OK, I’ll Admit it. I’m Confused
November 11, 2025
At my age (74), any admission of confusion leads to the obvious conclusion that I’m starting to lose command of my mental faculties. My counter argument is that this process began long ago, and I have tapes from my final years at WIP to prove it.
Nevertheless, I should be able to watch a football game without wondering what the hell the coaches on both sidelines are thinking for three frustrating hours. The Eagles’ 10-7 win over Green Bay at Lambeau Field on Monday night is the latest case in point.
Yes, the Birds found another way to win against a solid opponent and are now 7-2 – yet another feather in the cap of the most improbably successful NFL head coach in recent memory.
Nick Sirianni just keeps winning.
I just wish I understood how.
That’s why I’m going to try to explain my muddled state of mind with a series of questions (and answers) that cropped up during one of the least entertaining games of recent vintage. (Did Troy Aikman actually say he found it to be one of the most fun 0-0 games he had ever witnessed? If so, maybe it’s time for him to get a dementia test himself.)
Is Kevin Patullo ever going to learn how to call plays?
On defense, there’s no question coordinator Vic Fangio devised a plan that constantly befuddled QB Jordan Love. Fangio is the star of the win, as far as I’m concerned. He deserves a big raise. He has been amazing in his two seasons here.
On offense, it was painfully obvious that the Eagles were compromised whenever OC Kevin Patullo had to think on his feet, in the moment, away from the pregame script compiled by the entire offensive staff.
How absurd was the play-calling? It was the first series after the half, and the Eagles finally seemed to have a plan to counter Green Bay’s intense defense, driving 53 yards down to the GB 17. With A.J. Brown, DeVonta Smith, Dallas Goedert and Saquon Barkley all present and accounted for, Patullo lost his way.
On second and four from for GB 17, QB Jalen Hurts handed the ball off to Tank Bigsby for a three-yard loss. Tank Bigsby? Seriously?
Then, on third and seven from the 20, Patullo took too much time getting the play in, so the delay penalty moved the ball back to the 25, third and 12. The extra time did not bring wisdom. On the ensuing play, Hurts handed the ball off to third-string RB Craig Shipley for four yards. NFL MVP Saquon Barkley stood on the sidelines for the entire sequence.
Ultimately, instead of breaking through with a touchdown, the Birds had to settle for a 39-yard field goal by Jake Elliott.
Where the hell is A.J. Brown?
With 15 days between games, the Eagles had a chance to correct their criminal misuse of their best weapon – and arguably the best WR in Eagles history. They did not. If anything, they doubled-down on their stupid strategy to use Brown as a decoy.
Brown was targeted twice in the first half, both receptions, for 13 yards. He got one more ball thrown his way at the very end of the game, an ill-advised deep ball that fell incomplete.
Chew on this insane stat for a second: The Eagles targeted Shipley, Johan Dotson and Greg Calcaterra a combined four times, to three for Brown.
If I were Brown, I would hire a lawyer and sue for desertion.
He has every right to be pissed.
So should every fan.
This is coaching malpractice.
Did Nick Sirianni lose his mind at the end?
By all appearances, yes, he did.
With the game hanging in the balance, the Eagles head coach decided to go for it on fourth down from the GB 35, up 10-7 with 33 seconds left. Then Patullo (or Sirianni) dialed up a low-percentage deep pass to Brown that eluded the receiver.
Suddenly, the Packers had new life, no more than 30 yards from a makeable field-goal attempt that would have sent the game into overtime. They got as close as the Eagles 46, but Brandon McManus’ 64-yard field-goal attempt fell short.
It’s better to be lucky than good, you say?
Tell that to Sirianni.
How bad were the Green Bay coaches?
Maybe worse than the Eagles, actually.
Amid a plethora of dubious strategic moves, the most glaring was the key play-call of the entire game, a fourth-and-one run at the GB 44 by RB Josh Jacobs with 1:26 left.
What was so bad about using their piledriving runner to pick up one yard in a big spot?
Well, everyone on the field knew what the play-call was, including the Eagles, who were in perfect position to throw Jacobs back four yards and end the drive.
After the game, Jacobs said he didn’t agree with the call.
“Fourth-and-one, they called out our play,” he said. “We ran it like four times. They called it out.”
