Donovan McNabb defends Andy Reid's legacy

Donovan McNabb has said some kind of bitter and a little annoying things since his departure from Philadelphia. There was of course his hilarious in hindsight "Everybody makes mistakes and they made a mistake" comment after his Redskins beat the Eagles in his return. In retrospect, that game was probably the high point of his post Eagles career and little did he know he would be out of the NFL fairly soon after.

So when McNabb starts talking Eagles again, we expect something along those lines... and he kind of gave that to us this week. In defending Andy Reid's legacy, McNabb implied that the fans may have been a little spoiled by Reid's (and his own) tenure.

"Making it to the NFC Championship is not easy, and I think they're starting to see that right now, that getting to the playoffs and going to the NFC Championship consistently, it's just not that easy," McNabb said. "There are teams right now who have winning records, like the Atlanta Falcons, they've done it for so many years, and they get to the playoffs and all of a sudden they're one-and-done."

Thing is, McNabb isn't wrong. The Eagles have been tremendously successful under Andy Reid and the very fact that we wring our hands about the lack of Super Bowl win, as opposed to just a playoff appearance or any playoff win (like say the Cowboys in this era) is proof of that.

"People want to make it look like you have nothing to show for it," McNabb said. "Well, we have a lot to show for it."

He's right. Those playoff runs were fun. That was a great era of Eagles football and if history shows us anything, whoever the next new coach is probably won't be as successful as Reid has been. Only a pretty small handful of coaches in this era have been.

This isn't an argument to keep Andy, I think we all recognize that its time for all parties to move on... But I think McNabb's quote should be both a cautionary tale and a reminder to appreciate what we've had.

"You look at everything he's been able to accomplish, I think it outweighs what you've seen the last two years," McNabb said.

I agree, these last two years have soured us and Andy won't depart on a positive night. Still, I'll look back on Andy's time fondly.