that that document is well underway. I'll have that ready for Thursday. I'm excited about that. It'll be fun. So it'll be a scouting report on the Eagles

roster and the depths are going into the postseason. So nothing giants related on that. It'll be all it'll all be about the Eagles and where they stand going to the playoffs. Zach, Super Chat from Chase Daniel Plainview, who wants to know if Vic Fangio and Drew Locke

are going to catch up after this game. Yeah, that didn't end well if memory serves. Is that right? I don't know. I mean, He got fired, so. Yeah. Yeah. He got, no, I drew lock up benched.

Yeah. I imagine, well, actually, you know, Fanjo's upstairs. So unless they catch up pregame, there won't be one of those post-game handshakes. How do you guys feel about the Mormon missile? A lot of talking to chat about the Mormon missile. If its teammates are calling them that. Yeah. So I don't know.

Do you disagree? Do you not like it? I don't feel strongly. I have a kindred spirit feel closely to the Mormons because our championship winning softball team, our captain, his name is Joe Mormon. So that's why you have a kindred spirit. So yes.

So we named the team Batter Day Saints. Nice. Thank you. So yeah, I feel a little bit of a connection. Brought home a ring. Only one. Zach, obviously, has never seen the book of Mormon because he would never. I have seen the book of Mormon.

That's what, yeah. It's from the South Park creators, right? Yeah. Is that right? Yeah, I went. I was living up in Hoboken in 2011 covering the Giants. And I went with my brother and his college roommate. And, you know, my mom came up.

Yeah, it took that because it was, yeah, it was. It's supposed to be like a comedy. I actually heard someone told me, someone told me recently there's a John Mullaney play or musical in New York right now that was recommended to me that I would like to see. You know what that is, Mo? Do you think that was the last musical you saw? Musical, no, I mean, I've seen some with Emily,

and it's just not my, it's not my speed, honestly, but I'm happy to go because she's, wonderful wife, but she loves musicals. I don't mind plays. We went to New York. We saw the Larry David play that they had. That was actually pretty funny. But then you were disappointed by his appearance in Philadelphia.

Yeah, but that wasn't a play. That was just a conversation in conversation with. But no, I'm trying to think the last musical I saw. Yeah. It's been some time, honestly, if I'm being honest, she's gone more with friends or. She knows, yeah. Yeah, yeah, she knows. Now, friend, do you want to get into what happened last night?

Can we, like, get angry at somebody or you don't want to, you don't want to? No, actually, there's nothing to necessarily be angry about. Basically, I was cooking dinner and there's a knock on my door and, you know, a young gentleman accidentally clipped my car as he was driving by. I was parked out front. Nothing crazy, but he was kind enough to stop and exchange info. Like it could have been, it could have been way worse. So, yeah, nothing to be upset about from that. Young gentlemen, like a teenage driver?

No, a little bit older. Everybody, you know, young 20s. Did you reflect on where you were parked? Were you far from the curb? Did you take any onus on yourself? Or this was all, this was all just this guy, not paying attention? Yeah, I would say, yeah, I would say more of the latter. But yeah, no, it was fine.

It was, you know, it's more just like, all right, I got to go through the whole. Oh, yeah, the headache. But yeah, exactly. But glad that the guy owned up to it. That's good. And nothing crazy, like damage-wise. So, no. Just like a little scrape or what?

Yeah, it's where we were talking like some, some scrapes and scuffs and stuff like that. Okay. It could have been worse. Could have been worse. Yes. Okay. All right, Zach. Close us out with what is your New Year's resolution for 2025.

I mean, this sounds cliche, but I always answer. if there's something that you feel strongly about, then you should start doing it right away. You shouldn't wait until New Year's. But for the purpose of the fact that we've had the conversation, Emily and I, there's, yeah, I mean, there's a handful of things that I said. You know, I can be more organized in my non-work life. That's something that I would do. Emily runs a home organization business.

