Philadelphia Eagles Schedule 2017: Game-by-game record predictions

The Philadelphia Eagles 2017 schedule is officially HERE! There's still a lot of time (... five months ...) before the regular season actually begins in September, but it's NEVER too soon for some ridiculously early game-by-game record predictions!

The only problem is ... it totally IS way too early for those. Especially since the 2017 NFL Draft hasn’t even happened yet. But that's not going to stop me from doing meaningless predictions anyway. Lighten up and have some fun.

Last year I predicted the Eagles would go 8-8. I was only off by one game since they went 7-9. Now it’s time for this year’s version!

Eagles 2017 Schedule

Week 1 - at Washington Redskins (Sept. 10, 1:00 PM ET, FOX)

Win: The Eagles haven’t beaten Washington since 2014. They haven’t gotten a win at FedEx Field since September 2013. The Eagles are going to want this game real bad. It’s time to put their losing streak to an end. Washington has had a dysfunctional offseason and they’ve lost some key players, such as DeSean Jackson. Carson Wentz outperforms Kurt Coupons in an Eagles win to open the 2017 campaign. You like that?

1-0

Week 2 - at Kansas City Chiefs (Sept. 17, 1:00 PM ET, FOX)

Loss: This will be the second time the Eagles have played against Andy Reid since the team fired him in 2012. His side was victorious in his 2013 return to Philadelphia. Now the Eagles will go on the road to face him in his new home. This game also marks Doug Pederson’s first return back to Kansas City since becoming the head coach of the Eagles. Should be interesting to see how this game goes since Pederson is so heavily influenced by Big Red. The Chiefs haven’t had a lot of post-season success but they’ve been a really good regular season team under Reid. I wouldn’t bet against them at their house.

1-1

Week 3 - vs. New York Giants (Sept. 24, 1:00 PM ET, FOX)

Win: I’d be remiss not to mention the Eagles are 14-4 in their last 18 games against the Giants. Some of those losses were really close, too. New York always blew their win last season. One of those losses also features a matchup where Matt Barkley had to play most of the game … and the Eagles still only lost by seven points. In short, the Eagles own the Giants. New York had a legit defense last season, yes, but that offense is still skeptical due to a declining Eli Manning. I can’t pick against the Eagles when it comes to the Giants.

2-1

Week 4 - at Los Angeles Chargers (Oct. 1, 4:05 PM ET, FOX)

Win: The San Diego Chargers are no more. They are now the Los Angeles Chargers. I really wonder what their crowds are going to be like this year. It didn’t seem like L.A. desired them. The feeling here is this might not be a real tough road venue to play in. San Diego still has Philip Rivers and a few talented players so I’m not expecting a free win, but I feel fairly comfortable projecting a victory for the Eagles.

3-1

Week 5 - vs. Arizona Cardinals (Oct. 12, 1:00 PM ET, FOX)

Win: Carson Palmer turns 38 this season. After having an MVP-like season in 2015, he really cooled off last year. Arizona doesn’t project to be an easy matchup since Bruce Arians seems like one of the league’s better coaches, but given the fact the Eagles have home field advantage, I’ll side with Philly.

4-1

Week 6 - at Carolina Panthers (Oct. 15, 8:25 PM ET, CBS/NFLN) Thursday Night Football

Loss: Really down year for the Panthers last season. They went from being the Super Bowl runner-up to finishing the season at 6-10 and sporting the league’s eighth worst point differential. I don’t know what to make of the 2017 Panthers. I’d expect them to bounce back to some extent. Just how much, though, I’m not sure. I’d lean towards a loss since it’s on the road. I’m really 50-50 on it though.

4-2

Week 7 - vs. Washington Redskins (Oct. 23, 8:30 PM ET, ESPN) Monday Night Football

Loss: I have Washington’s winning streak against the Eagles ending in Week 1 but I can’t project Philadelphia to sweep them this year. As nice as that would be, Kirk Cousins has had Philadelphia’s number recently and I can’t say the Birds will completely dominate him until I see it first. I think splitting is a fair projection.

4-3

Week 8 - vs. San Francisco 49ers (Oct. 29, 1:00 PM ET, FOX)

Win: San Francisco looked even worse than the NFL’s worst team, the Browns, at times last season. Chip Kelly is gone and now Kyle Shanahan is in. The 49ers only have room to go up, but there’s a lot of work to be done. New and untested general manager John Lynch has a tall task of improving the 49ers’ massively untalented roster. The 49ers are especially unthreatening at quarterback with Brian Hoyer and Matt Barkley in the fold. This is a win for the Eagles.

