While I was dissapointed in the loss, I didn't feel as if the Eagles played terribly. The Cowboys have played pretty good football of late.
That game could have gone either way, but AR frustarted the heck out of me. The guy's a terrific coach, but he's an average gameday coach at best.
The first challenge was ridiculous...no way he was going to win that one, and everybody knew it. While it would have netted a first down, that lack of a first was not crucial at that point in time.
The second challenge made more sense given the situation, but when's the last time you saw a ball moved after a challenge on a QB sneak? Has it EVER been moved after a challenge on a QB sneak? I think many coaches would have challenged here, he had to know he was going to lose the challenge and his final timeout.
The FG...WTF!!!??? Down 7 with 4 minutes t go and NO TIMEOUTS...what good is a FG? It's not like the defense had been lights out. (They played well....but so did the Boy's Offense) STUPID CALL.
Looking ahead...this loss hurts, but I think the Eagles have shown they are a playoff caliber team, but need to get better if they hope to go anywhere in the playoffs.
Regarding the bolded part, I just don't understand this sentiment from AR supporters. If he's an "average at best" gameday coach, how can he be considered a "terrific" coach? I would think that one of the most important criteria to evaluate a coach would be their ability to actually coach the game.
Because gameday coaching is only one part of overall quality of coaching. It may not even be the most important part. He's worked well with GM's to get a decent product on the field virtually every year. He's overcome devastating injuries to QB's and O-linemen in the past to continue to field a competitive product year in and year out. He makes most of the drafting calls and has done an above average job with that. Coaching is far more then in game management of timeouts and challenges.The Eagles generally come to play...so yes, despite his deficiencies on gameday, he's still a terrific coach.
He has passed off O play calling when he's gotten too predictable...another sign of a good coach, even though it's bad he got so predictable.
He needs to hand that red flag to an assistant though.................
I agree that there is more to coaching than in game management but I think that it is the most defining criteria to evaluate a coach. AR is great at preparing the team for a matchup but when the Eagles lose to an inferior opponent (which I think has happened twice this year), I believe it's usually because AR was outcoached. I think he's good at evaluating talent and usually does a good job with the draft but in my opinion that speaks more to his ability as a GM than a coach. I'm not disputing that he's a terrific GM. I think in order to be a "terrific" coach, he needs to improve in several areas of game management (e.g. clock management, use of challenged, run/pass distribution). I think he's a very good coach (he has to be with that kind of record) but not "terrific".
I'm going to have to respectfully disagree here. It took him years to figure out that he needs half-way competent receivers. Honestly, find me one other head coach EVER that would have tried to make James Thrash a WR1? Or Pinkston? It took an embarrassment at home against the Panthers on the biggest of stages to convince him of that? Why does our head coach have a learning curve? I can go back to the inept 7 plays from the goal line at San Francisco, which ended with an INT, and state that Andy's learned nothing about how to convert the short yardage consistently. Is it personnel? Those are all Andy's guys, is he not bringing in the right talent to convert 3rd and short? Is it play calling in that situation? Could it be that we're in so many 3rd and 8+ yards that the players aren't prepared to convert short yardage? Again, it's Andy's responsibility to put his players in a better position to make plays. I am just wondering when he'll ever get around to that? He's only been saying that since the Clinton Administration.
It seems that Andy's never figured out that talent wins more games than schemes. Why does he consistently resist bringing in a RB that can get the tough yards? Or is it the OLine? He's certainly invested a lot in that, so again, why are we still struggling with the basics of basics here in converting on short yardage?
I'm calling a spade a spade and flat out say that Andy Reid is the overall problem NOT the solution. He can scheme and gameplan all he wants but if his teams can't even get the basics accomplished then what's that say about him as head coach, offensive coordinator by proxy and GM?