Will The Eagles Rally Around A Lambasted Nick Sirianni?

Nick Sirianni is under fire. Not just in Philly, but around the NFL. After his antics on the field, and in the post-game press conference this week, he became a national punching bag. People called him a fool, people called him a clown. Few people around the league have received more ridicule than Nick Sirianni this week.

That is obviously not a great thing. But could it be the kick this team needs? They have not played like a team on fire out of the gate. In fact, they played with some of the same lifelessness we saw last year. Not to say there is not any effort, but they are not living up to their potential. Maybe seeing their head coach drug through the mud will be the kick in the pants they need.

That is what Barrett Brooks thinks will happen. He joined The Best Show Ever on Monday and talked about how while it was not a great look for Sirianni, he thinks it is the type of thing that will get his players fired up.

We already saw some players do that. Brandon Graham stood up for his coach. His former player Jason Kelce stuck up for him. Even Jalen Hurts, whose relationship with Sirianni has been rocky, defended him.

We have also seen pro athletes use much dumber things as motivation. Anybody who followed Michael Jordan's career knows he invented slights to get that extra motivation. Someone could just look at him and he would make up whole stories in his head to pretend that person had insulted him. To the point "and I took that personally" became a Michael Jordan meme off the back of the 'Last Dance' documentary.

A few years ago we saw DK Metcalf twist Jim Schwartz saying that he could be on Calvin Johnson's level into an insult. We saw the Chiefs pretend like they were underdogs even though they were Super Bowl favorites. Athletes will do anything they can to motivate themselves.

So yeah, the Eagles player could absolutely twist this into a motivating factor. They could see their head coach being called a clown, and rally to support him. Despite the team's struggles, he does seem to be loved by most of his players. It doesn't excuse Nick Sirianni's behavior, but it could turn out well for them.

We will see what kind of impact, if any, it has on them when they play the Giants this weekend. Hopefully, they show more life than they have over the first 5 games, because right now despite an ok 3-2 record, things do not look good for this team.

A win is a win. We told ourselves that so many times last year, we started to believe it. But those ugly Eagles wins eventually turned into ugly losses. And now it carried into this season despite the new Coordinators and some new faces on the roster. Their latest ugly win came over the Browns.

Related: Eagles Get The Week 6 Win, But Questions Linger On Offense

They did get the win. It is more than you can say about any other team in their division. But squeaking out a win vs the now 1-5 Browns is not going to make anyone feel better. They were 9.5-point favorites over this team. The expectation was that they would demolish them. But this offense, with all the weapons they have, crawled across the finish line, managing just 20 points.

This offense was talented last year. It got even better this year with the addition of Saquon Barkley. Yet somehow it is still underperforming. The Browns' defense is not Swiss Cheese, but a roster this talented should score more than 20 points.

The defense meanwhile looked great. They allowed just 3 field goals and held the Browns to 244 points. They also finally got pressure, specifically from the edge where both Bryce Huff and Nolan Smith got in on sacks. But it is also the Browns, the worst offense in the league. They deserve credit for doing what they need to do, but it is hard to crown them for doing what every team has done to the Browns.

Still, they got the win and kept themselves in the running for the NFC and the NFC East. With the schedule coming up, they could be 7-2 when they go into the Thursday Night Game vs the Commanders. But they don't look right, just like they didn't look right last year when they were 10-1.

So what should we take away? Were there any positive takeaways to be had? How bad are they in the 1st quarter right now?

Let's start with a positive, Jalen Hurts had a turnover-free game. 0 interceptions, and 0 fumbles. It is something we haven't seen in a long time. Hurts stats may not jump off the page, but he had a pretty decent game despite the team scoring just 20 points. His TD pass to AJ Brown was a thing of beauty, as was the pass to Brown that sealed the win. Jonathan Vilma might have called it an underthrow, but it was placed right into Brown's breadbasket where he was the only player who could make a play on it.

