The Commanders nearly beat the Eagles

[Reverend Conehead]

I rooted for the Commanders, then took a long cleansing shower.

Me too. Then again, I would root for Darth Vader if he were playing against the Eagles.

 

[Reverend Conehead]

Not slinging this at you, but I find it interesting that when a team almost beats the Eagles, they are good. However, when the Cowboys loses to a "bad team" or lets a bad team hang around, Cowboys are bad. Dallas beats a good team, that team is bad. Good team beats Dallas, Dallas is bad. I guess the Cowboys just can't win.

It's the same with the Cowboys or any NFL team. The difference between the elite NFL teams and the cellar dwellers isn't as big as people would have you believe. I find it really interesting to watch on Youtube the 1989 Cowboys. At the time, I watched those games totally half-assed (if I could even get the game). Back then, I saw both Jerry Jones and Jimmy Johnson as stupid country bumpkins who had bought the team, but had no earthly clue what they were doing. I figured that we were the new '72 Oilers or '76 Bucs, and we wouldn't even have a winning season until decades later. I had no idea that Johnson really, really knew what he was doing. Today, when I watch those '89 games in hindsight, I notice what a ton of talent they had, despite not being a winner yet. In '89, the team already had a lot of the players that would be on the Super Bowl teams. There were also a few holdover Super Bowl 12 champions such as Too-Tall Jones. It's really interesting to watch them. I noticed that they didn't simply get steamrolled. Even back then, before Johnson was done building up his team, that '89 team had some abilities to make plays. When watching with hindsight, you know which players would stick around and become champions, and which ones were just filling a position for the time being.
...
At the same time, I don't like watching games with rose-colored glasses, assuming it's our year. The truth is, the league is insanely competitive, and there's no guaranteed formula for winning a championship. Sure, there are plenty of things a team can do to be in the running. Win in the trenches, protect your QB, build a great running game, stifle your opponent with good defense. These are all things that help a team to be of high quality, but none of them guarantee a championship. A really good organization can build a high-quality team based on fundamental principles. That team has a shot at a championship. A shot. There's no such thing as a shoe-in. In '92, when we won Super Bowl 27, there was tremendous competition in the league that year. The 49ers and the Eagles had really good teams that year. A different bounce of the football, and one of those teams could have ended up with the Lombardi instead of us.
...
There's a reason why no coach or team has ever won 5-straight Super Bowls. The league is just way too competitive for that. In the 70s, Tom Landry put together outstanding teams year after year. Every year, except '74, the Cowboys were in the running to maybe win it all. They did so twice. With a few slightly different bounces of the ball, maybe Landry's Cowboys win 4 or 5 Super Bowls. Or maybe they don't win any. The competition is so fierce and so close that you end up with a handful of contending teams, and one team wins it all, often with the help of some luck. Or maybe a great team just has crap for luck. Bud Grant built outstanding Vikings teams year after year, but somehow it was just never their lucky year. I don't think Landry stood head and shoulders above Grant, but Landry ended up with two Lombardis to Grant's zero. Chuck Knoll ended up with 4 of them to Landry's 2, but I don't think Knoll was ultra superior to Landry.
...
But, back to your points. It actually IS an accomplishment to beat any of these teams. The Cowboys deserve credit for any of their victories. I will say that a victory over the 49ers would mean more than our victory over the Giants or the Jets. It's because the 9ers really have it together. This year, they're one of the teams that has a legitimate shot at the Lombardi. But they ain't no shoe-in. No one is. They can be beaten.

 

[KingCorcoran]

I have more non Dallas games than I have in years. Buffalo is legit. SF is every bit as good as people say. Miami's offense is frequently electric.

Philly . . . has been rather meh. They are entering one of the most brutal schedules I have ever seen. I don't think it is going to go well. Jalen Hurts is cold this year and looks more like his earlier career throwing than last year. Their defense has been shaky at times.

