Roob’s observations: Eagles nearly lose 22-point lead, escape with win over Jags originally appeared on NBC Sports Philadelphia
It would have been one of the worst losses in franchise history. That would really be the case. Blowing a 22-point second-half lead in your own stadium against an injury-prone team with two wins?
The Eagles escaped with a 28-23 win over the Jaguars, but yeah, that was a little scary.
Here we go with our 10 direct observations.
1. With every chance the Eagles got to put this game away, you could see the Jaguars becoming more and more confident. When you’re up 22-0, you just can’t let that happen. You can’t let the other team think they have a chance. And the Eagles did just that. The two failed two-point conversions. Saquon Barkley’s fumble. The ridiculous botched 4th-and-inch near the end of the third quarter. All those accidents with the Eagles killed the Jaguars. Gave them hope. If you want to be a great team, you put teams away when you’re 22 points ahead, for crying out loud. Great that Nakobe Dean made a play and the Eagles escaped, but they should never have been in that position in the first place. They need to learn from this and not put themselves in the same position again.
2. Speaking of Nakobe Dean… wow. This kid is playing so well and to make that play with a minute and a half left and save the game – who knows, maybe even save the season – is just reward for all the work he’s put in. The expectations were so high for Dean he’s coming out of Georgia in 2022. Then he didn’t play as a rookie and got injured last year and I’ll be honest, I wasn’t sure what to expect this year. He looked good in camp, but the first few weeks weren’t good. But man, he’s settled down and is just playing great football and that interception was the product of an incredible amount of preparation and film study. He knew exactly what the Jaguars wanted to do there and he was ready for it and it was also a pretty athletic play for his first career interception. Kudos to the Eagles for sticking with Dean and good on Dean for never letting himself down during a challenging few seasons. Great game.
3. We’re seeing some really special play from Jalen Hurts, who continues to stack clean, efficient and productive games. He was brilliant Sunday, going 18-for-24 for 230 yards with two touchdown passes and no interceptions for the fifth straight game and the fourth game without a turnover. His passer rating of 132.3 makes him the first Eagles quarterback ever with four straight games with a passer rating of 119 or higher. It would take some time with his fifth play-caller in five seasons, but once it clicked with Kellen Moore, it clicked great. Hurts lets the game come to him, just like he did with Shane Steichen in 2022. He makes quick decisions, he throws the ball accurately, he doesn’t force anything, he throws the ball deep in spectacular fashion and he plays with his legs again. That’s a product of being decisive and getting started before the defense is ready. And he just looks faster than last year. That 18-yard touchdown run was his longest since a 22-yarder against the Bears in Week 15 of 2022. This team can go a long way with this Jalen Hurts.
4. That DeVonta Smith touchdown is one of the greatest catches I’ve ever seen. And it wasn’t just the one-handed jab into the back right corner of the end zone with Ronald Darby in solid coverage, it was also that Smith somehow dragged both feet within the confines of the back of the end zone while doing this spectacular made. catch with one hand. With AJ Brown out of the game in the second half, the Eagles needed Smith to step up in a huge way and he did and it was incredible. That’s an impossible game, just hanging out on the schoolyard with your friends. To do it in an NFL game? Astonishing.
5. Hey, Howie… get Zach Baun signed. Now! Wow, what a find he has been. Baun is getting better and better in a position he’s never played before, and he was unreal on Sunday. Player of the week kind of thing. Ten tackles, two pass breakups and that diving interception just before halftime set up Saquon Barkley’s 19-yard touchdown. Baun has been playing well all year, but this was something next level. The Eagles gave him a one-year contract to play off-ball linebacker based only on a handful of snaps Vic Fangio saw him play with the Saints. Which is crazy in itself. But he’s not just playing a new position, he’s playing crazy. That interception was a thing of beauty. He reacted as soon as the ball bounced through Travis Etienne’s hands, diving to full extension and somehow getting his hands under the ball and maintaining control. Baun has shown intelligence, instincts, toughness, playmaking ability, everything you expect from an off-ball linebacker. The toughness of DeMeco Ryans and the athleticism of Mychal Kendricks. Quite a combination. The Eagles can’t afford to lose him.
6A. Saquon Barkley just keeps delivering and it’s incredible to watch. Broken and sore and beat up, he just kept answering the bell to the tune of 159 rushing yards, 40 receiving yards, two more touchdowns. The fumble was bad – I’m not sure if it was actually a fumble – but I love that Kellen Moore went back to Barkley as soon as the Eagles got the ball back, and he never gave up. In the second half he carried 14 times for 98 yards. On the day the Eagles honored the greatest running back in Eagles history – LeSean McCoy – Barkley showed why he is on pace to have the best season ever for an Eagles running back. The numbers are crazy: He already has 925 rushing yards in half a season, 5.9 yards per carry, 1,071 scrimmage yards, eight touchdowns and we have nine games left. And great to see Barkley more involved in the passing game as well. Barkley caught 288 passes for 2,100 yards in six years with the Giants, but was just 17-for-106 in his first seven weeks here. I know he had that bad loss to Atlanta, but he’s a very good receiver and too good to average 15 yards per game. He had season highs with three catches for 40 yards Sunday and that early touchdown. It’s astonishing how good he is.