His season so far has been underwhelming. Yes, he was without his best weapons, but he also should be able to carry the team when those guys are out. The mistakes have been far too common. But we also have seen glimpses of the guy they paid that big contract to. Maybe now that everyone is healthy, they can finally get the offense moving.

Quinyon Mitchell has looked the part in his 1st 5 games so far. On Sunday he had his best game yet. Again, it is the Browns, so take everything with a grain of salt. But even when playing a bad team, you can tell how good an individual player is, and Mitchell was amazing.

He allowed a passer rating of 39.6 when targeted. Deshaun Watson had a passer rating over 90, so it is not just that Watson was bad. He was efficient, just not productive. But Mitchell was drawing some of the toughest assignments on the team, especially once Slay was ruled out, and he shut his side of the field down, allowing just 1 catch for 10 years. Mitchell should have had his 1st interception, but CJ Gardner Johnson ran into him stealing that chance.

If you are looking for a bright spot, Mitchell is it. Cooper DeJean also looked pretty great. The Eagles very well may have found their CB tandem for at least the next 4 years.

The Eagles have played 5 games this season. That is 5 chances to score in the first quarter, 75 minutes of game. In those 75 minutes though, they had 13 drives, controlled the clock for 32:39 minutes, and scored 0 points.

Now it should be said that they ended the 1st quarter with the ball in week 1, and then went on to score on that same drive in the 2nd quarter. Vs the Browns, they had the ball to end the 1st quarter and went on the score an FG. But both of those were the 3rd drive of the game. The first two drives have been the real problem. In the first 2 drives of every game, a total of 10 drives, they have 140 yards, 0 points, and 4 turnovers. That is 14 yards a drive. They have 2 Interceptions, a bad snap for a fumble, and a turnover on downs.

Those drives should be their best drives. They are the plays you get to script. But for the Eagles, they are their worst drives of the game every week.

The Eagles D-Line has been a major issue this year. They showed up in week 3 vs the Saints but otherwise had been missing in action the other 3 games. But they showed up vs the Browns. The Browns O-line is a mess, and every team has done this to them, but it was refreshing to see consistent pressure out of this defense.

The Browns had 33 pass-block snaps, the Eagles had 21 pressures. Some of those came on the same snap, but there was consistent pressure. And it came from places we hadn't seen yet this year, Bryce Huff and Nolan Smith got sacks. Well in Huff's case, a half sack, but still, it is .5 more sacks than he had in the first 4 games. Jalen Carter had another monster game with 5 pressures and a sack.

We need to see it more, and vs better O-Lines, but it was a very encouraging sign.

We didn't need to see AJ brown play again to know how much they missed him. But even if the offense overall was underwhelming on Sunday, he was not. AJ Brown came back after missing 3 games and looked as good as a WR can look. 6 catches, 116 yards, and a TD. Including as we mentioned the great play that sealed the win.

But perhaps even more impressive, he averaged 4.5 yards per route run. YPRR is a stat that does exactly what it sounds like it does. It takes the WRs yards, vs how many routes they ran, and averages it out. It tells you how impactful that WR is, taking into account how much playing them they get. 4.5 is a very good number. For context, 6 weeks in, Nico Collins leads the league with 3.61 YPRR.

That part of the Eagles game we know works. Hurts and Brown have as good a connection as any QB/WR duo. The Eagles just need to figure out how to get everything else to work.

This Eagles offense should be great. It has the talent to be a top 5 offense. But 5 games in, they look average. They average only 21.2 pts per game. That is 18th in the league. not only are they not a top offense, but they are also a bottom-half offense. They are 10th in yards per game at 366.8. Something is wrong. The talent is there, which makes it a coaching issue. Whether it is Nick or Kellen Moore, they need to get more out of this talented roster. You can say they have missed some of their players, but they had both WRs this week and still struggled to score. If this offense is not elite, this team isn't winning anything.