Mob Mentality the Key for Eagles First Test Versus Packers in Survive or Get Whacked Postseason

Ok people Big Games 101 class is in session.  You might want to write this down.  Big games aren’t usually decided by the team that makes the most big plays, they are usually decided by the team that makes the fewest mistakes. Mistakes are often born from inherent flaws.  In the NFL your strengths are what get you to the postseason but your flaws are what get you eliminated. Do you know what else gets you eliminated? Before we get into that here’s a look at today’s Wildcard Round game between the Eagles and Packers in South Philadelphia at a glance.

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The Basics: Packers at Eagles

• Who: Packers (11-6, 5-3 Away) at Eagles (14-3, 8-1 Home)
• When: Sunday 4:30 p.m. ET
• Where: Lincoln Financial Field, Philadelphia, PA
• TV: FOX
• Betting: Eagles -5  Money Line: Eagles -105, Packers -115

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Eagles Need Killer Mindset to Advance

The NFL in a lot of ways is like “this thing of ours.”  The head coach is the boss and each week he puts a hit out on the other team.  The players are the soldiers and they get their orders each week and are expected to carry them out.  And if you get out of line you get whacked.  After the postgame body dismemberment party the winning team might go out and dine together over spaghetti and marinara while the losers get egg noodles with ketchup.  The NFL Playoffs take that mob mentality to the next level.  You flinch and you get whacked and most likely you’re never to been seen again.  Do you think the little Lopez’ little league team were wondering why their manager never showed up to the team banquet?  Maybe because their manager was a hassa, a pig that didn’t fly straight.  Frank Lopez whiffed on a Tony Montana hit.  And scene.  It’s a cut throat life and the winner is usually the one doing the cutting.  Oh and the one who gets Michelle Pfeiffer too.

Fortunately for the Eagles they don’t have too many flaws in their game.  They’re relatively healthy and the starters are rested.  They have the top defense in the league yielding less than 17 points per game and their offense is riddled with superstars and several potential hall of famers.  They are NFL hitmen and they are programmed to execute.

But they’re not a perfect team.  Their kicker struggled from 50 + yards this season and their punter, who was thrust into kick-off duties this year couldn’t find the end zone if the balls had a GPS in them.

At times they let their emotions play with them versus playing with emotion, costing them unnecessary, mind numbingly stupid penalties.  Fortunately for the Eagles none of those flaws ended up costing them wins this year.

You Get Out of Line You Get Whacked

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As I mentioned above, in big games the team that makes the fewest mistakes usually comes out on top.  If you need examples of this you need not look back any further than the National Semi-Final College Football Playoff game between Penn State and Notre Dame last Thursday.  Both teams made big plays, especially in the second half, but clinging to a seven point lead in the waning minutes, the Irish scored on a 55 yards pass from Riley Leonard to Jaden Greathouse. The Penn State cornerback was playing press coverage and basically just fell down as he tried to run with Greathouse.  Then the safety got caught flat footed as Greathouse waltzed into the end zone and just like that the game was tied at 24, with the P.A.T. that followed.  Then after a couple of back and forth series’, Nittany Lions quarterback Drew Allar threw a horrific interception at his own 42 yard line with just :32 seconds left in regulation.  A couple of safe plays later, ND’s Mitch Jeter drilled the game-winning field goal with just :08 seconds left to send the Irish to the National Championship Game.  Penn State got out of line.  Penn State got whacked.

Perhaps an even better example would be Super Bowl 57, a couple of years ago in Glendale, Arizona.  How many times have you heard someone say since then that Jalen Hurts far and away outplayed the Chiefs’ Patrick Mahomes?   Well, not so fast.  Hurts certainly made far more big plays than the three-time Superbowl Champion  that day but he also made the biggest mistake of the game and it ended up costing the Eagles a Super Bowl title.  Leading 21-7 in the second quarter, the Eagles were driving again when they faced a 4th and six at the chiefs 45 yard line.  Hurts kept the ball on a designed run but inexplicably just dropped it and when Kansas City’s Nick Bolton scooped it up and took it back 50 yards for the touchdown, it  turned what looked like a possible 21 point Philly lead into a seven point game, 21-14.  It was, worst case, a 10-14 point swing and it ultimately led to the Birds’ demise that fateful day in the desert.  Of  course it wouldn’t have been a 4th and six if guard Isaac Seamalo didn’t flinch on, what was, a fourth and one Tush Push attempt, that ended up costing the Birds those precious five yards that led to the disaster that ensued.  Jalen and Seumalo and the Birds got out of line.  Jalen, Seamalo and the Birds got whacked.  

But here’s the thing with the 2024 version of this Super Bowl or bust team.  They are loaded with goodfellas, top earners who know their way around a football field. They are a high end mix of through executioners and cleaners.  Much like a goaltender in the NHL who often is called upon  to cancel out the mistakes of the five guys playing in front of him, the Birds are chock full of high-caliber players who are good enough, if not elite enough, to overcome mistakes should they be made on a Sunday, when they are not imposing their second half will.

