It's been an odd road to get there, but all in all the Eagles have to be satisfied with a 17-10 halftime lead over the Rams on the road to start the season. The game got off to a nightmare start for the Birds as they went backwards on their first offensive series and surrendered a 47 yard TD run to Steven Jackson on their first defensive snap of the season. However, they would settle down and pretty much control the game for the remainder of the first half.
Michael Vick got rolling on the Eagles second drive with passes of 41 and 20 yards to DeSean Jackson and Jason Avant respectively before hitting LeSean McCoy for a 7 yard TD to tied the game at 7 a piece. The Eagles second TD came on a mistake from Sam Bradford who seemed to have some miscommunication on a handoff, which allowed Darryl Tapp to strip the ball, which was picked up by Juqua Parker and returned for a 56 yard TD. The teams would each add a FG before the end of the half.
The fact that the Eagles are up by only a TD probably flatters the Rams a bit. They have ran the ball well, but Sam Bradford has looked shaky and their passing game is the same dink and dunk we saw from them last year. Their defense has also started to struggle, although they got a big play on the Eagles second to last offense drive when Quintin Mikell put a blindside hit on Michael Vick, causing a fumble and costing the Eagles at least three points.
DeSean Jackson has 4 catches for 70 yards, but has dropped two potential TDs already. Both cases would have been challenging catches, but fact is that they hit him in the hands and a guy looking for a mega contract absolutely has to make them.
And hey, the Rams need only 30 second half points to fulfill Marshall Faulk's prediction of a "40 burger."
We'll also use this as our third quarter thread