I came across a really good Eagles' training camp summary from SI.com and figured I'd attach some excerpts for everyone's enjoyment:
1. Memo to anxious Eagles fans everywhere: He's fine. Really. Everything's going to be OK. Donovan McNabb may not be all the way back just yet, but if you didn't know the Eagles quarterback had blown out his right knee a little more than eight months ago, you wouldn't be able to tell from his early work in training camp.
"If that's being 75 percent for him, I'd love to see him get to 100 percent,'' Eagles running back Brian Westbrook said Friday after McNabb turned in another strong practice performance. "Minus the [knee] brace, you'd be hard-pressed to tell anything had happened to him.''
McNabb has been very accurate in camp thus far, and I saw him put pass after pass on the hands of his receivers Friday morning. He hit the newly acquired Kevin Curtis in stride on a bomb down the left sideline midway through live team drills, and he's moving around with aplomb, avoiding the pass rush and occasionally taking off if there's no open receiver in sight.
I'm convinced he could start a regular season game next week and fare pretty darn well for himself, but in reality he has more than a month before Philly's Sept. 9 opener at Green Bay to continue making progress. He'll make that without breaking a sweat, even though the Eagles may hold him out of the first two preseason games for precautionary reasons.
I asked him Friday if he wanted me to spread the word that he's good to go, so folks can stop asking him about the state of the knee?
"I've tried to do that in so many words,'' McNabb said. "But this is Philadelphia. It's something to talk about. The biggest question in camp this year is 'How's Donovan?' But really, I'm good. There are steps in this process, but getting back on the field and playing again, it's just like riding a bike.''
2. I think one of the trickiest things for the Eagles to figure out early this season will be how to duplicate the prominence Westbrook had in their offense during last year's late-season run to the playoffs. Westbrook himself is interested to know if a run-pass balance will be the byword with Philly's offense this season, after he was successful carrying so much of the load while the Eagles were winning six consecutive games without McNabb last season.
"I think a lot of people around the league were surprised, but I've been asking for that, to carry the load, for a while now,'' Westbrook told me between practices. "We've been a quarterback dominated team and we've won that way. But I would hope [last year] would influence us to run the ball a lot more than in the past. Andy [Reid] loves the passing game. Sometimes he gets bored with the running game.''
It wasn't too boring when Westbrook was helping the Eagles rescue their season last year. It was smart football by Reid and offensive play-caller Marty Mornhinweg. McNabb comeback or not, Philly shouldn't forget the winning formula that had Westbrook front and center.
3. I can't help but root for Takeo Spikes a little bit this year. The Eagles new weakside linebacker has been one of the best at his position in the first nine years of his career, but has yet to sniff the playoffs. He spent the past four years in Buffalo, and the five previous in Cincinnati. He made the questionable move of leaving the Bengals as a free agent after the 2002 season, just before head coach Marvin Lewis returned them to respectability (and the postseason in 2005). In four seasons as a Bill, Spikes played on just one winning team (9-7 in 2004).
With the Eagles, he's finally on a team that's favored to win, and has a recent track record for success. "That's your motivation, to be playing meaningful games late in the season,'' Spikes said. "Dick LeBeau, who coached me in Cincinnati and Buffalo, said you never reach your full potential as a player unless you have other great players around you. Now I do.''
4. Looks like Jeremy Bloom, the former Olympic skier who Philly drafted in the fifth round in 2006, is well positioned to handle the Eagles punt and kick returns this season. Bloom spent all of his rookie year on IR with a hamstring problem, but he's healthy again and has looked sharp in camp. The former moguls champion said last year that it would take his body time to transition from skiing to football, because of the different muscles and movements he used in each of them. Bloom's speed in the return game should give Eagles fans a few thrills along the way in 2007.
5. The Eagles are pretty happy with their depth at numerous positions. From this vantage point, they're deep at linebacker, receiver, tight end, quarterback, defensive end and in the secondary. For a team that lost a lot of key players to injury last season, Philly has done a nice job of trying to ensure that it can withstand a few such subtractions this year.
I think they're especially well stocked at linebacker with Spikes, Jeremiah Trotter and Chris Gocong as the expected starters, with rookie Stewart Bradley and a pair of second-year vets in Matt McCoy and Omar Gaither in reserve. At tight end, the Eagles go four-deep, with L.J. Smith, Matt Scobel, rookie Brent Celek and Lee Vickers all having chances to stick.
Of the three NFC East teams I've visited in camp (all but Dallas), the Eagles easily have the best depth. They're going to cut some players in the next few weeks who will be quickly snapped up by other NFL clubs. If I had to choose now, Philly would get my nod to defend its surprising division title of a year ago.
The more I read over the last day or so, I'm starting to think Matt Schobel will be cut. It also sounds that since McNabb looks pretty healthy, Big Red may return to his pass happy ways, which will surely aggravate us all. I'm also encouraged to hear that the linebackers appear to be a position of depth instead of a group of question marks. I'm not ready to jump on the Bloom bandwagon until I see the kid play on the pro level.
By the way, did anyone notice that both T.O. and Dante Stallworth are fighting injury problems? I have the feeling we're not going to be missing those guys all that much this year.
Don't know about you guys, but I'm really getting psyched for football.
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