Hayden Fox Assessment: Week 10 @ Philadelphia Eagles

[Hayden Fox]

Positives
* Great character win. The team battle back from an early deficit. Things did not go well early again, but the team kept grinding. They easily could have gone in a shell, but they kept fighting. Major contributors were out with the injuries and backups we had not seen much of came it and played well. Considering this was the third road game in a row against a hot team, this was an excellent win.
* Plus 1 turnover differential.
* 17 unanswered points.
* From late round draft picks to undrafted free agents, rookie players stepped up everywhere. Neville Hewitt, Zach Vigil, Bobby McCain, Mike Hull and Tony Lippett we have not seen much of until today. All came up and played key snaps with starters going down. Add to the mix the work that Ajayi, Jordan Phillips, Andrew Franks and Matt Darr and the Class of 2015 came up big today.
* Ryan Tannehill's toughness.
* Lamar Miller did it as a runner and receiver. He had 43 yards on 16 carries. As a receiver he had 50 yards on 6 catches and a TD.
* Jay Ajayi ran tough again. He had 48 yards on 6 carries.
* Rishard Matthews had 93 yards on 5 receptions for 18.6 per reception. Huge, clutch day for Matthews.
* Jarvis Landry being alert after a Tannehill pass caromed off of a Eagles' defenders helmet. Landry caught the ball for what was the game winning score.
* Jason Fox was much better this week.
* 3rd down defense was 7-18 which is 39%, but the third down D was much better in the 2nd half.
* Rush defense was excellent as they gave up 83 yards on 36 carries for 2.3 per carry.
* Strong pass rush today. They had 4 sacks and 10 pressures.
* Red Zone defense. Held the Eagles to 2-5 in the Red Zone.
* Ndamukong Suh was completely dominant. He had 8 TOT, 7 solo, 1 sack, 3 TFL and 3 QB hits. He was a one-man wrecking crew.
* Reshad Jones was a monster today. Jones' interception of Mark Sanchez was huge as the Eagles were looking to go ahead. He had 9 TOT, 7 solo, 1 sack, 1 TFL, 1 PD, 1 QB hit.
* Derrick Shelby had a strip sack, 4 TOT, 3 solo. He brought strong pressure off the edge.
* Olivier Vernon had 6 pressures.
* Kelvin Sheppard had 11 TOT, 8 solo and 2 TFL's.
* Chris McCain's jarring sack on Sam Bradford. He got the sack and forced a fumble. Bradford was knocked from the game.
* Zach Vigil's punt block. The block came at a huge time the team needed momentum.
* Walt Aikens open field tackle on a Darren Sproles punt return.
* Caleb Sturgis miss. Sturgis killed Philadelphia's momentum.
* Loved how physical the team was today. Between McCain's hit. Jamar Taylor's 3rd down stick of Jordan Matthews, to hard hits by Jones and Sheppard, to some tough blocks by receivers on offense, the team beat up and out-physicaled the Eagles.
* Love Miller not backing down from an Eagles' defender after scoring a TD.
* The coaching staff stepped up big today. Campbell did not panic when his team was down early. He kept his team working. Bill Lazor had a solid return to Philadelphia. He stayed balanced and got enough out of his offense to get the win. Lou Anarumo had a rough start, but made adjustments and his players played much better after the 2nd quarter. Darren Rizzi's special teams helped snatch momentum back with a big punt block. Also, tip of the cap to LB Coach Mark Duffner and DB Coach Blue Adams. Both had starters go down with injuries today, but they had their replacements ready to play. Simply a strong effort from the coaching staff today.
* Dan Campbell's challenge of a Bradford fumble.
* Loved some of the play calls today. The wheel route to Miller for 35 yards on the opening drive helped set up a score. The the play design in which Miller and Ajayi were on the field together was creative.
* The Patriotic ceremony pre game in which the eagle flew on to the field.