So she likes things very tidy. So if I have the laundry piling up or if I'm sitting at my desk here and I have this can of seltzer that should have been disposed of yesterday from working late last night. So things like that. Yeah. So that's that's one of the resolutions. there's there's recommendations for resolutions that I need to kind of find compromises on like like you know she she thinks my sleep is is an issue I've agreed I I've been frustrated recently about some of my show performances I have a list of things I want to improve on the show and one of the things is

without getting into too many details I I wasn't speaking clearly on a on a recent and show i was i was stammering too much and she says yeah you're not sleeping you you know that's that's related to you're like asleep she's right and so um and then there's other things that i can improve with the show there's there's things i can improve with my articles um yeah making sure that i maintain the gym regimen it's easy to say that uh it's the playoffs i'm busy job yeah that kind of things. I need to make sure that I stick to the regiment. So things like that, things like that. Would you guys care to share any of your any of your New Year's resolutions? I mean, I haven't had as prolonged a conversation about it as you have. One thing, I would,

I would like to read more fiction in the year 2025. Why, why that? I just, every time I read a book, I'm happy I'm reading a book, but it's hard to convince myself to do that when there are so many other options. I would like to, I would like to read more fiction in 2025 yeah for me i'm like uh i'm not a big like new year's resolution guy like i'm usually like all right like if i'm going to make a change i'm going to make it's like uh wait until the i week to make to make changes i'm gonna i'll start start right away so uh yeah i don't have uh anything big uh overpowering there oh i probably so zach you won't can you won't you won't accept you need to sleep better you need to meet you need to find a compromise for that

well yeah because i'm not going to i'm not going to agree to to to like um Like be asleep by this time. Like an actual parameter. She's like, yeah, she's like be in bed by this time. And no, I simply will not agree to that because my, the people, my, I don't want to say my competition, my colleagues on the beat, they're not in bed at that time. Like, so, yeah, I want to, I'm excited for the month ahead. We'll have some great stuff coming up this, this month ahead. And I don't want to put a limit on myself.

What about naps? So naps an option? No. Can't nap. No. Definitely not. Definitely not. That's another, that's been another conversation piece, but no, I'm not napping.

Could you sleep in a little bit more? I think it would be on the other side of it. I think I would go to bed earlier because I do my best work in the mornings, honestly. And I love being with the kids in the mornings. We have, like, great conversations in the morning. So if I can, if I can wake up and, hour earlier to work and therefore go to bed an hour earlier. Yeah.

Question from Nick Field. He wants to know, how do you know when your competitors are sleeping? Or I shouldn't say, I guess it's just something I've always thought about it. I always thought about it in my head. Like, you know, is Tim McMahoners working on this? Is Jeff McClain working on this? Is it E.J. Olivia? Like, you go on down the list.

You know. And so Dave Z, there's so many, there's so many good people. And then you go nationally. I mean, I, I, oh, that's, Zach's asleep. His first nap. Tough framing. It's all right. You know, no, no, no, no, you know what I did there?

Oh, there is. I was speaking so passionately there that I kicked the Ethernet out of the, I kick. I kicked the Ethernet. No, but it's always the expression that, you know, Kobe used to say, like, you know, if you're not in the gym, someone else is. And so that's kind of the way I view it. If I'm not, if I'm not working on it, someone else is, you know, there's an expression. You're either writing it or you're reading it.

And I feel strongly about that. Okay. Well, that'll do it for this episode of the Ph.L.Y. Eagles podcast. A happy new year to all. All of the Sickos, we will talk to you on Thursday, 2 o'clock. We should figure out a different format for that show, because I don't think we need to go deep into, presuming that we find out that egos are not going to play their players.

I don't think we need to go deep into that matchup. So maybe we can do something a little bit different as a playoff look ahead for that show on Thursday, and of course, the return of Swooper. Well, maybe in the spirit of France breakdown, we can do a player by player, a look, of, you know, how this guy did this year. going into the playoffs.

Yeah, that's a good idea. New Year's resolution for every player on the 53. Yeah, now we're talking. That'll be a long show. Aren't they all? All right, that'll do it for this episode. Thanks everybody for watching and listening. Thanks to Brenna for stepping in.

We will talk to you on Thursday. And as always, we love you.