The Cowboys schedule is more difficult than Philly’s. SF, Buffalo, Miami on the road, the Eagles get all three at home.

 

[doomsday9084]

The Cowboys schedule is more difficult than Philly’s. SF, Buffalo, Miami on the road, the Eagles get all three at home.

Dallas' schedule is pretty bad too but Philly gets to mix in @LAR, @Sea and @KC into that batch. Their next easy game will be Christmas day at home against the Giants. Dallas at least gets to break up its run with a game @Carolina and at home against NY.

 

[GimmeTheBall!]

Me too. Then again, I would root for Darth Vader if he were playing against the Eagles.

You have a point there, dear reverend.

 

[MRV52]

If they are frauds, what does that make us with our loss to a team who probably wont win more than 3 games this season? Eagles are a not as good as last year, but to say they are frauds is a bit of a stretch. Dallas should not take them lightly and need to go into each game against them prepared for battle in the trenches, which hopefully we come out on top.

They are very lucky and could very easily be 1-3. When we play them we are going to kick the hell out of them.

 

[MRV52]

They played like this last year too and ended up in the SB.

This is 2023. They will not win the East.

 

[mcmvp]

Here's what we know from that game:
1. Washington should be taken seriously. They're a capable team.
2. Philly ain't invincible!
3. Washington has provided the blueprint for beating the Eagles. It involves grinding it out on the ground and playing good defense.

lol at how many times those words have been said. And no… I’m not talking about just the Eagles. I’m talking about any team in any game. Too many fans assume that every team plays the exact same way against every other team. The NFL does not work that way. Never has.

 

[TheMarathonContinues]

This is 2023. They will not win the East.

They are currently #1. I don’t know who will win the East I’m just pointing out this is what they do. They can win games but playing particularly well thanks to their offensive line.

 

[Reverend Conehead]

lol at how many times those words have been said. And no… I’m not talking about just the Eagles. I’m talking about any team in any game. Too many fans assume that every team plays the exact same way against every other team. The NFL does not work that way. Never has.