Negatives
* Slow start.
* Another safety.
* 84 yards on 8 penalties.
* 5-15 the offense was on 3rd down.
* The offense was 2-4 in the Red Zone.
* Gave up four sacks and lots of pressure.
* Kenny Stills' drop of a perfect deep ball by Tannehill.
* 4 minute offense that could not ice the game late. They needed one more 1st down to end the game and they could not get it.
* Vernon not being able to scoop a fumble that would have put the ball at least in the red area for the offense.
* C.J. Mosley penalty that took away a Hewitt pick.
* The Eagles had a poor snap and Shelby could not recover the ball.
* Nobody being able to recover a fumble caused by McCain.
* 2 DB's covering one receiver in the end zone while leaving Brent Celek wide open for Philadelphia's first TD.
* Big plays given up to wide open TE's.
* Damien Williams fumbling a kickoff in the end zone, panicking and bring the ball out in which he was tackled at the 1. I truly believe he did not know the rule and thinking if he muffed the kick, he had to bring the ball out. Terrible decision making.
* Landry's no fair catch in which the offense had to start inside the ten.
* Landry drawing a personal foul which killed field position around midfield.
* Too many routes short of the chains on 3rd down.
* Why is Williams returning kicks with a bum hand?

Overall Assessment
* What a great character win today. On the road for three straight weeks, after getting blown out the two weeks prior and off to a poor start, Miami looked in trouble. However, the team kept plugging away. The team's best players stepped up as did players that had not contributed to this point in the season. Playing without Wake and Brent Grimes and having some other players go down with injuries, Miami had adversity. There were some ugly parts of the stat line, but Miami found a way to make enough plays to get a much needed victory.
* Tip of the cap to the front office today. The FO has been getting killed this week. However, they should take a bow with late round picks and undrafted free agents coming up big today.
* Great that the team caught some breaks today. Seems like everything has gone against the Fins this year. However, today they got some.
* I will be honest. I thought Sanchez was going to drive the field and we would lose on Sturgis field goal. I am conditioned into thinking like this. However, it was simply tremendous the team stepped up and made enough plays to get the win.
* Ryan Tannehill has to get better in the 4th quarter. He needs to start coming up much more clutch then he does. Far too many times, he comes up small. The QB has to start stepping up.
* Great to see Jason Laconfora get ripped today. He had two "insider" stories. One was about Bill O'Brien going to Maryland and the other was about Eddie Debartolo getting part ownership with the Raiders. By 1pm, both stories were shown to be completely false. In O'Brien's case, respected writer John McClain showed JLC's information to be wrong. The best was the actual statements made by Mark Davis and Debartolo themselves. If you get a chance, go read them. They torch Laconfora. I am shocked CBS keeps him on TV as their "insider". There is so much more talent out there to replace that bag of wind.
* Look, it is going to be hard for the Fins to make the playoffs. That said, they are just one game out from the playoffs. For the rest of the year, I want to see this team work as hard as they did today, improve in certain areas and win some games as we go. Let's have some fun the rest of the way and enjoy our football and see where things end up.

 

[royalshank]

Hayden thanks. I've been putting off going to sleep to catch your write up. Great job as usual.

Good of you to give props here:

Jason Fox was much better this week.

I thought the line played pretty well so kudos to Fox and the gang.

 

[gregorygrant83]

Since the Bradford fumble was called on the field as a Miami recovery and then refumble shouldn't the play automaticly been reviewed and Cambell not be allowed to challenge the call.

 

[royalshank]

Also, wow - I count 9 rookies played?

undrafted free agents, rookie players stepped up everywhere. Neville Hewitt, Zach Vigil, Bobby McCain, Mike Hull and Tony Lippett we have not seen much of until today. All came up and played key snaps with starters going down. Add to the mix the work that Ajayi, Jordan Phillips, Andrew Franks and Matt Darr and the Class of 2015 came up big today.

 

[royalshank]

Since the Bradford fumble was called on the field as a Miami recovery and then refumble shouldn't the play automaticly been reviewed and Cambell not be allowed to challenge the call.

that whole thing thoroughly annoyed me to say the least. Why were they about to line up at 3rd and 14? Whether it was a fumble or re-fumble weren't we looking at either 4th down or 1st down Philly?

 

[J. David Wannyheimer]

Not sure I'd list coaching as a positive today. They were late getting calls in and our defense looked unprepared to deal with the hurry-up. It was also easily the worst game I've ever seen Bill Lazor call. We do some good things on offense and I think Lazor does a better job in most respects than Mike Sherman did. But today, I saw a lot of plays in which we had multiple skill players moving laterally behind the line of scrimmage after the snap. That's completely insane to me that we not only drew all of those plays up, but then decided to just keep using all of them this week against a Philly defense that is fast in lateral pursuit.

I think the most completely bizarre call I saw was the reverse to Rishard Matthews where we fake a jet sweep and then do a series of complicated misdirections that involves having our quarterback block a linebacker... and we do that for three yards. And we're doing all of this with an offensive line that is struggling badly to sustain blocks right now. And we're alternating these with screens behind the line of scrimmage that Philadelphia is all over and their defenders are laughing about how stupid we are.

