October 19, 2026
The Eagles are dealing with so many injuries this season, the last thing I want to do is hurt their feelings, too.
But the truth is, this version of our favorite football team stinks — and not just because of all the missing starters on offense, or the rigorous travel schedule or the dumbass decisions by the head coach.
If you endured every play in Sunday’s 25-14 loss to Carolina at Lincoln Financial Field, congratulations. You powered through one of the most unwatchable games in recent memory, a three-hour-and-a-half exercise in frustration filled with bad offense, lousy coaching and a ungodly total of 24 penalties for 233 yards.
At this point, Vic Fangio appears to be the only coach on the Eagles staff earning his money, and even his overworked and demoralized unit allowed a 92-yard drive in the fourth quarter that ended whatever slim hopes the team had to spring an upset.
The amazing twist to this season so far has been how a terrible offense can ruin a defense, too. The Birds in their last four losses have allowed 30 points in the first three quarters and 38 in the fourth. Why are the failing late? Because the offense can’t stay on the field long enough for the defenders to catch their breath.
But I come bearing some good news today. Finally, some of our questions about this team are getting answered. Many of the dumb debates about this corpse of a team that won a championship less than two seasons ago have been silenced. (I hope).
For example:
- McKee is never going to be a successful starting quarterback in the NFL. He is not fast enough, not accurate enough and not even smart enough (despite his Stanford education) to overcome a so-so arm and a lack of composure under pressure.
- Of course, that pressure was the result of the Achilles heel on the team, an offensive line that has been exactly that all season — offensive. Somewhere out there, legendary ex-line coach Jeff Stoutland is laughing his ass off today.
- Nick Sirianni did not do anything as stupid against the Panthers as the strategic mistakes he made to blow the previous two games, but once again he had no answers when adversity struck. If anything positive comes out of this shameful season, it should be the departure of this hackneyed fraud.
- Sean Mannion, say hi to Kevin Patullo. For the second time in two years — third in four — Sirianni hired a guy to call plays who has no clue how to do it. I have seen enough. Mannion is Patullo 2.0.
The game against the mediocre Panthers was so torturous, so distasteful, that I felt a compulsion to seek some solace on Eagles Post-Game Live right after the final seconds ticked off, just in time to see ex-Eagle Jason Avant losing his mind. Avant is the best watch after an Eagles game since the incomparable Ray Didinger was offering his astute insights.
“Something’s wrong!” Avant howled. “It just tells me that they’re in over the head when it comes to offensive football and coaching.”
Yes, indeed. The amazing part to me is that any of us — me included — bought the hype over Mannion’s high football IQ after we got bamboozled last year with Patullo.
A case in point is that Mannion somehow never got the message that McKee cannot run an offense effectively when lined up under center. It got so obvious by the fourth quarter, everybody except the offensive coordinator realized that the Panthers blitzed whenever the inexperienced QB was in that alignment.
In the end, McKee dropped back from center five times, all after run-fakes, completing zero passes and absorbing two sacks. It’s fair to wonder whether Mannion was watching the same game we were – or watching any game at all.
I would have loved to read the new offensive coordinator’s mind during two plays that encapsulated the futility of the offense on Sunday.
If Mannion needed any hints that his game plan was a dud, he got rude notice on the very first play, when blitzing linebacker Bobby Okereke barreled through the line and assaulted McKee for an 11-yard loss.
The other misfire came at the one moment in the contest when it appeared the Eagles might be flipping the script from the previous two weeks with a stunning comeback. They were down only five, 19-14, with 9:32 left when McKee started a drive at his own 48-yard-line. Then center Jake Majors snapped the ball into the ground on first down, skipping it right past the young QB, who fell on it 12 yards behind the line.
I’ll spare you the rest of the gruesome details. The seats at the Linc were barren by the time the two-minute warning had mercifully arrived. The paying customers had seen enough. Haven’t we all?
All I could think about after the game was the speculation a week earlier that GM Howie Roseman was disgusted at the strategic gaffe by Sirianni that cost the Eagles a victory over Jacksonville.
The GM had every right to be angry with how that game in London ended. And now, after Sunday’s debacle, it’s time for him to be equally disenchanted with himself. He’s the one who let so many free agents take better deals elsewhere, leaving the roster dangerously shallow.
Howie blew it. He must know that by now. The last two off-seasons after the Super-Bowl win 20 months ago were far from Howie’s best work, and it all evolved from a misguided philosophy that even the best rosters need constant refurbishment.