Teams never attempt to duplicate other teams' success. No one ever tried to copy the West Coast Offense or the '85 Bears' defense. When Landry brought back the shotgun in '75, he wasn't copied by any single team, nope. The shotgun was only used in the '75 season, and only by the Dallas Cowboys, and has never been used since ... on account of (as you say) there isn't any copying at all going on in this league. The shotgun was a one-hit wonder and has never been copied by any single team since then. You can't turn on the TV at all and ever see a single play run in the shotgun. Because, as you say, there isn't any copying at all going on in this league. What happens is a team does something successful, and every single other team says, "Gosh, that sure is successful, but I don't wanna do it that way. I wanna wanna wanna wanna do it my way." That's why the shotgun, the West Coast Offense, the Run'n'Shoot, the 46 defense, the 4 3 defense, the 4 3 flex defense, and the 3 4 defenses have never been copied even one single time. Every single one of these schemes has only been done by one team and one coach. Every single other coach has seen success and has said, "Whelp, that shore did work, but I would be too embarrassed to try to duplicate someone else's success." And that's why only Landry's '75 Cowboys have ever used the shotgun, and no one else has ever made any single attempt to make it work for them. It's virtually unheard of in today's game. Thanks for clarifying that there's no such thing as copying in the NFL. Doesn't happen. Nopers, ain't no chance that such a thing could ever happen. "The NFL does not work that way. Never has." Yup, you're 100 percent correct, for sure guaranteed and positively without any doubt whatsoever. No NFL coach has ever made any attempt to duplicate the success of another one. Just look at the lack of success of the shotgun on any team other than the '75 Cowboys. It's never worked for any other team, so now, every coach in the NFL is saying, "Whelp, thet thar shotgun shore did work well fer thet Landry feller, but I ain't a never a gonna do thet on account of I ain't no copycat -- so there."
...
"Too many fans assume that every team plays the exact same way against every other team." <=== Straw man, straw man, straw man. If you can't address the point that someone else made, just make **** up and put it in their mouth, and hope no one notices. Well, I noticed, and so can every person here. I never said that every team succeeds in exactly duplicating what other teams do. Every team doesn't have Elway, Montana, Lawrence Taylor, or Too-Tall Jones. So ... duuuuuuhhhhh ... they can't all do everything the same way. However, what does happen is some coach comes up with a system that works, and therefore another coach attempts to use that model as a model for success, adapting it as necessary to fit his team. Some of them succeed, and some of them don't, but attempts to duplicate another team's success happen all the time. It's not a case where coaches are saying, "Well dawg mah cats, thet West Coast Offense shore did work fer Bill Walsh's 49ers, but I ain't got no Joe Montana, so we ain't a gonna attempt that."
....
But I'm sure I've got it totally wrong. The tape off the Washington/Eagles game now exists, and every single coach with the Eagles on his schedule is saying, "Aaaahhhh, we ain't botherin' to watch that stupid game, even though the Commanders almost won it. None of that info could possibly help us. Washington has Sam Howell as their quarterback. We ain't got him, so we ain't a gonna try anything at all that them thar Commanders did. Howell is the greatest quarterback who's ever played this game; he's so great that Washington might go 8 and 9. We've only got [Dak Prescott or Brock Purdy or Dan Marino or Johnny Unitas -- or whoever they've got], so we're not going to watch the tape at all. There's nothing at all there that we can duplicate, nopers. What we'll do is drink a bunch of tequila the night before, and show up hungover and expect to win."
...
But I'm sure I have it all wrong. Thanks for clearing up the undeniable fact that no team ever attempts to copy the success of another. Now, thanks to you, I know that no team has ever tried to copy another one, and that no team can ever learn anything of value from watching film. In fact, I have the Cowboys' practice field and classrooms bugged, and I just listened to the tapes. McCarthy was saying to the team, "We were going to watch film of the Eagles to see what other teams have done successfully against them, but I was just reading on this Cowboys fan forum where this mcmvp dude said it's a waste of time to do that. We don't have identical clones of the Commanders playing for us; therefore, any attempt to duplicate what worked for them will be futile. In practice, we'll just run into a bunch of tackling dummies, and then take the field and hope for the best." Okay, I admit it. McCarthy clearly agrees with you. I'm sure glad I bugged the Cowboy complex so now I know.
...
Reviewing film is worthless. There's nothing at all in there that can help a coach to prepare. Just have your team slam into tackling dummies and yell, "We gon beat choo Eagles" and that will be some first-class prep. I sure hope McCarthy sticks to that idea. We would never want anyone to watch any film or anything.

 

[BoyzBlaster]

How'd you get from my comment that I was offended?
I just happen to notice the back-and-forth you, 'The Marathon' and another CZer had yesterday in a thread about the term. I didn't even enter into the banter. I just remembered it when 'TMC' used it in his comment today.
It's a southern colloquialism /term. Every part of the country has their own -- example "Youse guys", "ain't, "lotsa", "hon", and "bro", and so on.
People from other parts of the nation hear them and think they're odd or irritating. None of that bothers me.
Just shows how different people speak across the U.S.
Part of our nation's fabric.

Does this mean you are going to start addressing posters as "hon"?

 

[Calvin2Tony2Emmitt2Julius]

Here's what we know from that game:
1. Washington should be taken seriously. They're a capable team.
2. Philly ain't invincible!
3. Washington has provided the blueprint for beating the Eagles. It involves grinding it out on the ground and playing good defense.

3. That's the key to beating anybody. Running the ball and playing good defense. But that type of football has been deemed outdated. Now if your a powerhouse passing team fine, but everyone doesn't have the personnel to do that. Some Teams don't have the QB, some teams don't have the receivers, most don't have the Offensive line.

