Inside the penalties — and non-calls — that contributed to the Eagles’ first loss of the season

Sports

add

PHILADELPHIA — Every Monday after an Eagles game, Nick Sirianni reviews a personal checklist based on his core principles to determine how his team played — win or lose. Among the questions he asks is, Did we play detailed?

When he reviews the Eagles’ 21-17 loss to the Denver Broncos on Monday, the answer to that question will be obvious and aggravating. The Eagles were undone by foolish penalties, including two flags that negated first downs on a potential go-ahead drive in the fourth quarter and one flag that extended a Broncos drive late in the game when the Eagles had forced a fourth down. There were vexing penalties among the Eagles’ nine infractions. A few might have even been perplexing. But they were contributing factors in a loss that should be difficult for the Eagles to accept because too many of the errors were of their own doing.

“A lot of the penalties were honestly just dumb mistakes by us,” linebacker Zack Baun said. “We can’t be making those silly mistakes.”

The Eagles didn’t lose because of penalties. There’s never one reason. The offense grew stagnant while the run-pass ratio skewed too far in the direction of passing. The defense missed a few key stops, failing to protect a two-touchdown lead in the fourth quarter. There were missed opportunities on both sides of the ball. And there have been missed calls from the officials, too. But the Eagles lamented the types of penalties that leave good teams infuriated because they were penalties before the snap and after the play that should be avoided.

“Those are some self-inflicted things that we did,” Sirianni said. “When those happen, I’m always putting that on myself. When we don’t master the things that require no talent, that’s something that’s always going to be on me because that’s something that we talk about an awful lot, and we have to drive that home and I have to drive that home, so that’s on me.”

The three plays late in the fourth quarter are the ones that will gnaw at the Eagles the most. They had ramifications on scoring opportunities and the clock after the Eagles surrendered the lead and needed to come back from an 18-17 deficit with more than seven minutes to play. On a second-and-1 at Denver’s 48-yard line, Jalen Hurts converted an 8-yard pass to DeVonta Smith on a run-pass option. That would have put the Eagles past midfield and they could have kept their no-huddle attack. Instead, they were set back five yards because guard Tyler Steen was ruled as an ineligible player downfield — a penalty that has plagued the Eagles on RPOs in the past. Hurts shouldered responsibility, wondering if he should have handed the ball off. (Barkley only had one carry in the second half.)

“I think there’s a level of situational awareness and the level of preparation we have in those moments,” Hurts said. “Again, I can be very critical of myself. I have to watch the tape. On second-and-one, I could have very easily handed that ball off and I threw the bubble. And so there are a lot of opportunities.”

The Eagles did not convert the first down on second down or third down, and they kept their offense on the field for a fourth-and-4 at their 49-yard line. Hurts connected with DeVonta Smith on a 30-yard pass that would have put the Eagles in field goal range or on the way to a potential touchdown. There was celebrating in the stadium — until fans spotted the yellow flag. The Eagles were flagged for an illegal shift before the snap. The penalty was on Barkley, but there was more involved than Barkley.

“Two players went in motion, so, by rule, when two players go in motion, both have to reset for a second before the snap,” referee Adrian Hill said in a pool report after the game. “One player stopped, but (Barkley) continued in motion, so that’s what created the illegal shift. They didn’t both reset for a full second.”

It’s hard enough to convert a 30-yard pass on fourth-and-4, so to be set back five yards because of a procedure penalty is one that the team lamented. There were different explanations for why it occurred. Barkley said he must be “detailed better” — a term Sirianni uses in his checklist — and that he needs to own it because it’s on him. But part of the issue might have been because the Eagles were rushing the play, and it’s harder to put a player in motion when the play clock is ticking low. That should require the Eagles to assess their operation.

“I think if we operate a little faster, get to the ball, we can maybe avoid some of that,” Hurts said. “Nonetheless, when you have a motion tagged to a play, I put that towards operation as a unit and that starts with me. So I own that. I can play smarter in that and make it work, given what we’re doing.”

There were nine seconds on the play clock when Barkley went into motion and there were two seconds when he returned to the backfield.

“We want to get up and get set as quick as we possibly can, so then you can go through all the different things that you need to go through at the line of scrimmage to help you execute the play,” Sirianni said. “So that’s something where we can’t make that mistake. That’s a mistake that’ll get you, and it obviously got us today.”