Roseman got away with it for a time last season, but he was always one injury epidemic away from total disaster.
This is that disaster. This is the year when Sirianni’s cluelessness has been exposed, starting with his inability to hire the right coordinator. This is the year when Hurts got hurt, with a strange blood-clot issue that threatens his season. This is the year when all of the dumb roster decisions since that last parade have finally come to roost.
The Eagles are 2-4.
They have lost four straight games.
They stink.
I just hope none of this hurts their feelings.
I always have a good laugh when a sports executive in our city acts as if he is not the problem, even when it’s painfully obvious that he is. Such is the case right now with Phillies director of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski.
At his end-of-season news conference, he placed the blame on himself first, as his playbook requires. But it was about as sincere as his statement that Don Mattingly was his first choice all along to return as manager. At best, Mattingly was second, after Alex Cora, but the GM’s approaches to Chase Utley and Raul Ibanez suggest Don was actually as low as fourth.
The biggest headline from the GM’s annual exercise in deception was also the funniest, especially in this kiss-ass media environment. Much like his “not elite” missile aimed last year at Bryce Harper, Dombrowski found his target and blasted away. This time it was 33-year-old Trea Turner.
“He knows he has to be better at shortstop,” the GM declared. “And I told him that’s mandatory.”
My training in journalism demands a follow-up question that was never asked: “Since you gave Trea a $300-million contract that still has seven years remaining, do you regret the length and amount of that deal?”
Asking someone to improve at 33 playing a position that demands fast reflexes and elite footspeed is ludicrous, and yet the Phillies will be paying for those declining skills until Turner is 40 years old.
That’s not just incredibly reckless; it’s downright stupid.
Of course, Dombrowski never had to defend any of his absurdly generous free-agent signings because no one at a news conference wants to challenge the boss. Who would ever want to risk losing access to more of this brilliance from Dombrowski?
Let’s be perfectly clear here: The biggest problem on the Phillies right now is not Turner, Harper or any of the other whiffers on a maddeningly impotent offense. And it’s not even a bullpen so barren, the Phils primarily used their starters in relief during their brief playoff appearance this season.
The biggest problem is the washed-up executive who created those problems. Yup, the guy threatening others again after his own failings. Dave Dombrowski.
Food for thought. . . .
- The blood-clot problem that sidelined Jalen Hurts is bad news for two reasons. First, Hurts is the best player on the Eagles, the biggest reason why they stole wins in the first two games. Losing him for any length of time could be fatal in a season already on life support. And second is the fact that it gives Nick Sirianni a reason to get a mulligan this year because of injuries and retirements and blood clots. More of Nick Sirianni’s tired act beyond this season is a frightening notion, don’t you think?
- By far the best moment in this endlessly annoying baseball season was watching the Dodgers face-plant in the NLCS. The rich, smug LA big shots got swept by a team with less than half their payroll. How did the Brewers do it? By playing the game the right way – working counts, moving runners, making contact. Imagine that. Maybe the Phillies should try it some year.
- Here’s the most damning thing I can say about analytics, the MLB tool that sacrifices contact for power, strikeouts for launch angles and exit velocities: Three of the final four teams in the playoffs (Rays, Guardians, Dodgers) had the lowest strikeout rates in baseball this season, and the fourth (Brewers) had the best on-base percentage. In other words, the Phillies have been on the wrong path for years. Do you think they realize yet that analytics is a big bucket of BS? I doubt it.
- Troy Aikman appears to be in a snit right now because ESPN gave his broadcast partner Joe Buck a big contract extension and has not even begun talks with him on his own deal, which runs out at the end of this season. I say bravo to ESPN, for once. Although Aikman will never be as awful as NBC’s Cris Collinsworth, he hasn’t been an interesting listen in years. His mindless platitudes are becoming an intolerable distraction. The ex-Cowboy will be 60 next month, has enough money for several lifetimes and appears to have a good life away from the broadcasting booth. You’ve got to know when to fold ‘em, Troy. It’s time.
- I realize that I’m always railing against the media, but what am I supposed to do? Last week, Grant Cohn of Sports Illustratedrevealed that a fellow reporter covering the 49ers, David Lombardi of the San Francisco Standard, hugged the players in the clubhouse right after wins. Meanwhile, Denver coach Sean Payton greeted Fox reporter Charissa Thomson with a big, wet kiss on her cheek before an interview the other day. Hugs and kisses between the media and the sports figures they cover? No, I have no plans to shut up about this unprofessional chumminess between the media and sports figures. It makes me sick.