I’ve gotta be honest with everyone: I’m angry this week. I try to stay calm and see the bigger picture, but I’m struggling. Mostly because I feel like I’m writing the same article again. Last week, I wrote that the Eagles couldn’t keep running an under-center game and a separate shotgun passing game, and that the biggest problem was pass protection. Well, nothing changed. It just got worse.
I know some people (based on some comments) want me to come out here and say Jalen Hurts sucks and he’s the
problem. He didn’t play well, and this review includes plays he deserves criticism for. But I charted all 12 third downs, and I put primary blame on him in only one. On the others, I saw missed protections, poor spacing, receivers who couldn’t separate, and situations that were already a mess before the snap.
Yes, the injuries matter. Lane Johnson and DeVonta Smith were unavailable, Dallas Goedert was out, and Saquon Barkley left early. I’m not expecting this group to look like a top-five offense. I am expecting the coaches to give the players a chance. Right now, Nick Sirianni and Sean Mannion are failing to do that far too often. Let’s get into it. Sigh.
Offense
We’ll start with the third down that I did put on Hurts. The pocket is clean enough to make this throw, and a receiver is breaking over the middle of the field. He needs to deliver it. This is the kind of opportunity that the offense cannot afford to waste when it creates so few of them.
I think Hurts looks uncomfortable, and that is a legitimate criticism of his play right now. We can acknowledge the problems around him and still expect him to execute when the structure gives him an answer. Gotta have this one.
The running game did have some good moments. Tank Bigsby and Will Shipley weren’t the reason this offense collapsed, and there were individual blocks worth praising. Markel Bell had a difficult debut, which was hardly surprising given the circumstances, but look at his size and strength here. Phew. There is something to work with.
I also want to give Makai Lemon credit for blocking the safety. That contribution from a receiver matters, especially when you are trying to create room beyond the defensive line. I’m not going to spend the entire article pretending that nobody did anything well. The frustration is that these moments never developed into a running game that made the passing game easier. They are so disconnected, it’s unbelievable.
QB counter bash! It exists! This is one of the runs that reminds me why I have argued for so long that this offense needs Hurts involved in the running game. The back’s path and the quarterback’s run work in opposite directions, creating excellent angles for the blockers and forcing the defense to account for both threats. Tyler Steen does a really good job here, too.
I understand Hurts getting down rather than lowering his shoulder into a defender. He can still be an effective runner while protecting himself. What I don’t understand is trying to build an offense around him while barely using one of the things that makes him different. If he is reluctant to run, Sirianni needs to have that conversation with him. I don’t know what is being said privately, but the offense needs this element. They have to do this more.
And then we get this. Outside zone to the left, toward Zach Ertz, on third-and-short. Third-and-2 from the Rams’ 6-yard line, and this is the call? I hate it. It loses five yards. Cam Jurgens missing his block makes it worse, but I’m not convinced this was ever a great call.
There is also a question about what Hurts is actually coached to do here. Nobody follows the motion, and the Eagles appear to have a three-on-two advantage at the bottom of the screen. I would love a quick throw to be available against that picture. But watching Dontayvion Wicks, I’m not certain this is an actual RPO. Hurts appears to be reading the edge defender, and handing it off is the correct decision against that read. So, I don’t really know what the call is here.
The outside zone emphasis is particularly frustrating because it was supposed to be such a big part of the new offense. It’s not working. The Eagles ran outside zone seven times for 16 yards in this game (we track all the runs on our Patreon!), compared with eight inside zone attempts for 53 yards. That doesn’t mean every inside zone call was perfect or that outside zone can never work. Outside zone isn’t setting up the passing game. And it’s not working as a run call. It’s supposed to be the foundation of this new offense.
The under-center play-action game is laughably bad. I know some of us, including me, wonder whether Hurts really wants to do this. But come on. At least give him a chance. He hasn’t had a chance in either of the past two weeks when they go under center and run a play-action pass. Two routes are available here, and both are doubled. The fake does nothing to move the linebackers out of the passing lanes. Where is the easy completion that this approach is supposed to create? The Eagles never throw from under center, so teams can just keep blitzing. It’s either a run play or play action. If you don’t throw from under center, it’s a waste of time. We might need to just bin it.
The running back eventually becomes available as Hurts moves around, but by then he is trying to avoid rushers and prevent a negative play.
Deniz Selman’s charts put the season-long problem into perspective. He does fantastic work, and you should check him out.
Through Week 4, pending Monday Night Football, the Eagles are at roughly an 18% success rate on under-center play action, the worst team in the NFL. His broader play-action chart has the Eagles at approximately 26% success with play action, compared with about 40% without it. The gap is enormous. What’s supposed to make life easier is making it harder.
