Eagles Questions For 2009

Ten years of Reid has been pretty good overall

Another NFC CHAMPIONSHIP appearance, and another loss. How does this move forward? Isn't this the sign of consistency? How do they get over the last hump?

Interestingly he brought in Andy Reid a year after he bought the Eagles. Andy studied under Mike Holmgren in Green Bay as one of his Assistant Coaches. Ironically Holmgren was a spin off from a 49ers staff during part of the Niners reign of power. Holmgren also had 2 Super Bowl appearances to his name before Reid left his tutelage. His Packers won Super Bowl XXXI over New England in 1996.

So Laurie got what he wanted in many ways. The Eagles have been a West Coast style offense and have won a fair share of games under Reid. His Eagles record thus far is 96-62-1 in regular season games. He is 9-6 in the post season, 1-4 in NFC Championship games and 0-1 in Super Bowl games, reaching the NFC Championship game 5 times. 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, and 2008, a Super Bowl appearance in 2004, NFC EAST Division Champs in 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, and 2006. He was Coach of the year in 2002.

Overall I would give Andy an A- or a B+ as a head coach thus far in his career. And the good thing is he is only 50 years old. But there are concerns I have with Reid also.

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1- Andy is overly obsessed or committed to throwing the football. Of course he has an above average quarterback to do so. But this has gotten the Eagles into trouble at times. Especially when they play the leagues better defenses. Those teams just dare the Eagles to throw and Donovan McNabb will throw for 49 times, but for a 5 yard per attempt average. Teams will give you that all day when you can't run the ball.

2- Andy has way to much say in personnel in my opinion. To his credit the Eagles have occasionally drafted some good to border line All-Pro players. The bona fide picks are in bold. The others are quality contributors or the jury is still out but they have potential.

• McNabb in 1999
• Correll Buckhalter 2001
• Lito Shepperd, Sheldon Brown, Brian Westbrook 2002
• LJ Smith 2003 – I hesitate to brag about this pick
• Shawn Andrews 2004
• Mike Patterson, Trent Cole, Todd Herremans, Sean Considine 2005
• Brodrick Bunkley, Chris Gocong, Jason Avant, Omar Gaither, Max Jean-Gillis 2006
• Stewart Bradley, Brett Celek, Victor Abiamiri, Kevin Kolb 2007
• DeSean Jackson, Trevor Laws 2008

Now if you consider the rest of the picks during his heading up the draft, you will find a pathetic list of flops. You need more than this from the draft. Make no mistake Andy has the final say even though he is not listed as General Manager. Anyone and everyone who is near the team has reported this. Andy needs to let the GM and the GM's staff make the picks. Andy needs to get out of the way on draft day.

Actually the fact he is successful despite not building through a series of strong drafts, shows he is a coach and not a personnel guy.

3 – Andy needs to let his Offensive Coordinator get more involved also. Andy has thrown the ball an alarming and unprecedented 68% of the time during his years as Eagles head coach! That is absurd.

In other areas if interest, the Eagles will be wise to retain Defensive Coordinator Jim Johnson for as long as he is willing to go on but they better be grooming someone to step in when he steps down. Overall he has delivered with good to great defense. This in fact has kept the team competitive.

Heading into 2009 the Eagles need to address the wide Receiver position STILL! DeSean Jackson was a pleasant surprise and Kevin Curtis is a nice wide out in his own right but the Eagles still lack a legitimate big time wide out. Jason Avant and Hank Baskett have gotten better but they are not the answer. Reggie Brown and Greg Lewis should be demoted or sent packing.

LJ Smith needs to go also. He is talented yes, but he is a spoiled brat. He seems totally unwilling to do what a tight end needs to do. He misses blocking assignments weekly. Celek has outplayed him as a starter on top of that.

The offensive tackle tandem is old. John Runyan and William Thomas need to have a young buck beat them out of their job. Hopefully Shawn Andrews will be back to his old form. He was sorely missed in my opinion.

Brian Westbrook is great but not superman. He will not play 16 games a year. And he needs an alter ego style back to share the backfield. Correll Buckhalter is a nice back-up but his strengths are very similar to Westbrook. The Eagles need a big horse of a back. The short yardage and 3rd down conversions were very bad most of the year. Is Kyle Eckel a legit fullback?

Can Kolb play? I don't think so but we need to see him at times through the season when possible. Reid needs to tell McNabb his job is safe but we need to get Kolb some live work. They need to keep their eyes open on future QB's also.

I think the present linebackers are going to be pretty good. They are still very young. I think the secondary will benefit also from a better linebacker play.

Speaking of secondary, Brian Dawkins adjusted to his slowing legs and proved he can still play some, but for how long? Who is the next safety? Quentin Mikell did well, especially when he became the starter at strong safety. Considine is a depth player quite frankly. Hanson has been a nice extra DB I think though. They could see what teams are willing to give for Lito Shepperd however. I liked the idea of him being the 3rd corner but he was hurt and a big baby in the end.

Special teams were okay overall. Akers rebounded and was good enough. Jackson and Demps did enough to earn another year as returners. Sav Rocca has become a very good punter and has a chance to be a Pro Bowl level punter.

All in all this was still a 9 and 7 team who got hot at the right time. I think lack of depth and a full complement of running backs will make them a 10-6 o 11-5. If they enter next year with the same delusions as this year they may not make it to 8-8.

For now you have to give credit for the positives but not hold back from asking the tough questions.

By Andy Natalie
ProFootball-fans.com Staff Writer