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Redskins players are talking trash about the Eagles

By Brandon Lee Gowton
Geoff Burke-USA TODAY Sports

The Philadelphia Eagles opened their 2016 rookie minicamp on Friday and all the attention was, as you'd expect, on Carson Wentz. Everyone was taking pictures and video of the Eagles' potential franchise quarterback of the future in his first practice in Philadelphia.

For some reason, this video of Wentz caught the attention of one of his NFC East rivals: Washington pass rusher Junior Galettte.

Then things escalated from there.

A photo posted by Chris Baker (@bigbake92) on

Put that pressure on them boys y'all ready to do it again @kerrigan91 @sackmanlives @prestonsmith94 #defendtheeast #SWAGGYTIME #HTTR #2pieceandabiscuit

I don't know why a video of Wentz throwing a pass in rookie minicamp got some Washington players all fired up, but alas, here we are.

All of this is pretty funny to me. First of all, Galette hasn't even played a regular season snap for Washington yet. He only signed with the team last offseason after the Saints cut him due to multiple off-the-field issues, including a domestic violence incident.

Then there's the fact that Washington players are acting waaaaay overconfident for a team that wasn't even that great last season. Sure, they won the division, but let's not act like the NFC East wasn't downright awful last season. Washington didn't beat a single team with a winning record all year. In four games against teams with winning records, Washington lost by at least two touchdowns each time. They were outscored 140-64 in total, which is an average of 35 to 16 per game. Washington made the playoffs only to get smacked around at home in the opening round of the playoffs by a Packers team that would have gone 3-6 in their final nine weeks if not for a Hail Mary.

Oh, and let's not forget about this ...

History suggests that Washington is not likely to win the NFC East in 2016. The division hasn't seen a repeat winner since the Eagles finished on top four years in a row from 2001-2004.

Taking it a step further, early win projection models from Football Outsiders actually have Washington finishing dead last in the NFC East this year at 6-10.

Forecasting that Dallas will return to winning is probably less controversial than forecasting that Washington will return to losing. However, Washington isn't exactly starting from greatness. Washington won a bad division at 9-7, but ranked only 15th in DVOA. That was a big improvement over the previous two seasons, when Washington was 29th (2013) and 28th (2014) in DVOA. But this means they're likely to run into the "Plexiglass Principle," which states that teams that significantly improve one year will tend to decline the next year and vice versa. In particular, the defense is unlikely to keep up its turnover rate (15.1 percent of drives, fifth in the NFL) or ability to stop short-yardage runs (49 percent conversions, the best figure in the NFL). The addition of Josh Norman is somewhat blunted by the losses of veteran defensive linemen Jason Hatcher and Terrance Knighton.

Something tells me Washington might have better things to worry about than a rookie quarterback throwing a pass in his first day of minicamp.

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