October 14, 2024
Colleen Claggett/for PhillyVoice
A.J. Brown #11 of the Philadelphia Eagles reacts after making a catch during a NFL football game between the Cleveland Browns and the Philadelphia Eagles at Lincoln Financial Field on October 13, 2024 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
The Eagles disappointed on Sunday.
Listed as high as 9.5-point favorites by many betting outlets after their bye week prior, the Eagles barely skirted to a 20-16 win over one of the NFL's worst teams.
They left a lot of meat on the bone against the Browns in Week 6, with their still slowly moving offense and imperfect defense — and extremely flawed coaching and scheme — giving fans fits every weekend.
But there were signs of life. Maybe this is a playoff team after all.
Fully acknowledging the apt criticisms of a very frustrating Eagles season so far, here are four reasons for some optimism and positivity as the Eagles head into Week 7 with a 3-2 record.
They don't deserve any sort of irrational confidence after their Week 6 win — but it was a win. A win the Eagles couldn't get against the Falcons, against whom they blew what felt like a comfortable lead a few weeks ago. And a win they were no where near getting in Tampa two weeks ago.
The Birds hung on in a close game and regardless of how awful the opponent was on paper, the team should grow from the experience and that's key if they hope to play themselves into contenders.
"It's hard to win," Eagles head coach Nick Sirianni, who was the subject of some harsh criticism himself after the game, said. "What we’ll do is we'll stay hungry, we’ll stay humble, and we’ll look at the things we messed up and we’ve got to fix. Did we play like a championship-level team today? No, not by any means. We had mistakes that, first and foremost, always are going to be on me.
"We'll get those cleaned up. We'll be hard on the guys tomorrow, you know, based off those things, and we'll celebrate the things we did well, and we’ll be hard on the things we didn't do well."
If Sirianni does indeed have enough self-awareness to know that they were damn lucky to get out with a win the way they struggled on offense all afternoon, perhaps it will spark a little more ingenuity going forward. The Eagles will still be looking for their first first quarter points of the entire season against the Giants next Sunday.
Once again, the offense the Browns have been sporting this season is truly awful. But the Eagles defense actually played the way it was supposed to against them. They did not allow a touchdown to Cleveland's offense and the rest of the stat sheet shows a pretty impressive performance:
• The Browns went 3-for-12 on third down
• The Browns had just 244 total yards — 144 passing and 100 rushing
• DeShaun Watson had a meager 5.1 yards per pass
• The pass rush sacked Watson five times and hit him 10 times
This is the way a defense is expected to play against a bad offense. They will face a few more of them this season.
The Eagles don't have a chance when they are missing AJ Brown and DeVonta Smith. But the duo was back for Week 6 and could be credited with the victory, almost single handedly. Brown came back from missing three games with a hamstring injury to post 166 yards and a touchdown on six catches, including this apparent impromptu game clinching bomb:
AJ Brown in his return:
— Underdog NFL (@Underdog__NFL) October 13, 2024
9 targets
6 receptions
116 yards
1 TD
1 game-ending catch
He's back back.pic.twitter.com/7zhqR1sFBH
“He's really good at catching the deep ball," Jalen Hurts said of Brown. "He tracks it well. He knows how to use his body well. He's very strong, and I think he's gotten faster, too, so he made some great catches.”
Smith also had a touchdown in his return after missing a game with a concussion. He had a 45-yard touchdown in the first half, and eventually finished with 64 yards on the day. If the offense has these two receivers healthy they can always score.
Philadelphia was the only NFC East team to win in Week 6, and they are just a half game behind Washington for first place. And they'll have some winnable games as their slate continues:
| Opponent | Record |
| at Giants | 2-4 |
| at Bengals | 2-4 |
| vs Jaguars | 1-5 |
| at Cowboys | 3-3 |
| vs. Commanders | 4-2 |
| at Rams | 1-4 |
Besides division rivals the Commanders, the Eagles won't face another team currently holding a winning record until December, when they play the high-powered Ravens in Baltimore. After that, they host the lowly Panthers before finishing the year against the Steelers at home — followed by games against all three NFC East teams to end the season.
The schedule is, by opponent win percentage, the fourth easiest remaining in the entire NFL.
Follow Evan on Twitter:@evan_macy
Like us on Facebook: PhillyVoice Sports
