Eagles

Eagles 4-0 Largely in Part to Reed Blankenship’s Forearm

By Kevin Kinkead

Published: Oct 2nd, 2023 · 9:48 AM EDT

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Would the Eagles remain unbeaten if not for Reed Blankenship getting his forearm spiked by Terry McLaurin?

The key defensive play of Sunday’s win took place in overtime, when the sprawling Eagles safety laid out on a 3rd and 5 and found himself underneath the Commie receiver:

Reed Blankenship sacrificing his arm to make sure McLaurin doesn’t get the foot down in bounds pic.twitter.com/tGxNickeiJ

— Shane Haff (@ShaneHaffNFL) October 1, 2023

There’s plenty of debate about this play, which was ruled incomplete before the review. When you slow it down, it looks super-close, and might actually be a catch, but the refs, who had a terrible day overall, stuck with the call on the field.

Perhaps if Blankenship’s arm didn’t get trapped underneath McLaurin, the video replay would have been clear and obvious.

“I guess the football Gods watching out for us,” Blankenship told reporters after the game. “It was just a bang-bang play and luckily my arm was in the right spot, but end of the day a win’s a win. We got out of there and we’re ready to play LA.”

Blankenship said he was totally fine and ready to go back into the game if the pass was converted.

“Yeah I’m good, I’m good, I’m still walking around so I’m great.”

McLaurin had a big game for Warshington, logging a season-high 86 yards on a season-high eight catches.  The only player targeted more on either side of the field was A.J. Brown.

“I knew before we went out there that was one of their route concepts towards the end of the game,” Blankenship added. “As soon as he broke out I knew I had to get on my horse and go. Luckily it came out in our favor… Terry’s a really great receiver and route runner and they run crazy routes you could say. They’re not conventional. Sometimes it’s hard to play them at times. But at the end of the day we just have to be good with our rules and we’ll be fine.”