In this era of analytics, GB head coach Matt LaFleur earlier in the game gave up on two drives in Eagles territory (at the 46 and 40) by punting. Today, he’s getting roasted by the normally docile Midwest media for his cowardice. He deserves the lambasting. His coaching was really terrible on Monday night.
How does Howie Roseman keep doing it?
ESPN did a tribute to the Eagles GM late in the game, and it was thoroughly deserved. He is the best GM in sports. And that’s a good thing because his coaches need all the help they can get.
This time, it was LB Jaelan Phillips, rescued just before the trade deadline from the awful Dolphins, who stepped right in and had a major impact on the game.
Phillips ended the night with half a dozen pressures and the same number of tackles. He was all over the field.
Why do the other GMs keep picking up the phone when Howie calls? Don’t they realize they’re about to get fleeced again?
Maybe he sends them a nice fruit basket after the trades.
One thing all of those years at WIP taught me was gauging the response I would get to my strongest opinions. I know what I am going to say here will not sit well with a majority of the readers, but I feel an urgency to express it anyway.
The Phillies should NOT re-sign Kyle Schwarber.
I know, I know. He’s the most popular player on the roster, arguably the Jason Kelce of the Phils. But if there were ever a warning, caveat emptor – let the buyer beware – it’s Schwarber, who turns 33 two weeks before the 2026 season.
He is coming off by far his finest season (56 homers, 132 RBI, .928 OPS), and he is the spiritual leader of the Phillies. His signing in 2022 for four years and $80 million ranks among the best free-agent acquisitions in our city’s sports history.
And he is the trapdoor of this MLB off-season. Whoever is willing to pay him an asking price of five years and $145 million is going to add a player with no position to play and facing an inevitable decline in production due to age and conditioning.
Players having career seasons like Schwarber did in his walk year almost always get paid for results they can no longer replicate. The motivation of one more huge payday can stave off the ravages of age, but once the reward is achieved, the drive for excellence almost always takes a sharp turn downward.
The cautionary tales include many recognizable names: Christian Walker, Jurickson Profar, Anthony Santander, Joc Pederson. And those are just from the past year.
Now Schwarber will be asking his next team to guarantee him close to $30 million a season when he’s 37 and 38, on the backend of a contract that will become an albatross.
No, thanks. The best way to turn the favorable deal the Phillies got four years ago into a disaster is to allow sentiment to govern a bad decision.
He may be a great slugger and a terrific leader, but his best days will soon be behind him.
Goodbye, Kyle.
A moment of silence, please, for the head-coaching career of Jonathan Gannon, the most overrated assistant in Philadelphia sports history and now in the latter stages of destroying the Arizona Cardinals.
Gannon ruined Super Bowl 57 as his Eagles defense choked in the second half against the Chiefs, a team the Eagles destroyed two years later when Gannon wasn’t there to screw everything up.
Gannon’s tenure as Cardinals head coach was off to a rotten start when he ignored NFL rules and interviewed for the Arizona job in the days before the Eagles were headed to the Super Bowl. The Cards got a stiff fine – amount never disclosed – for that infraction.
This season, Gannon went berserk on the sideline when his star running back, Emari Demercardo, got stripped from behind at the goal line when he was celebrating his 72-yard touchdown a moment too early. Like many Gannon teams, the Cards then choked away a big lead and lost to the Titans, 22-21.
Gannon lost more than the $100,000 fine that day a month ago. He lost his team.
Since the sideline tirade, Gannon’s squad has been in freefall – except for a win against the hideous Cowboys – and they hit a new low on Sunday by falling behind 35-0 in the second quarter and losing big to the Seahawks, 44-22.
There is growing speculation that Jonathan Gannon will be fired at the end his fourth season as a head coach, if not sooner.
Before the epic choke in the Super Bowl, Nick Sirianni publicly lambasted me for being a critic of Gannon throughout his tenure as the Eagles defensive coordinator. Despite Sirianni’s typical BS, I said then, and still believe now, that Gannon is a lousy coach who traded friendships for jobs he didn’t deserve.
I wouldn’t hire Jonathan Gannon to rake my leaves.
Sirianni declined to come on my show the final week I was at WIP, after Gannon blew that Super Bowl, because Nick didn’t want to admit I was right about his buddy.
Now it’s clearer than ever than his trusted assistant sucks as a head coach, too.
I’m still waiting for that apology, Nick.
Fruit makes for a very nice gift.