Eagles All-22 movie review: Observations of the Buccaneers loss

Hello everyone, another week, another movie theater! This one is pretty depressing, especially on offense … so buckle up.

I’ll break the movie down on my Twitter account and then upload the tweets with some more analysis in this post. Obviously I can’t post everything so I will focus on some of the things that stand out to me every week. I can see something multiple times on film, but only download one example because you don’t have to see everything, so you’ll have to take my word for it if I say I’ve seen something multiple times.

I will break down attacking followed by defense each week and I will post the games in order so you can see how the game went. Sometimes I can focus on a specific area, I will see how each game goes. I just pick the most important games and highlight some of the players who stood out for me. As always, let me know your thoughts in the comments and I look forward to discussing the game with all of you. Let’s come to the cinema!

OFFENSE

Okay, I never want to be personal, but a lot of this is going to focus on Jalen Hurts because he just played really, really badly. We can debate the structure of the attack and whether it suits him, but he just doesn’t see the pitch at all right now.

I said last week that I don’t have much more to say about Jalen Reagor at this point so I won’t say more. I just think he’s lazy and soon took to college. Bad sign.

Back to Hurts – he missed DeVonta Smith on that shot on the first drive but there is no excuse for that shot. It’s a routine NFL throw. You just gotta do that. Accuracy is clearly an issue for him as well as processing.

No analysis here, just found it quite funny!

I am not an offensive coordinator and I would never claim to be. But I’ve watched a lot of good attacks over the past few years and they don’t look like this. The spacing just looks wrong. Not sure if this is a game design or players running lazy and drifting routes, but it looks awkward. The players are too close to each other and it looks bad.

More of that please! Surely the Eagles need to start building offense around the running game and not just using it as a random incidental play here and there. When they ran the ball this week they had real success against a very good running defense.

Again, I’m no expert, but the spacing seems out of sync here. I also think the Eagles really need to work on what happens when the game goes down because the receivers below look like they’re going around in circles. It’s a strange statement, but the Eagles’ “off-structure offense” needs to be more “structured”. If you know what I mean…

This is again a problem of treatment. His height 2 lets you immediately know that the cornerback can sit on the back roads to the outside. Space will obviously be in the middle of the field and Hurts has two options wide open but doesn’t quit his first reading and force him to Smith instead. It’s also just an imprecise throw and he’s lucky he didn’t get repelled.

It’s the worst of the day. Nick Sirianni and Reagor’s perfect appeal is wide open from the start. Hurts looks at Smith (who is also wide open) and just doesn’t throw him away. I really don’t know what to say about this piece. You just need to throw that ball at Reagor earlier. Actually, I don’t blame Reagor for slowing down here because he knows he’s straying too far for Hurts to make the throw. There has been a lot of talk this week that Sirianni needs to modify Hurts’ offense and while I think there is some truth to it, the fact remains that Hurts needs to do a lot more routine throws than he does. ‘it currently does.

Since this article is very negative so far, it is only fair to point out the positives too! There haven’t been a lot of positive plays from the Hurts this game, but it’s a nice pitch.

To run. The. Ball.

DEFENSE

I’m not sure what to think of defense this week. This is largely what we have seen in recent weeks. They were pretty passive but I think overall they did a decent job against a very good offense. I still struggle to see how far the safeties are, but I understand Gannon’s focus on not giving up on the big game.

I will also be using this post to give some players a mention here and I think Avonte Maddox deserves a mention. He played this game very well and is having a pretty good year. In particular, I was impressed with his descending physique in the run / screen game.

I complained earlier about the safeties playing very far BUT you have to give credit to Gannon and this defense for being so good against shots this year. Seconds always do a good job working together and making sure they don’t give up on huge games. I was impressed with that aspect of the defense and I think it’s impressive considering the Eagles were known to give up big plays under Schwartz.

Another member who is having a great year is Darius Slay. Partly because of a ploy, but he’s also playing a good ball right now and showing he’s still in the Premier League of this league.

Random Scream – Gernard Avery! How the hell did he make this play! He hasn’t really been a superstar this season, but it shows real athleticism. Who knows, maybe he can still carve out a bigger role for himself.

Last point, I think Singleton is actually a decent linebacker, but asking him to line up as a lone linebacker in men’s defense seems very hard on him. I’m just not sure he’s athletic enough or good enough to cover a tight end or run back and forth with all that space around him. I wonder if the Eagles will consider replacing him in this package in the future as the Bucs have chosen him a lot in this game with short throws down midfield.

That’s all for this week, I hope next week will be more positive! Thanks everyone.