The Linc – Joe Banner doesn’t think the Eagles will be losing Jonathan Gannon

Philadelphia Eagles news and links for 12/29/21.

Let’s get to the Philadelphia Eagles links …

Former Eagles GM Joe Banner: Pump the brakes on the Jonathan Gannon head-coaching buzz, at least for this year – Inquirer
EJ: Jonathan Gannon’s name has been floated as a potential candidate for a head-coaching job this offseason. What do you make of that? … JB: I don’t think there’s any chance that he’s on anybody’s short list. I don’t think there’s any chance in this moment in time that he’s a serious candidate to be a head coach. I could look really bad and eat those words, but I don’t think I will. That doesn’t mean that isn’t his future. We’ve spoken about how positively he’s viewed in a league that tends to be quite critical and critique-oriented. We don’t even know if he’s solved the problem that created terrible performances against opposing passing attacks. How, all of a sudden, is he now a head coach? I do think he has the respect of people from a character and intellect perspective to suggest his future could very well be as a head coach and a very good one in the NFL. It’s totally possible and believable. The fact that he’s there right now, based on the way this defense has played this year and it’s his first and only year as a coordinator, I would be very, very surprised.

NFL Power Rankings: Week 17 Edition – BGN
16 – Philadelphia Eagles (LW: 19) – The Eagles overcame a slow start against an NFC East rival in Week 15 and did the same in Week 16. On the bright side, the Birds have shown resiliency, Nick Sirianni is earning a place in the Coach of the Year discussion, the offense has an identity, and the defense is playing really well. There’s a good chance the Eagles are going to surpass expectations and make the playoffs. On the dark side, Jalen Hurts’ inconsistency as a passer is concerning, especially with Miles Sanders and Jordan Howard getting banged up. The Eagles have done a good job of beating up on lesser competition but they’ve yet to prove they can hang with the big boys.

The QB Factory Reboot #41: A tale of two halves, the QB position is complex, Week 17 Preview – BGN Radio
Raichele Privette and Mark Schofield get carried away breaking down the play where Jalen Hurts misses wide-open Dallas Goedert in the end zone, then they share their pity for the Giants franchise and preview Week 17 against the Washington Football Team.

NFC Hierarchy/Obituary: Week 17 – PhillyVoice
2) Cowboys (11-4): Uh oh. The Cowboys’ offense came back to life in Dallas’ 56-14 stomping of Washington Sunday night, and the playmaking defense made life miserable for Taylor Heinicke. If the Cowboys are able to put it all together like that in the postseason, they are legitimate Super Bowl contenders.

Depth Test – Iggles Blitz
Washington looked awful on Sunday night, but that scares me. Ron Rivera is a veteran coach and they have some talented players. That group could come together and look at Sunday as their Super Bowl. Pro athletes don’t like being embarrassed. Rivera will push every button he can to get his guys fired up. That was just a dreadful game and one they’ll want to use as motivation.

Grading all 32 first-round picks after Week 16 of the 2021 NFL season – PFF
PICK NO. 10: WR DeVonta Smith, Philadelphia Eagles. Overall Rookie Grade: 75.6 (Rank: 4/27). Week 16 Grade: 74.0 Smith made another touchdown grab in a toe-tapping style that is fast becoming his signature play in the NFL. In total, he caught five of the six passes thrown his way for 80 yards and that touchdown, generating almost 2.9 yards per route run. That was the most catches, yards and yards per route run Smith has managed in a single game since Week 9.

Post-Snap Read: Jonathan Gannon throws a curveball with the D-line – PE.com
There have been a lot of examples in recent weeks of the Eagles putting linebackers up on the line of scrimmage “mugging up” before the snap as a potential pressure player on a blitz. These fronts have helped to dictate some of those one-on-one matchups that we see in the clip above, but they also have served to set the Eagles up for some creative stunts at the snap of the ball. These stunts help against both the run and the pass, and we saw examples of both against the Giants. The Eagles stunt at a lower rate than basically any team in football (according to Pro Football Focus), but in this matchup, they used that tool to their advantage to create pressure against the quarterback and defend the run.

Blowout Moves Cowboys to DVOA Top Spot – Football Outsiders
[BLG Note: The Eagles are 11th in DVOA. WFT is 25th.]

Best available kickers on the Week 17 waiver wire – DraftKings Nation
Jake Elliott, Philadelphia Eagles (16.5%). Next up — at Washington Football Team. The veteran kicker has been consistent option this season in fantasy football. In Sunday’s win against the New York Giants, Elliott missed a field goal between 40-49 yards, but went 2-for-2 on field goals between 30-39 yards and a perfect 4-for-4 on extra points. In his last five games, Elliott is averaging 11 fantasy points per game, which is higher than his season average of 8.5.

2021 Fantasy Football Rankings: Running Backs for NFL Week 17 – Fake Teams
RB42) Jordan Howard. RB43) Boston Scott. With Miles Sanders out – here are options; but they’re not electric.

Washington Football Team Vs. Dallas Cowboys (Game Two) – Studs and Duds – Hogs Haven
Taylor Heinicke – If you didn’t know before, it should be PAINFULLY obvious to you…FINALLY! This guy is not an NFL starter! There was a reason he was sitting on his sister’s couch last year until November. There was a reason he couldn’t earn a starting position on an XFL franchise. I don’t want to hear anymore of this “he just needs a chance” BS, or he can be a bridge quarterback for a drafted rookie next year. No – just NO! The first interception was a microcosm of his time here – open receiver, had his defender stacked, underthrown and poorly placed football to our star receiver…interception! I’ve seen all I need to see! And, by the way – Kyle Allen is better.