Here is another under-center play-action pass with almost no chance. Just watch Tank Bigsby, Johnny Mundt, and E.J. Jenkins. They aren’t providing effective protection, and they aren’t contributing useful receiving options either. That is an awful combination. You are committing players to the fake and the protection structure without getting enough from either.
I can accept keeping fewer receivers in the pattern if the protection gives those routes time to develop. I can accept asking the quarterback to get the ball out quickly if the routes give him an immediate answer. Here, I don’t see either. Hurts is being asked to make something happen after the play has already put him in trouble. Again. The design is failing.
This is a beautiful throw on fourth down, and Lemon runs a really good route. They deserve credit for converting it. Unfortunately, it also takes excellent execution from both of them to rescue another protection failure.
The Eagles slide away from the pressure look and use Shipley to help on the overload side. That is a common approach because it gives the back a shorter path to his assignment. The problem is how they distribute the rushers. Jurgens looks caught between two defenders, almost trying to account for both without securing either. Shipley takes the linebacker, and the defensive tackle gets through Jurgens. I don’t know the exact coaching rule, but it’s wrong. Pass protection is killing this offense.
Hurts and Lemon bail them out for a 13-yard gain on fourth-and-2. That is good quarterback play under difficult circumstances. It is also a terrible way to have to sustain an offense. You cannot keep needing that quality of throw just to survive a protection breakdown.
Even a familiar concept can’t function if the quarterback doesn’t have time for it. The Eagles are running crash here, a staple of their offense for years. Ertz doesn’t run a particularly good route and takes too long to become available, but Hurts cannot wait for him because the protection is already breaking down.
Jurgens whiffs at the line of scrimmage and cannot recover to pick up the stunt. Hurts has to release the ball before Ertz is open. That is why I find some of the reaction to these incompletions so frustrating. The throw’s timing is dictated by a free defender rather than the route. Criticizing the final result without considering why the ball had to come out is pointless.
This is the biggest issue for me, just as it was last week. If you don’t have answers against pressure and cannot distribute your blockers correctly, you cannot succeed as an offense. Simple. The Rams keep attacking the rules, and the Eagles keep failing to respond. That is on the coaches.
The Rams bring four rushers from the weak side. The Eagles have enough blockers overall, but only three are assigned to those four defenders: the right guard, right tackle, and running back. The line slides left, while a defensive lineman drops out on that side. The Rams are attacking the Eagles’ protection rules, leaving the Eagles with help where they don’t need it and an overload where they do. Without an adjustment, Hurts needs a usable immediate passing answer. He doesn’t get one. This happened over and over again.
This is why I keep going back to the scheme. It isn’t enough to say the line needs to block better. The offense needs a way to change the protection or punish this look with the ball. Hurts completed only 33% of his attempts against the blitz, with minus-0.77 EPA per play. Opponents are being rewarded for sending pressure. Why would they stop?
Hey, a positive. Sort of! Darius Cooper makes an outstanding catch for the first Eagles touchdown, an 18-yard score in the second quarter. I’m happy to praise the result, but the process is still a mess. All five receivers end up on the same side, and the spacing between Lemon, Wicks, and Bigsby is particularly poor. They look confused. Cooper eventually uncovers at the back of the end zone.
Hurts deserves criticism for what he does outside the pocket here. He drifts backward when he could stay more parallel to the line of scrimmage, making the throw much harder. As he moves farther away, he cannot get enough on the ball to deliver it cleanly. That is something the coaches need to address, and something he needs to improve.
Fortunately, Cooper turns into Randy Moss for a moment and makes a fantastic play.
Cooper scored his second touchdown just before halftime. After Andrew Mukuba’s earlier interception helped set up the first field goal, Cooper DeJean’s interception gave the Eagles another short field late in the half. This is a much better rep from Hurts. He has to release the ball early under pressure, recognizes Cooper stopping at the back of the end zone, and delivers a lovely throw. Cooper does a good job uncovering, too. He finished with both Eagles touchdowns and deserves praise in an otherwise miserable review.
It is almost as if Hurts looks more comfortable in empty from the shotgun. That doesn’t mean every empty formation automatically works, as we will see later. But the offense is operating better from the shotgun, every single week.
Back to the under-center play-action game, and back to the same problem. Hurts fakes the handoff, turns, and immediately finds an edge defender in his path. The Eagles have no effective plan to block that defender. They are relying on him to chase the run fake from the backside, and he simply doesn’t.
I’m tired of seeing this. The quarterback cannot make the defender believe the fake if the defense has already worked out how to attack the play. The offense needs a way to account for that player when he refuses to chase. Leaving him alone and hoping for a different result is not an answer.