 

[popp1234]

It's the same with the Cowboys or any NFL team. The difference between the elite NFL teams and the cellar dwellers isn't as big as people would have you believe. I find it really interesting to watch on Youtube the 1989 Cowboys. At the time, I watched those games totally half-assed (if I could even get the game). Back then, I saw both Jerry Jones and Jimmy Johnson as stupid country bumpkins who had bought the team, but had no earthly clue what they were doing. I figured that we were the new '72 Oilers or '76 Bucs, and we wouldn't even have a winning season until decades later. I had no idea that Johnson really, really knew what he was doing. Today, when I watch those '89 games in hindsight, I notice what a ton of talent they had, despite not being a winner yet. In '89, the team already had a lot of the players that would be on the Super Bowl teams. There were also a few holdover Super Bowl 12 champions such as Too-Tall Jones. It's really interesting to watch them. I noticed that they didn't simply get steamrolled. Even back then, before Johnson was done building up his team, that '89 team had some abilities to make plays. When watching with hindsight, you know which players would stick around and become champions, and which ones were just filling a position for the time being.
...
At the same time, I don't like watching games with rose-colored glasses, assuming it's our year. The truth is, the league is insanely competitive, and there's no guaranteed formula for winning a championship. Sure, there are plenty of things a team can do to be in the running. Win in the trenches, protect your QB, build a great running game, stifle your opponent with good defense. These are all things that help a team to be of high quality, but none of them guarantee a championship. A really good organization can build a high-quality team based on fundamental principles. That team has a shot at a championship. A shot. There's no such thing as a shoe-in. In '92, when we won Super Bowl 27, there was tremendous competition in the league that year. The 49ers and the Eagles had really good teams that year. A different bounce of the football, and one of those teams could have ended up with the Lombardi instead of us.
...
There's a reason why no coach or team has ever won 5-straight Super Bowls. The league is just way too competitive for that. In the 70s, Tom Landry put together outstanding teams year after year. Every year, except '74, the Cowboys were in the running to maybe win it all. They did so twice. With a few slightly different bounces of the ball, maybe Landry's Cowboys win 4 or 5 Super Bowls. Or maybe they don't win any. The competition is so fierce and so close that you end up with a handful of contending teams, and one team wins it all, often with the help of some luck. Or maybe a great team just has crap for luck. Bud Grant built outstanding Vikings teams year after year, but somehow it was just never their lucky year. I don't think Landry stood head and shoulders above Grant, but Landry ended up with two Lombardis to Grant's zero. Chuck Knoll ended up with 4 of them to Landry's 2, but I don't think Knoll was ultra superior to Landry.
...
But, back to your points. It actually IS an accomplishment to beat any of these teams. The Cowboys deserve credit for any of their victories. I will say that a victory over the 49ers would mean more than our victory over the Giants or the Jets. It's because the 9ers really have it together. This year, they're one of the teams that has a legitimate shot at the Lombardi. But they ain't no shoe-in. No one is. They can be beaten.

Well said!

 

[_sturt_]

I'm with Clarence. And answering the question, Eagles 25, Patriots 20.

 

[bottleKids]

They are very lucky and could very easily be 1-3. When we play them we are going to kick the hell out of them.

I hope you are right.

 

[plasticman]

Never evaluate an NFC East team by a game they play against a division rival.

 

[meddleroidz]

didnt you lose to ARI? the r-e-d-s-k-i-n-s always played us tough for as long as i can remember and we played them tough when we were average in the 90s

 

[visionary]

When are people going to realize that the Eagles are nowhere as good as last year. That team are frauds and very lucky they are 4-0. They could have easily lost 2 or 3 of those games.

Got to SB last year
4-0 this year

Total frauds

 

[MRV52]

Got to SB last year
4-0 this year

Total frauds

You will see when they play the tough part of their schedule and against us.

 

[DB_Cooper]

That game says more about the Commanders than it does the Eagles. All the Commanders have needed is some consistency at QB and they can be formidable. Great front four. Decent set of skill players on offense. I wouldn’t be surprised if we split with them. I don’t like it but it could happen.