Fixing the Giants: How much change does ownership have an appetite for? – Big Blue View
The Giants are broken. They are football’s Humpty Dumpty. A proud franchise, one with four titles during the Super Bowl era, an original NFL franchise that has long considered itself a model organization that others should aspire to be. The Giants are lying in pieces at the bottom of a wall they fell off years ago. They seem to have no idea how to put themselves back together and start scaling the wall to becoming a relevant NFL team once again.

Betting takeaways from ESPN’s Week 17 NFL Power Rankings: Jump on the Cowboys – ESPN+
This is the best team in football. The Cowboys deserve to be No. 1. They are 11-4 and the current 2-seed in the NFC. Yes, they get to beat up on an awfully weak division, but they prove each time out how superior they are to the Giants, Eagles and Washington Football Team. They have the best ATS record in the NFL at 12-3. The offense can run. The offense can pass. The defense can pressure the quarterback. The defense is one of the best in the NFL at creating takeaways. There are no weaknesses to this team when it’s at full health and playing its best football … and it appears it is doing just that as we head into January. In Week 17, the Cowboys host the reeling Arizona Cardinals as 5.5-point favorites. I’d jump on the Cowboys now with that number under two field goals. I have a feeling it won’t be there very long.

5 takeaways from Dallas’ win over Washington: The offense is gaining momentum at the right time – Blogging The Boys
If you need any other reason to be excited about the defense at this point, consider this, the Cowboys are tied for the seventh-youngest defense in the NFL. Here are a few defenders still on their rookie contracts: Micah Parsons, Trevon Diggs, Osa Odighizuwa, Kelvin Joseph, Chauncey Golston, Dorance Armstrong, Donovan Wilson, Trysten Hill, Neville Gallimore, and Leighton Vander Esch. Outside of Randy Gregory and Demarcus Lawrence, this defense is built around an incredibly young core. What is even more encouraging than the younger players getting significant playing time is they are some of the most impactful players on the team.

NFL Updates COVID Protocol—Meaning Colts Could Get Several Key Starters Back in Time for Sunday – Stampede Blue
It’s big news for the Colts because not only is starting quarterback Carson Wentz now on the COVID-19/Reserve List, but so are at least 7 other starters (13 total players)—including a pair of 3x NFL All-Pros: Darius Leonard and Quenton Nelson, three starting offensive linemen, and two starting defensive backs collectively. The Colts could potentially get them all back—should each player’s symptoms lessen enough by Sunday respectively (and for a distinction here, not necessarily be asymptomatic to clear the protocol).

Raiders legendary coach John Madden dies at 85 – Silver And Black Pride
Legendary Oakland Raiders coach John Madden has died. He was 85. The NFL announced Madden’s death on Tuesday afternoon after he passed away unexpectedly that morning.

John Madden’s unparalleled impact on NFL influenced generations of football fans – NFL.com
How you remember John Madden today is largely about how old you are, because Madden, who died Tuesday morning at age 85, had three acts in his NFL life, each arguably more impactful than the previous one. His coaching career was successful — he was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame as a coach, after all — but relatively brief. After it ended, Madden did nothing less than contribute to the transformation of two industries, broadcasting and video gaming. That made Madden one of the most influential people for more than a half century of NFL history and certainly one of the very few who can be individually credited with the game’s staggering popularity and cultural impact, putting him in a pantheon with shapers of the game like George Halas and Pete Rozelle. But even those two colossal football figures did not cross and conquer genres the way Madden did. The best way to put Madden’s career in perspective is this: John Madden won a Super Bowl as the coach of the Oakland Raiders, and at the end, that is his least memorable accomplishment.

Here’s what the NFL playoff picture looks like going into Week 17 – SB Nation
The Eagles have been slowly becoming more dangerous each week and now find themselves in the playoff picture. It’s not an easy remaining final two games against NFC East rivals, but I think this can hold.

Off Day Debrief #69: Dolphins continue historic run + AFC/NFC Playoff picture – The SB Nation NFL Show
Rob “Stats” Guerrera and Brandon Lee Gowton react to Miami’s win on MNF with Justin Hier of The Phinsider and break down the playoff picture in both conferences. How the hell is Miami doing this? Can we believe in Tua Tagovailoa going forward? Can the Titans actually take the #1 seed in the AFC? Why the Ravens will finally succumb to injuries and absences The Chargers aren’t supposed to be this inconsistent anymore. How does the bottom of the NFC playoff seeding shake out? MVPs and LVPs of the week. Also, be sure to check out the only 100% accurate power rankings in the entire NFL podcast kingdom!

Covid-19 surges spark chain reactions that strain US hospitals everywhere – Vox
America’s hospitals and their workforces have reached and exceeded their breaking points in the last two years — and another surge of Covid-19 is already underway. Earlier this month, with a new wave of Covid-19 cases looking likely after the omicron variant was identified, Rhode Island emergency doctors wrote their state leaders to warn that any new surge of patients would “lead to collapse of the state health care system.” In Kansas, patients in rural hospitals have been stuck in the ER for days while they wait for a transfer to a larger hospital with the capacity and resources to care for them.

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