GLENDALE, AZ - If Matt Prater is healthy on Sunday, the Eagles are in overtime and in peril of losing for the first time in the 2022 season, perhaps another chapter in the organization’s tortured history at StateFarm Stadium or Kliff Kingsbury’s strange dominion over the NFC East.
Instead, Matt Ammendola was disappointing his third city inside of two calendar years by pushing a 43-yard field goal so far right in a pristine kicking environment it might have landed in New Mexico.
The Eagles survived with a 20-17 win over a frustrated Arizona team that hasn’t won at home since October 24 of last year, a skid that reached eight games with the setback.
"I don't have an explanation, but like I said all along, to me we've lost three this season," Kingsbury said. "I know what it is overall, but each year is different and we've got to find a way to win at home. We play really good on the road but for whatever reason we haven't got it done here. "
Turn 180 degrees from that and you might find A.J. Brown, who was asked about the Eagles' recent futility in Maricopa County leading up to the game before looking at the reporter offering the query quizzically.
The first-year Eagles receiver spent his college days at Ole Miss and his first three NFL seasons in Nashville, so Philadelphia’s five-game hiccup at the Jiffy Pop-shaped spaceship plucked into the middle of the desert or Kingbury’s previous 6-0 mastery over the NFC East had exactly zero relevance to him.
The moral here is you can cherry-pick statistics to fit predisposed narratives.
Maybe it was 0-5 or 6-0 for you or perhaps it was the Eagles’ dominance in second quarters this season, which slowed on Sunday, or the Cards’ haplessness in the first 15 minutes, which didn’t.
What can’t be manipulated is the degree of difficulty it takes to win in the NFL.
“I said they were really good so here we are after a close game talking about the looks that they gave us,” Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts said. “I think they flew to the ball. They’re very physical. They play very physical defensively. Up front they gave us some different exotic looks and they did a good job with their scheme.
“I think we were just able to kind of find a way.”
Only one team has found a way in each of the first five weeks and the Eagles have done it in many different ways.
Nick Sirianni's team gouged Detroit with unscheduled offense, bamboozled Minnesota’s soft zone defensive schemes with Hurts’ improved accuracy, smothered Carson Wentz and Washington with a stifling aggressive defense, turned Trevor Lawrence and the Jaguars into a turnover machine with the help of Mother Nature, and now outlasted Kyler Murray and the Cards thanks to an ill-advised slide and the inadequacies of a practice-squad kicker.
- MORE EAGLES
- Three pivotal plays in the Eagles' win over the Cardinals
- Offensive line depth keeps Eagles afloat against Cardinals
- Handing out 10 awards from the Eagles-Cardinals game
Maybe No. 5 doesn’t read as impressively as the first four weeks but it was why Sirianni arrived at the post-game podium with his now-patented slap and a “let’s go.”
Everything about the NFL is contextual.
And the context of the 2022 Eagles is the 17-round fight marches on with Dallas week, a game with first place in the NFC East on the line.
When the wheels are up for Philadelphia and Camelback Mountain is in the rear-view, the real takeaway should be the Cardinals themselves, however.
Arizona was the Eagles in 2021, the last unbeaten in the NFL. That run ended at 7-0 when the Cardinals lost to Green Bay on October 28 and since that day Arizona is 6-10 with the eight-game futility at StateFarm.
The minute you take winning for granted in this league is the first step toward losing.
John McMullen is a contributor to PhillyVoice.com and covers the Eagles and the NFL for Sports Illustrated and JAKIB Sports. He’s also the co-host of “Birds 365,” a daily streaming show covering the Eagles and the NFL, and the host of “Extending the Play” on AM1490 in South Jersey. You can reach him at jmcmullen44@gmail.com. Follow John on Twitter here.