Washington shows blueprint to beating Eagles in first loss of season

There is no rollercoaster like an NFL season.

On Monday morning the Eagles woke up at 8-0 and a double-digit favorite over their divisional rivals.

Things certainly won’t feel the same Tuesday morning.

The Eagles didn’t turn in anywhere close to the dominating performance everyone expected on Monday night against the Washington Commanders, and for the first time all season, it looked like the blueprint to beat the Eagles was shown to a national audience in the 26-21 loss, their first of the season.

The blueprint? Run the ball agains a bad run defense and keep the Eagles offense on the sideline by controlling the clock.

The main issue on Monday night against Washington, and what could be a fatal flaw moving forward, was the run defense.

The Commanders didn’t hit any huge runs against the Eagles, but they ran it well enough to move the ball down the field and keep the Eagles offense on the sideline. Washington held the for just over 23 minutes in the first half compared to just over six minutes for the Eagles.

The result? The Eagles were trailing at halftime, 20-14, for the first time all season.

Washington kept it up in the third quarter. After a quick three-and-out by the Eagles offense Washington went on an eight-plus minute drive, ending it with just a field goal, but with over half of the quarter taken away from the Eagles’ offense.

A huge play in the game in the fourth quarter when the Eagles had the ball. After a long completion, Dallas Goedert fumbled the ball, but there was an obvious facemask penalty during the fumble. The facemask call can’t be reviewed, and with the ball clearly fumbled, Washington got the ball on the Eagle’ 34-yard line. The defense did hold them to a field goal, but the Eagles went from down two-points with the ball close to the 50, to being down five points.

Turnovers for the first time all season were a major issue for the Eagles. They turned the ball over 3 times on Monday night, equalling the total they had all season. The Eagles likely won’t go from one of the best in the NFL at protecting the ball to one of the worse, but the loss did highlight how much the Eagles have been relying on winning the turnover by a margin that was always going to be very hard to keep up.

The scariest part for the Eagles moving forward? Washington isn’t even that good running the ball. Washington came into the game 16th in the NFL in average yards-per-carry. They haven’t been able to run on teams like they did against the Eagles. (By the way — next week’s opponent, Indianapolis Colts, is No. 1).

An even scarier part for the Eagles is there is no clear answer to fixing the run. The defensive tackles they have — Fletcher Cox, Javon Hargrave, Milton Williams, and Marlon Tuipulotu — are not strong against the run. Rookie Jordan Davis is still recovering from an ankle injury and expecting him to come back and completely fix the run defense might be asking a lot.

Another scary reality? As great as the Eagles have been this season, they don’t have the cushion many would expect with an 8-1 record. The Minnesota Vikings only have one loss. The New York Giants only have two losses — and still play the Eagles twice. With eight more games to be played, despite their stellar record, the Eagles simply don’t have many chances to slip up before they are in danger of not being on top of the NFC East.

Not finishing at the top of the NFC East this season very well could be a huge difference when it comes to playoff seeding. If the Eagles don’t win the division the highest they can finish is 5th in the NFC playoff seeding. That means not only will they not have home field advantage, but they might not even have a home playoff game at all in their attempt to go to the Super Bowl.

Before the season, if you were told the Eagles were going to start 8-1, you would have expected the No. 1 seed to be all but wrapped up. And they very well could still end up as the top seed in the NFC. One loss does not ruin the season by any stretch.

Regardless, Monday night was a scary reminder to the team that despite playing nearly perfect football, they still have a long way to go before they accomplish clinching that No. 1 seed that once felt like a lock — and they are going to need to fix the run defense to end up as the top seed

https://www.audacy.com/94wip/sports/eagles/washington-shows-blueprint-to-beat-eagles-in-1st-loss

The blueprint has been there all year. Run the ball against us as we can't stop it and it limits our offense. We then get behind and in that situation have to throw to get back in the game.