The Great Eradicator

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The biggest and baddest cleaner that the Eagles employ is the guy who just became the ninth player in NFL history to rush for over 2,000 yards in a season.  Barkley makes Richard “the Ice Man” Kuklinski look like Spider’s bar back.  Saquon Barkley is a generational football player.  Yes, I’m acutely aware of his inexplicable drop in week two that would have sealed another win for the Eagles against the Falcons, but other than that the man has far and away exceeded the hype that preceded his signing here last March and he has constantly and consistently bailed out his team this year with his most of his finest work, his greatest hits – epic highlight reel bursts, explosive, timely and sensational individual efforts that were directly commensurate with the Birds’ success this season, winning 14 games for only the second time in franchise history.

Time and time again, Saquon was the great nullifier and executioner all in one churning out epic performances against the Packers, Saints , Giants, Jaguars, Commanders, Rams and the Cowboys.  He’s a difference maker and he’s made a big difference this season in covering up turnovers, missed kicks, bad penalties and the somewhat anemic passing game at times.

Has Jalen Hurts made some opponents disappear at times this year?   Oh you betcha.  Was it at times a collective effort?  Did A.J. Brown have to dig a hole or two?  You think its the first hole A.J. dug?  Did Smitty have to bring the lime once in a while?   Of course.  But almost every time an opponent got a little out of order, #26 took care of things and a healthy dose of Saquon was always the remedy for a team playing, perhaps, a tad under the weather and needed to infuse a little might to make right.

On the Mount Rushmore of the Eagles’ offensive elite, Saquon Barkley is front and center.  And if he’s able to pick up where he left off in Week 17 against the Cowboys there’s no reason to believe that Sunday’s Wildcard Round Game versus the Packers will be much of a contest by the time the fourth quarter winds it’s way on down.

Of course it doesn’t hurt to have stalwart and opportunistic defense to hold down the fort at times until the offensive reinforcements show up.  In the season opener against the Packers, if you recall, the Birds got off to an inauspicious start.  The very first offensive play of the year, Barkly did a face plant on a routine hand-off losing five yards.  Two plays later, Hurts threw an interception giving the ball to Green Bay at the Philadelphia 19 yard line.  On the very next series  a fumbled exchange between Cam Jurgens and Hurts gave to ball to the Packers once again, this time at the Eagles’ 15 yard line.  It was a disastrous start by the offense but the Birds’ defense swooped in and cleaned up the mess holding the Packers to just two field goals, keeping the game close in time for Hurts and company to get clicking as they exploded in the second quarter for 17 points enroute to a 34-29 win over Green Bay in Brazil.  

Then again in week 15 against the Steelers, two Philly turnovers gave Pittsburgh the ball at the Eagles’45 and 11 yard lines respectively but the defense, once again, had the offense’s back, yielding just three points off those two turnovers to keep the game close as the Eagles would go on to beat Pittsburgh to set a franchise record with their 10th consecutive victory.

Sweep The Leg

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This Eagles team has done a sensational job of playing complementary football this season. But a good start would be somewhat refreshing to take some pressure off of the defense.  In the first 13 games this year the Eagles putzed around and took their time to get untracked.  The offense was deliberate and not always in sync in the early going.  The Birds scored a total of 17 first quarter points in those 13 games.  That’s an average of 1.3 points in the opening quarter.  Not good.

But in the final four games they scored 45 points in the first quarter, an average of 10.1 points per opening quarter.  Much better. Fortunately their slow starts didn’t hurt them this year,  They seemed to do much better at reacting versus setting the tone.  It took them until the second quarter to get rolling in most games and as they got markedly better and more dominant as the games went on. 

In the NFL’s second season, time is a precious commodity and if you show up late for the game, where time is especially of the essence, you might just run out of it.  If you played for Packers legendary coach Vince Lombardi, if you showed up on time you were late and most likely suffered a consequence.  The punishment in the NFL’s postseason is death.  The blood that was shed was yours.  Then you get to spend the next seven months kabitzing with those three poor souls in Brainerd who met the same fate. You can’t play with your food against good competition in the NFL and high wire acts in the postseason usually end up in chalk outlines so it is of the utmost importance to harness that playoff emotion into a fast start and make the under-manned and more inexperienced Packers play up hill before you send them to the after life.  Strike first, strike hard, no mercy.

Lastly and most importantly is the aggressive approach that flows from Birds’ head coach Nick Sirianni needs to carry over into the postseason.  But aggressiveness looks like recklessness if his players don’t execute (see complementary football).  We’ve seen it before.  It’s not for the meek.  But it’s what how champions think.  It’s a mindset for NFL hitmen.  By definition hit men execute.  When you have your foot on your opponent’s throat you don’t let them up.  You drive your foot through their windpipe until the coroner arrives.  Then you say a little prayer for the deceased, tell the cops “it wasn’t me” and then start preparing for your next opponent who gets out of line.  No mercy.

Prediction: Eagles 31, Packers 14

 

 

 

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