If they want to keep playing from under center, they need to throw conventional dropback passes from there, too. Give the defense something beyond a run or an occasional play-action fake to attack. If they cannot build that into a workable package, reduce the under-center offense and commit to something else. At the moment, they aren’t convincing anyone, including their own quarterback, that this approach can work. I would be very tempted to bin it. Use the pistol more, but live in the shotgun. I know it’s only been 4 weeks, but it is a disaster.
The best run of the game comes from the shotgun. I’m stunned! There is a little misdirection, with the tight end pulling back across the formation in the same direction as the receiver in the backfield. That movement makes the linebackers hesitate instead of charging straight downhill, giving the offensive line an easier job getting to them.
Bell, Drew Kendall, and Steen all do excellent work, and Bigsby gains 19 yards to begin the fourth-quarter drive. I thought Steen was one of the positives in this game. This is the sort of movement I want more of. The offense changes the defenders’ picture and creates better blocking angles without asking Hurts to turn his back and hope an edge defender disappears. They also lost another 19-yard Bigsby run earlier to a Mundt holding penalty, which came from the shotgun. Maybe build around the things that work and bin some of the under-center stuff?
As if Jurgens’ afternoon wasn’t bad enough, this happens on third-and-2 near the goal line. He runs into Hurts before the quarterback can cleanly take the snap and execute the handoff. Whatever the intended play was, the collision prevents the Eagles from finding out.
I feel for Jurgens. He is not a guard, and moving a player who was already struggling into a different position has not fixed anything. He’s just not playing well. The film shows missed blocks, problems against stunts, and now this. He simply cannot keep playing left guard like this.
Sirianni has said they are not benching him. I have no words. Try another guard, or move Jurgens back to center and Kendall to left guard and hope the arrangement works better. I don’t love having to reshuffle the line again, but continuing with this combination and expecting the problems to disappear is not a plan.
On fourth-and-2, I would like the Eagles to have something better than asking Wicks to win in isolation against Trent McDuffie. There is no separation. Hurts gets unsettled and works back across the play, but no receiver is open. Eventually, he has to put the ball somewhere, and Cooper cannot bring it in.
This is a lack of creativity in a situation where the offense desperately needs help. The Eagles have a depleted receiver group. They know that. Asking those players to win difficult individual matchups without doing enough to help them will produce exactly this kind of result. That 11-play fourth-quarter possession gained 62 yards and ended at the Rams’ 2-yard line with no points. It was their only sustained second-half drive, and they still couldn’t finish it. By the way, nearly all the runs on that drive came from the shotgun. Can you detect a theme?
Game on the line. Third-and-4. The Eagles go empty, which I’m fine with. The Rams play Cover 1 man coverage, and the Eagles should have a way to create an opening. Instead, they give the defense a static picture and ask Ertz to win on a straight slant. A 35-year-old tight end signed two weeks ago is your answer here? Really?
No motion. No bunches or stacks to force defenders to work through traffic. The spacing isn’t particularly good, and nobody separates. Empty can help the quarterback identify the coverage, but identifying man coverage does not magically get a receiver open. You still have to design a play that gives this group a chance against it.
And finally, here is every 3rd down charted…
Final Thoughts
I charted every third down because I wanted to be fair about responsibility, rather than deciding who to blame before watching the film. Only one of the 12 went primarily on Hurts. Some were protection failures. Some were poor designs or receivers failing to separate. Some were difficult situations created by the previous two downs, including the final third-and-17, when Bell lost to Byron Young and the routes never became available. By that point, it was almost impossible to convert. The chart above shows how I assessed all 12.
Hurts can still be part of the problem. I am not asking anyone to ignore that. But the claim that he cannot succeed against the blitz is simply untrue. Against Brian Flores’ Vikings defense last year, he went 11-for-14 for 233 yards and two touchdowns when blitzed. He has also played good football under proven offensive coaches such as Shane Steichen and Kellen Moore. His struggles under Brian Johnson, Kevin Patullo, and now Mannion matter when we try to evaluate what is happening. I struggle to judge him in an offense that routinely gives him no protection and no available receiver. He has been better than this. He’s clearly not comfortable now.
Bell struggled, and losing Johnson makes everything harder. Jurgens had a dreadful game. Those individual issues need addressing. But I maintain that the biggest problem is the protection scheme and how the running game connects (or doesn’t) to the passing game. The Rams repeatedly attacked the Eagles’ protection rules, and the Eagles couldn’t adjust. The running game and passing game are still completely separate. The outside zone emphasis isn’t working, and the play-action game is making the quarterback’s job more difficult.
Sirianni and Mannion need to change something substantial. Commit to a coherent shotgun offense with quarterback runs and useful pressure answers, or build an under-center package that can actually protect and throw the ball. I don’t care which coach owns it. I care that somebody takes responsibility for making it function. The Eagles cannot keep putting this offense on the field and calling the same failures execution problems. I’m angry because we have already watched this happen. Change it. Just give me something different to watch!
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