5-3

Week 9 - vs. Denver Broncos (Nov. 5, 1:00 PM ET, CBS)

Loss: The Broncos were unable to make the playoffs in the season after they won Super Bowl 50. They weren’t awful, though. Denver finished as the best team not to make the post-season. They had a 9-7 record and were tied for the ninth best point differential in the league. The Broncos’ defense is still good, though not necessary as elite as it was during their title run. Denver’s quarterback situation is still up in the air. Perhaps 2016 draft pick Paxton Lynch will win the starting job and square off against Wentz. This is a coin toss for me, but I’ll say Eagles lose.

5-4

Week 10 - BYE

This is certainly a whole lot better than last year’s dumb Week 4 bye.

Week 11 - at Dallas Cowboys (Nov. 19, 8:30 PM ET, NBC) Sunday Night Football

Loss: It used to be that the Cowboys couldn’t beat the Eagles in Dallas and the Eagles couldn’t beat the Cowboys in Philadelphia. The two teams flipped the script last year when the Eagles suffered a overtime loss in a game they controlled and easily could have won. This game figures to be the second real Carson Wentz versus Dak Prescott battle since last year’s second Eagles-Cowboys game was meaningless and Prescott barely played. I feel good about how the Eagles played the Cowboys last year, but I’ll take them to lose since they’re on the road.

5-5

Week 12 - vs. Chicago Bears (Nov. 26, 1:00 PM ET, FOX)

Win: Chicago’s top two quarterbacks right now? Mike Glennon and Mark Sanchez. Maybe they’ll draft one at No. 3 overall, but that’s not really intimidating right now. The Eagles have Alshon Jeffery now and I think he’ll enjoy putting up a big game against his former team.

6-5

Week 13 - at Seattle Seahawks (Dec. 3, 8:30 PM ET, NCB) Sunday Night Football

Loss: The Eagles looked surprisingly competitive in their game against the Seahawks last season until a disastrous series from Nelson Agholor basically ended any remote shot Philadelphia had at winning. The good news is, if all goes to plan, Agholor should have a lesser role this year. The bad news is the Seahawks will still probably be pretty good. And winning in Seattle is really tough to do. This is a loss.

6-6

Week 14 - at Los Angeles Rams (Dec. 10, 4:25 PM ET, FOX)

Win: The top two picks from the 2016 NFL Draft will go head-to-head in Los Angeles: Carson Wentz versus Jared Goff. That’s assuming Goff can even hold on to his starting job after looking really awful as a rookie. Los Angeles figures to have a good defense with Wade Phillips in the fold. But man, that offense, and that quarterback situation … just not really fearing it. This could be an ugly game but I think Wentz wants to make the Rams regret passing on him.

7-6

Week 15 - at New York Giants (Dec. 17, 1:00 PM ET, FOX)

Win: Again, the Eagles own the Giants. Coming off two straight road games on the West Coast could be tough, so I don’t doubt this game could be tough. But I always have faith in the Eagles to beat the G-Men.

8-6

Week 16 - vs. Oakland Raiders (Dec. 25, 8:30 PM ET, ESPN) Monday Night Football on Christmas

Loss: What a game this has the potential to be. Eagles versus Raiders on Christmas … on Monday Night Football. The last time these two teams met, Nick Foles threw seven touchdown on Oakland’s awful defense. A lot has sure changed since then. The Raiders are a lot better, mainly thanks in part to young stud quarterback Derek Carr. Oakland has a lot of talent on their roster. They won 12 games last season despite playing in a tough division. This will be a hard one for the Birds, though not necessary unwinnable since it’s at home. It would be a great Christmas gift to see an Eagles win.

8-7

Week 17 - vs. Dallas Cowboys (Dec. 31, 1:00 PM ET, FOX)

Win: Just like with the Washington series, I think the Eagles split with the Cowboys. In this instance I think the Eagles win at home in the final game of the year in order to potentially clinch a wild card spot.

9-7

...

Final record: 9-7

As I’ve written many times before, the Eagles were better in 2016 than their 7-9 record indicated. Philadelphia finished tied for the ninth best point differential and tied for the seventh best point differential. Historically speaking, teams that underperform their record in one season tend to improve the next year. With that in mind, I expect the Eagles to take a step forward.

But there no guarantees. For better or worse, this 2017 squad isn’t the same unit from last year. The Eagles lost multiple defensive starters. Then again, they added some actual NFL receivers to the roster, so that’s nice.

The real needle-mover, if you will, as far as the Eagles’ success is concerned is the development of Wentz. If he takes that next step forward, the Eagles definitely have the potential to improve in 2017. If he continues to struggle, well, things might not be so pretty.

For now I’ll split the difference and project Wentz to be average. Factoring in Wentz, the play of an Eagles defense that showed positive flashes last year, and an elite special teams unit ... I think that’s enough to be at least a .500 team in 2017. I’ll predict 9-7 with a ceiling of 10-6.