Coach Nick Sirianni said he shoulders responsibility for penalties because he talks about them so much. (Bill Streicher / Imagn Images)

The Eagles were left punting because of the penalty. That meant the defense needed to force Denver off the field and get the ball back in time for the offense. The Broncos took possession at the 5-minute mark in the second half, converted one third down and then were stopped one yard shy on their next third down. It would have been fourth-and-1 at the Eagles’ 28-yard line with 2:21 to go.

Except once again, a flag.

Baun raced to stop Broncos running back R.J. Harvey, who was trying to fight through a tackle by Eagles safety Drew Mukuba. Baun, one of the best linebackers in the NFL, did what he’s coached to do: ensure the ball-carrier is down, diving toward Harvey to keep him short of sticks. The officials thought Baun lunged too late, flagging him 15 yards for unnecessary roughness and giving Denver a fresh set of downs while the Eagles only had one timeout remaining.

“The officials saw we had a prone player on the ground, and he came in and hit the player that was prone on the ground when the play was over,” Hill said.

“Short-yardage situation, he was fighting for extra yards, we’re taught to cap off in those situations, I didn’t think he was done,” Baun said. “One ref threw the flag. It was a (subjective) penalty. …I thought it could have gone either way.”

Baun approached the official for an explanation because he said he’s taught to cap off hits — “especially in a short-yardage situation,” he added. He was eager to review the film to see if his split-second assessment was accurate. The flag was costly because the Eagles did not regain possession until only 1:06 remained in the game and they had no timeouts and needed to drive 74 yards for a touchdown. The penalty cost them 75 seconds, a timeout, and the two-minute warning on offense. But Baun’s explanation was plausible, and a reasonable person can disagree that it was a late hit. That’s why the fan base was irate at the officiating, and the Eagles sideline didn’t seem thrilled with the officials, either.

“I’ve been around this long enough where calls, they balance each other out,” Sirianni said in a diplomatic response. “I know sometimes there’s always going to be like, ‘Well, we get screwed in this one.’ I don’t think that way. They all balance each other out. You’re going to get some that you think you should get, you’re going to get some that’s going to go against you sometimes as well, so those guys do the best they can do and take a lot of pride in that. …You just don’t want to put yourself in those situations where it’s coming down to a decision made by somebody else.”

The Baun penalty was not the only controversial call — or no-call. Earlier in the drive, Broncos quarterback Bo Nix was flagged for intentional grounding on a Jalyx Hunt pass rush on second-and-6. That would have been a 10-yard penalty and a loss of down, pushing the Broncos to a third-and-16 from their 37-yard line. If the Eagles could have forced Denver off the field in that spot, they would have regained possession and only needed a field goal to take the lead.

The problem: The officials picked up the flag. The Broncos had a third-and-6, which they converted, and reached range for a field goal.

“What happened there, we have an O2O – that’s our official-to-official communication system,” Hill said, “My O2O was not working. Grounding is a teamwork foul. I had intentional grounding. The line judge had that there was a receiver in the area – 28 – but I didn’t hear the information over O2O, so I threw the flag. The line judge came in and let me know that 28 indeed was in the area, and that’s why we picked up the flag.”

The last one that left screenshots circulating on social media came with four seconds and the Eagles went on a last-ditch effort to score. Hurts attempted a deep pass to Dallas Goedert at the 5-yard line, and Goedert appeared to be wrestled to the ground. The officials determined that there was “mutual hand fighting and hand-to-hand combat and did not see action that rose to the level of a foul on that play.” Sirianni was furious on the sideline, raising his arms in disbelief when the big screen showed the replay.

“They obviously didn’t throw a flag. I need to go back and see it on tape, but it would have been interesting to see what would have happened,” Goedert said.

These are subjective calls in a game with 125 plays between the offense and the defense. There were opportunities to win the game without making the officials a topic of postgame queries.

But part of why they lost was their own errors that led to flags. In a four-point game, a first down taken off the board or giving an opponent a fresh set of downs have lingering effects. Hurts repeated a line that’s been said about other shortcomings with the team: “Certain things don’t get you until they get you.” These were not all new issues for the Eagles. They were simply costlier. Baun said the “bright side” is that they’re “small details” that can be fixed. But it’s why Sirianni will have a difficult answer to the question Monday when he asks, Did we play detailed?

“That’s how you lose football games,” Barkley said. “Not being detailed.”

(Top photo of Jalen Carter: Emilee Chinn / Getty Images)

This news was originally published on this post .

Share on

email

Previous

trending_flat

Paulo Henrique, do Vasco, é convocado para amistosos da seleção brasileira

O Globo

Next

trending_flat

It took 147 seconds for the Jets to unravel against the Cowboys

Sports