Easily the most frustrated I have been with Bill Lazor since he has been here. I give a lot of credit to the players for nutting up and somehow finding a way to pull that game out in the end, because I really don't know that the staff did them many favors today.

 

[gregorygrant83]

that whole thing thoroughly annoyed me to say the least. Why were they about to line up at 3rd and 14? Whether it was a fumble or re-fumble weren't we looking at either 4th down or 1st down Philly?

Because instead of letting Philly have it 1st and 10 Miami was going to accept the 10 yard holding penalty.

 

[royalshank]

Not sure I'd list coaching as a positive today. They were late getting calls in and our defense looked unprepared to deal with the hurry-up. It was also easily the worst game I've ever seen Bill Lazor call. We do some good things on offense and I think Lazor does a better job in most respects than Mike Sherman did. But today, I saw a lot of plays in which we had multiple skill players moving laterally behind the line of scrimmage after the snap. That's completely insane to me that we not only drew all of those plays up, but then decided to just keep using all of them this week against a Philly defense that is fast in lateral pursuit.

I think the most completely bizarre call I saw was the reverse to Rishard Matthews where we fake a jet sweep and then do a series of complicated misdirections that involves having our quarterback block a linebacker... and we do that for three yards. And we're doing all of this with an offensive line that is struggling badly to sustain blocks right now.

Easily the most frustrated I have been with Bill Lazor since he has been here. I give a lot of credit to the players for nutting up and somehow finding a way to pull that game out in the end, because I really don't know that the staff did them many favors today.

that was a bizzaro play. Not as bizzaro as chuck paganoz fake punt but it was odd indeed.

---------- Post added at 11:58 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:58 PM ----------

Because instead of letting Philly have it 1st and 10 Miami was going to accept the 10 yard holding penalty.

ah - thank you. Now that makes sense.

 

[fisi]

great job as usual, hayden. you never disappoint.

 

[t-dubya]

that whole thing thoroughly annoyed me to say the least. Why were they about to line up at 3rd and 14? Whether it was a fumble or re-fumble weren't we looking at either 4th down or 1st down Philly?

There was a penalty on philly on the play, holding i think. If it was not a recovery by vernon, it was 4th and 20+ and phins decline the penalty, otherwise they accept and it goes fr 3rd and 3 to 3rd and 13

 

[royalshank]

There was a penalty on philly on the play, holding i think. If it was not a recovery by vernon, it was 4th and 20+ and phins decline the penalty, otherwise they accept and it goes fr 3rd and 3 to 3rd and 13

thanks yeah I missed that part. Gregorygrant83 explained it above too.

 

[Chuck Willie]

Nice write up Hayden, was waiting on it brotha! Lot of young guys came up big for us today and that was nice to see. Really thought Bobby McCain played his tail off for us today and 29th more reps I look forward to him being a solid player for us at CB.

As you stated, it's going to be a tall order for us to get into the playoffs. As long as the team gives the type of effort they did today, I'll be satisfied. Big win.

 

[J. David Wannyheimer]

that was a bizzaro play. Not as bizzaro as chuck paganoz fake punt but it was odd indeed.

Even though I don't think Rich Gannon is a very good analyst (he mixes up names constantly and confuses plays), I do like that he likes to show the blimp shots of the action because you can see clear as day how incredibly stupid some of our pass route concepts are.

It's always cool to see when our receivers collide with each other because they're being asked to run ridiculous route combos on top of each other.

 

[Hayden Fox]

Hayden thanks. I've been putting off going to sleep to catch your write up. Great job as usual.

Good of you to give props here:

Jason Fox was much better this week.

I thought the line played pretty well so kudos to Fox and the gang.

I am not lying when I say this. This usually takes me over an hour and I typical use a google doc and cut and paste it over. Well, I hit the wrong button and hit paste and long story short I lost my work. I went right to the site typed on the page. I snapped when I lost it. Could not find it anywhere.

 

[.....]

My two quick observations from the game:

1) Tannehill took some massive hits today, two of which I could not believe he got up from, much less continued playing. Say what you want about him, but he is a tough SOB.

2) Damien Williams needs to be flipping burgers at McDonalds. When I saw him back to receive kicks again, I told the Mrs. "This is not going to turn out well." Sure enough, every time he touched the ball he either made a poor decision or flat out dropped it. He kept the team in bad field position, which set up the safety and slow start.