6B. As for Barkley’s fumble, it appeared that Ventrell Miller hit Barkley’s ankle on the way to the ground, meaning he was down due to contact and the ground caused the fumble. But it was a weird day for the replay booth all around. On that first Eagles two-point conversion attempt, Hurts clearly had the ball over the plane. A strange day for the referees.
7. Young, fast, aggressive, physical, athletic. Five words no one would have used to describe the Eagles’ defense last year. But here we are, and this reworked unit, now stripped of dead weight and infused with youth and playmaking at every level, has quickly become a great young unit. They still have to do it consistently every week, but during this four-game winning streak, the Eagles’ defense has played remarkably well. There is nothing this group doesn’t do at an elite level. Filling the run. Coverage at a consistently high level. Put pressure. Hit. And now they’re even forcing turnovers: they’ve gained five points in the last two games, after gaining just seven in the previous fourteen games. And every week you see more and more of young guys like Cooper DeJean, Quinyon Mitchell, Nolan Smith, Nakobe Dean, Jalen Carter and even Zack Baun, who is 27 but a rookie at off-ball linebacker. They leaked a bit late Sunday, but the bottom line is they allowed 215 yards and 15 points on Sunday and over the last four games they allowed 3.6 yards per rushing attempt, 141 passing yards per game, 215 total yards per game and just 45 points – that’s 11.3 per game. That’s remarkable. This is only the third time since 1998 that they have held four teams in a row to 280 yards or less. To go from what we saw last year to this? Incredible. And they will only get better.
8. I don’t talk about Josh Sweat enough, but he’s playing at a Pro Bowl level again, and it’s great to see. Sweat had two more sacks on Sunday, along with three quarterback hits, two tackles for loss and even a pass knockdown. In the last five games he has five sacks, five tackles for loss and seven QB hits. This is the Josh Sweat who made the Pro Bowl in 2021 and had 11 sacks in 2022. Watching him play like that, it’s hard to imagine him going 12 consecutive games without a sack, from Week 11 last year through Week 3 this year. But he’s back to playing as we’re used to, and another interesting decision for Howie Roseman. Sweat isn’t signed after this year and he’s only 27. Probably a good idea to keep him for a few more years.
9. Looking ahead to next week, the Eagles head to Dallas, where they have lost six straight games, four of them by 20 or more points. The last time they had an extended losing streak in North Texas was from 1966 through 1978, when they lost thirteen in a row. This is not a good Cowboys team. They are 3-4 and 0-3 at home and have lost three in a row to the Lions, 49ers and Falcons. They’re dealing with a slew of injuries and the bottom line is it’s time for the Eagles to win in Dallas, something they haven’t done since the 2017 championship season. The Eagles are the better team at every stage. Every phase. This isn’t the Cowboys team that went 36-15 over the last three years. The Eagles have shown they can win on the road – 4-1 away to the Linc, including the game against São Paulo – and this is a must-win game. The Cowboys have embarrassed the Eagles lately. The Eagles are just 9-15 and 2-4 under Nick Sirianni over the last twelve years. It’s time to put that to rest. Time to get out there and kick their ass.
10. I give Jahan Dotson so much credit. I can’t imagine the pressure he felt after the Eagles traded a third-round pick to Washington for him in August and all he had to show in his first seven games was 35 yards. But you can tell the kid is a class act. He never got down on himself, he never complained about not hitting enough goals, he never blamed anyone else for his lack of production. And when AJ Brown had to leave the game early in the third quarter, Dotson showed up with a circus catch of 36 yards — more yards on one catch than he had in his first 7 ½ games as an Eagle. Dotson showed tremendous focus and concentration, securing the ball after it bounced off cornerback Tyson Campbell and then fighting for a few extra yards. Big game at a big moment. Dotson was talented enough to be picked 16th overall in the draft just two years ago, and he’s signed through 2025, so he’ll be around for at least another year. Games like Sunday’s only give Kellen Moore and Jalen Hurts more confidence in Dotson, and I expect Dotson to see more big plays in the second half of the season. They’ll need it.
Subscribe to Eagle Eye wherever you get your podcasts:
Apple Podcasts | YouTube music | Spotify| Stitcher | Simplecast | RSS | Check out YouTube
