Michael Vick, Eagles talk red zone woes

The Eagles took 5 trips to the red zone on Monday night and failed to score even a single TD from them. 4 of those trips actually saw the team get 1st and goal, but they resulted in 2 field goals and 2 turnovers, one of which was a pick-6.

Needless to say, the red zone ineptitude was a major topic of conversation around the Eagles locker room today.

"It was just one of those nights," said Michael Vick. "It's not like we're not trying to score in the red zone. Sometimes, you've just got to put it all together and you've just got to give the defense some credit sometimes. We should be better. We've been good in the red zone all year when we've gotten down there. It was just one of those nights."

Jason Avant seemed to disagree that it was "just one of those nights" and admitted that it's been a problem all year.

"It's a problem with this team every week, so we've got to just correct it, play disciplined and hopefully we can score some touchdowns," he told reporters. "It was just bad things going on at the wrong times. We have good possessions getting into the red zone and, basically, melt down there. We've got to make some plays. We have some plays to be made when you watch the film and it's just getting to them and being able to protect, block, catch. Those type of things."

Certainly a part of those red zone struggles have been due to breakdowns on the offensive line, which were particularly bad on Monday night. Dennis Kelly tried to explain what happened.

"They brought a lot of pressure and I think it led to us having a lot of miscommunication. There was confusion on who was getting who, where was the MIKE backer and things like that. That's where we have to build that rhythm, get that continuity that I was saying, and just have the trust in each other to know that we're going to know the assignment before we have to call it out."

In other words, they were just as overmatched and confused as they look. And that was against a terrible Saints defnese that came into the game ranked last in the league (and still are). They'll need to find someway to improve against a Dallas defense this week that is currently ranked 5th in the league in terms of yards per game.