Ad Disclosure
Undefeated – 30 Immediate Takeaways from Eagles 31, Buccaneers 25
Published:
That one was satisfying. Was it enjoyable to watch? Absolutely not. But satisfying because the Eagles always struggle with these jokers down in Tampa, so you take a win however you can get it against the Bucs to move to 4-0 and come back home to rest up.
This was a classic “ceiling is as high as the floor is low” type of game. They looked like they were gonna run away with this one in the first half. Great play calling, special teams, and defense. Then they couldn’t pick up a first down or even complete a pass for most of the second half, while the defense uncharacteristically gave up two deep bombs before locking it back down. So it’s one of those things where you see how good they can be if they finally put together a complete performance over four quarters of football.
Regardless, the Eagles win again. They cover the spread. They are undefeated, with three wins in three weeks over quality teams. The Birds are the NFC’s best team through four games, and that’s the bottom line! Because Stone Cold said so.
To the observations!
1) “91 degrees but feels like 100,” said Erin Andrews to begin the game. Good thing the Birds were loaded with SEC guys who have played in Florida. Obviously the heat was a storyline coming into this one, but the way they talked about it you’d think they were playing on the surface of Venus.
2) That was a very loud “Coooooooooooop” after the DeJean PBU on Chris Godwin. Confirmation, perhaps, that Tampa fans are just New York expats who have forsaken the Jets and Giants.
3) Everything about the punt block touchdown was awesome. Great camera angle on Sydney Brown running it in. Michael Clay with the aggressive fist pump. And Cam Latu was a reclamation project, a third round pick who tore his meniscus as a rookie. That resulted in the 49ers giving up on him, then he did the practice squad shuffle with Cleveland and the Birds before finding a role here on special teams. He came into this game as one of the top eight guys in ST snaps.
4) Eight plays, 73 yards, 4:14 off the clock on the opening drive, which was probably their best of the season. They had:
- two check downs to Saquon
- a deep shot for A.J. Brown (they should throw 2-3 of these per game)
- a blitz-beating slant to DeVonta Smith
- an A.J. Dillon chunk run
- an easy underneath crosser to Dallas Goedert
- Hurts scrambling for 29 yards
Then the TD pass, which was cool as hell. That looked like something that evolved from the Andy Reid red zone shovel pass:
The fact that they’ve got four guys stacked up but put Hurts under center had to be confusing for Tampa. They didn’t know what was coming, nor did we.
5) The taunting calls are obviously annoying, but the players gotta know by now that they’re calling this stuff. It’s Week 4, so the Allen Iverson stepover is gonna be flagged. That being said, I guess it’s okay for Baker Mayfield to get up in Quinyon Mitchell’s face and talk trash and provoke a reaction. Would Troy Vincent say that belongs in the game? A question, perhaps, for the philosophers.
6) Totally forgot Haason Reddick was playing for the Bucs.
7) They showed the dudes holding up the shade on the sideline. Don’t they have poles they can use? What is, like Ancient Greece and the servants are doing the manual labor here?
8) Gotta wonder why the Bucs kept throwing at Mitchell when Kelee Ringo was filling in for Adoree Jackson on the other side.
9) The tight end seam to Goedert was a really nice piece of evidence that Jalen can indeed throw across the middle. Lovely ball right here:
10) Hurts scrambling to his left and hitting Smitty to extend the 4th drive was pretty significant. He has historically struggled to hit anything when forced to his left.
11) Between Oregon on Saturday night and the Eagles on Sunday afternoon, there is TRUE HOMAGE being paid to Andy Reid and the red zone shovel pass. Absolutely lethal!
12) Thought it was pretty funny that they did that Tush Push segment with Cowboy lover Dean Blandino when there had been zero pushes run in the game at that point. Afterward, sources say Blandino joined Jerry Jones on his bus, for a cocktail.
13) Crazy that Vita Vea is in the trenches without gloves. That guy is an absolute monster.
14) The field seemed a little crappy. PTSD from the boys sliding around in Super Bowl 57.
15) Missed opportunity at the end of the first half. They had a blown play (I think?) with that sideways toss to Saquon, then did a give up run on 3rd and 13. Jake Elliott hit the field goal to extend the lead, but they had a chance to really bury those cockroaches and settled for three.
16) Kind of a bullshit call on Jalen Carter, right? He got the side of Baker’s helmet? Dunno. It put Tampa in position to hit a 65-yard field goal, which was ridiculous.
17) The lower third chyron screwups were pretty annoying. We didn’t have down and distance at the start of the second half, only super-imposed on the field. What kind of operation are we running here?
18) Two weeks in a row that Jordan Davis has run down the opposing QB to prevent a crucial conversion.
19) Fully support Nick Sirianni jawing at Baker Mayfield. As one of our guys says in the Slack channel, “Sirianni may be an asshole, but he’s our asshole.”
20) Vic Fangio’s reaction said it all on the Emeka Egbuka touchdown. They had two guys right there and neither could make the play on the ball. All of a sudden, it was a 11-point game.
21) Is slowly walking backwards into the end zone taunting? Asking for a friend,
22) The Birds got really lucky on the 3rd quarter fumble because that was a hip drop tackle from Jalyx Hunt. It happened in a pretty tight space, in a bang-bang type of fashion, but this was the point of emphasis tackle they flagged last year, and you can see him coming down on Irving’s ankle:
23) Fake tush push into a counter handoff. Suck it, Blandino! Suck it, Joe Schad!
24) Not much to say about the Irving bomb TD. Pass rush can’t get there and it’s a broken play with a rookie linebacker covering a running back. Really off-brand for the Eagles to give up huge explosives, but it happens.
25) Pretty stupid hands to the face penalty on Tampa after gaining some momentum and putting the Eagles into third and 8. bonehead type of stuff there. Instead, the Birds got another set of downs and picked up some field position before having to punt after the illegal shift and bad snap.
26) Sad penalty on Josh Uche. Can’t get the QB to the head or neck area, but what about the collarbone?
27) Jalen 0-8 to start the second half was pretty sad. You wonder if that hit to the head was affecting him. Otherwise, not sure what the hell they were doing on that drive when he forced it to A.J. Brown three times in a row, but Tampa was all over it. They burned a grant total of 12 seconds with that three and out.
28) Kelee Ringo – why play 3rd down defense when you can just grab the guy’s jersey instead?
29) I’d like to thank Reed Blankenship for deflecting the pass on the late interception. At that point you probably felt like the Birds would prevail.
30) What a sack from Moro Ojomo. Perfect stunt and a Baker obliteration. And that was all she wrote.
Kevin has been writing about Philadelphia sports since 2009. He spent seven years in the CBS 3 sports department and started with the Union during the team's 2010 inaugural season. He went to the academic powerhouses of Boyertown High School and West Virginia University. email - k.kinkead@sportradar.com