Eagles News: Resting starters was “the right thing to do”

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In Roob’s Obs Sirianni makes the right decision, plus more - NBCSP
1. As hard as it was to watch this game, and wow was it hard watching the Cowboys come into the Linc and win 51-26, resting the starters really is absolutely the right thing to do. It’s just unfortunate when one team is resting everybody and the other team is playing everybody. But it was still the right thing to do. Is there something to be said for staying sharp going into a playoff game? Maybe. I don’t really think so. Heck, the 2004 Eagles clinched the No. 1 seed and a 1st-round bye with two games to go so their starters didn’t play for a month going into the postseason. Didn’t slow them down. The value of a bye week is tremendous. That’s what teams play all year for. That’s what teams fight for all year. Getting a week off. It’s been a very long season. Even the guys who aren’t on the injury report are banged up and beat up. Having a week to heal, a week to recover going into the wild-card round is so valuable and so worthwhile. Even if it means we have to watch the Cowboys score 51 points, it’s the right thing to do. 2. Jerry Jones enjoyed this game a little too much. Jerry, your team just beat the Eagles’ practice squad, calm down. Just a reminder that the Cowboys have won three playoff games in the last quarter century. The Eagles won three in a 23-day span in 2017.

Handing out 10 awards from the Eagles-Cowboys game - PhillyVoice
But if you’re a fan who only casually follows the team, there’s a good chance you had never heard of half the guys who played Saturday night. In the fourth quarter, I’m pretty sure they pulled a fan out of the stands, put a No. 50 jersey on him, and had him play left tackle. It was 100 percent the right call by Nick Sirianni and the Eagles’ brass, by the way, for all the reasons we laid out after the Eagles clinched a playoff berth last Sunday night. The Eagles should be fresh for their wildcard round playoff matchup. Whoever they play will have likely played their starters.

Eagles set new single-season franchise rushing record - BGN
It’s ironic that the 2021 NFL season started with a chorus of “run the damn ball” from Eagles fans and media members, and ended with the team setting a new franchise record for rushing yards. In Week 18 against the Cowboys, Kenny Gainwell ran the ball in for the team’s 25th rushing touchdown of the season — tying the franchise record — and in the process, hit 2,623 total rushing yards for the offense this season.

BGN Instant Reaction Show: Eagles fall to Cowboys, who cares! Eagles backups hung in game with Dallas starters - BGN Radio
Eytan Shander and Jessica Towne Taylor discuss the biggest takeaways from the Eagles meaningless Week 18 loss to the Cowboys, 51-26.

Boys Beat Backup Birds - Iggles Blitz
I will be really interested to see how Dallas plays next week. Dallas wanted to play well and get some momentum going for the postseason. Boom. 51-26 win. All is good. Right? Dallas beat WFT 56-14 a few weeks back and the NFL world fell in love with them. The offense was back. Then they struggled against the Cardinals, having one of their worst games of the year. Now they beat the heck out of the Eagles practice squad. Does that really mean anything? I have serious doubts. I have no problem with Nick Sirianni resting Eagles starters. There just wasn’t much to gain by playing them. Get some rest and get ready for the playoffs.

NFL Week 18 Game Recap: Dallas Cowboys 51, Philadelphia Eagles 26 - PFF
Philadelphia’s backups in the secondary struggled significantly against Prescott and Co. Josiah Scott, a second-year fourth-rounder out of Michigan State, allowed a team-high 75 yards and a touchdown in coverage on PFF’s first review of the broadcast film. Andre Chachere and K’Von Wallace both allowed 40-plus yards in coverage and scores, as well.

The day after: Rest assured, the rest is still to come for the Eagles in the playoffs - The Athletic
1. Almost every starter rested. No defensive starter played a snap Saturday. On offense, Jason Kelce snapped the first offensive play of the game to maintain his consecutive-starts streak and then ran to the sideline where he spent the rest of the game. The only nominal starters who played Saturday night were the Eagles wide receivers. DeVonta Smith played 14 snaps and caught three passes for 41 yards to set the franchise mark for receiving yards in a player’s rookie season. Quez Watkins played 29 snaps and Jalen Reagor played 59 (of a possible 70). Given the Eagles’ standing heading into the game — a win or loss would have little effect on their seed or first-round opponent — risking injury to their best players never made sense. That was especially the case with Jalen Hurts.

2021 NFL season, Week 18: What we learned from Chiefs-Broncos, Cowboys-Eagles - NFL.com
2. Eagles fans shouldn’t take this loss too hard. With a postseason berth already secured, Philadelphia made it clear it wasn’t about to risk injury in Week 18 and played a significant amount of backups on both sides of the ball, starting with quarterback Gardner Minshew. The second-stringers battled, tying the game at 17-17 before the Eagles’ skeleton-crew secondary surrendered two passing touchdowns in the final two minutes of the first half. From there, Dallas’ starters proved to be superior. No worries, Philadelphia — the starters will be back next week and ideally ready to go on Super Wild Card Weekend.

Eagles don’t believe Tyree Jackson tore his ACL Saturday night - PFT
Eagles tight end Tyree Jackson opened Saturday night with his first NFL catch and first NFL touchdown, but things didn’t end all that well. Jackson had to leave the game with a knee injury in the fourth quarter of the Eagles’ loss to the Cowboys. It was a non-contact injury and Jackson was ruled out quickly, but Mike Garafolo of NFL Media reports that the team does not believe that he tore his ACL.

Opening drive presents short-term and future potential for Eagles - PE.com
Wide receiver DeVonta Smith started and played with the intention of staying sharp, and in the process, he established a franchise record for most receiving yards in a season by a rookie. On that first drive, Smith caught a deflected Minshew pass off the hands of cornerback Kelvin Joseph to convert a third-and-9 play and gain 25 yards, and from there the Eagles finished impressively to get the ball into the end zone. Smith finished the night with 3 receptions for 41 yards, ending his 17-game regular season with 64 receptions for 916 yards. “It kind of feels good just to get it out of the way,” said Smith. “In the beginning, I wasn’t even worried about it (the rookie record), but once it happened, everybody around me started congratulating me, just kind of felt good.”

Dallas Cowboys at Philadelphia Eagles: 6 winners, 3 losers, and 3 honorable mentions - Blogging The Boys
Loser: Mike McCarthy. If I am being honest, if the Cowboys had pulled their starters at halftime I might have led the winners section with Mike McCarthy. My plate was full of crow at that point. But the Cowboys chose to keep their starters in the game even through the third quarter. Prior to coming out of the locker room for the second half they had scored on every offensive possession and looked to have flawlessly executed their plan. To be clear there was no real consequence to how the Cowboys handled Saturday night; but they were at the point of irresponsibility by taking things as far as they did in the second half. Thankfully it didn’t come back to haunt them.

If Joe Judge returns as Giants head coach, here are 3 things he must do - Big Blue View
Watching the indefensible product the Giants have put on the field the second half of the season it is impossible to conclude that Judge and his coaching staff did that this season. It appears that Judge will return for Year 3 as Giants head coach. It seems that unless whoever John Mara and Steve Tisch hire to replace Dave Gettleman as GM insists on his own head coach from the get-go, Judge will get at least one more season to prove he is the “right guy” to lead the Giants, which is what Mara called him back in August. Judge’s job will be to figure out why his efforts to teach produced so many ‘D’ and ‘F’ students, particularly on the offensive side of the ball. Judge said last week that he would start preparing for Year 3 of his tenure “first thing Monday morning.”

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