Some people are fans of the Philadelphia Eagles. But many, many more people are NOT fans of the Philadelphia Eagles. This 2020 Defector NFL team preview is for those in the latter group. Read all the previews so far here.
Your team: Philadelphia Eagles.
Your 2019 record: 9-7. GIMME THE DROP.
God, and it was such a nice throw, too. And so was this one!
Unreal. Look at those fucking alligator arms! It’s like the ball has tetanus!
Remember last preseason when people (OK, me) were like HOLY SHIT THE EAGLES ARE LOADED FOR THE NEXT FIVE YEARS! Funny story! They weren’t. This team won the NFC East last year but winning that division is like being crowned barbecue champion of Indiana. Their starting linebacker got so thoroughly owned by Kirk Cousins that they had to release him after the carnage. Their tight end got sucker punched by a Florida Man at a South Dakota bar, which feels like some kind of election metaphor I can’t quite articulate. They blew a 17-point lead to Miami and let the Dolphins’ PUNTER throw a touchdown in the same game. Their fans at a tailgate attacked a member of their city’s own NBA team when he walked by them. Derek Barnett tried to kill a Packers running back by coming into the pile later than your first girlfriend’s menstrual cycle. They hosted Seattle in the Wild Card round and their starting QB didn’t even last a quarter. NO SAINT DICKOLAS AS BACKUP TO SAVE YOUR ASSES THIS TIME!
Your coach: What Gruden would look like if he were British.
Doug Pederson got the rona this summer. He won’t comment on how he got it, which means he got it sucking on the pool filter at the Lake of the Ozarks festival. Now, if you’ll indulge me for a moment, I go through all the coaching staffs for these previews, and the layout for these staffs on every team site makes every coach look like a secondary guest star on The Love Boat. BEHOLD!
Oh, the romantic misunderstandings those three could get into!
Your quarterback: Carson Wentz, who will never be better than he was before his knee injury and will never finish another season intact. It’s a delightful irony that the ginger Dakota boy who can skin a polar bear alive can’t make it out of a hogpile without losing both kneecaps. [Eagles fan calling into WIP voice] HE’S FINISHED! He can’t play anymore! Nick Foles understood what this city is ABOUT. Carson Wentz has always been about Carson Wentz and no one else. MY GIRLFRIEND ONLY FUCKS WARTIME QUARTERBACKS AND CARSON WENTZ IS NOT A WARTIME QUARTERBACK. What we need a fresh start! I masturbate to the Rocky statue a lot!
Thankfully, Howie Roseman drafted Oklabama’s Jalen Hurts in the second round, which will TOTALLY clarify everything. Already the Eagles are sketching red zone packages for Hurts to give him the Taysom Hill treatment. And we ALL love the Taysom Hill experience, do we not? Having someone like Hurts around is just BEGGING Pederson to get too cute and run a failed quintuple reverse at the goal line. The man has already beaten both the Patriots and COVID-19. Common sense is the next logical target.
What’s new that sucks: DeSean Jackson hearts Hitler!
I’m used to DeSean dropping the ball before he’s crossed the goal line, but I was NOT ready for him to become spokesman for all Illinois Nazis. THAT’S 2020 FOR YA, FOLKS! Anyway, Jackson apologized and that was somehow enough.
“It was never intended to put down any race or religion.” YOU QUOTED FUCKING HITLER! AND YOU DIDN’T EVEN QUOTE HIM RIGHT! You grabbed a bullhorn and were like, “The Jew is using the black as muscle against you.” I’ve seen more credible apologies from Harvey fucking Weinstein, man.
To potentially replace DeSean—at least as a downfield threat and not as a Louis Farrakhan dinner guest—the Eagles signed Marquise Goodwin, who promptly opted out of this season. They also drafted Jalen Reagor in the first round, which Eagles fans enjoyed about as much as they enjoy the idea of embracing gay rights. SO MANY JALENS NOW. Philly now represents the highest concentration of Jalens outside of Duval County. My whole life, Eagles fans have spent the bulk of their time bitching about their wideouts. Reagor will fit in with that tradition so seamlessly I can hardly stand it. To that end, Hurts already got Reagor to hurt his shoulder after throwing an interception in practice. Vinny from Port Richmond is ecstatic.
Nelson Agholor is gone: a monumental victory to a fanbase that believes subtraction is the only form of addition. Jordan Howard is also gone, which is fine because Pederson never bothered to use him. Also gone is Malcolm Jenkins. Philadelphia PD celebrated his release the only way they know how:
Along the offensive line, Lane Johnson ALSO contracted COVID-19. Brandon Brooks tore his Achilles in June. An aging Jason Peters was gonna switch to right guard to replace Brooks, but is remaining at left tackle for the time being. Gonna be tough for Wentz to complete a pass from his own grave. On defense, Roseman treated himself to Darius Slay and the infamous Nickell Robey-Coleman. Let’s hope Robey-Coleman gets away with more field crimes!
You blew a 17-0 lead in Week 1. To a team that can't even name itself.
What has always sucked: Fans here have been low-heat simmering about Carson Wentz self-reporting a concussion in last year's playoff game, but will usually only tell you about it after they've emptied dad’s liquor cabinet (2 p.m.). The Eagles still had a chance to tie that game against the Seahawks at the end. Their middle-aged backup QB didn't even get a pass off. The good news is that they're building a casino down the street from the Linc, so those same fans can leave the stadium and throw their more of their money away after the games.
Philadelphia is the asshole little brother of the East Coast. Its people are simultaneously entitled and filthy, with every Eagles fan acting like a trust fund baby who develops a kleptomania habit out of sheer boredom. They’re violent but cowardly. They constantly cry out for attention and then scream NO NOT THAT KIND OF ATTENTION when you give them any. They’re horrible winners but ALSO horrible losers. They’re horny but ugly. They’re loud but also a constant downer. They’re only happy when the people they love fail. They love to eat but eat like fucking raccoons. They love to party but always bring the local skinhead chapter president as their +1. They play the victim while stealing your kidneys while you sleep. They can ruin ANY meal with their sheer presence. These are DEEPLY shitty people whose appetite for petty grudges knows no bounds. I would rather get a rectal exam from whoever gave Pederson the rona than spend any time around Philadelphians. All they do is steal garbage and burn crosses. “Gonna Fly Now” is a hideous piece of music. Kellyanne Conway will one day be murdered by her own kid and America will throw a parade.
Alshon Jeffery is fat. He’s Big Ben’s physique in a wideout and he’s slower than 911.
What might not suck: You’ve never lost to the Jets. Quite the laurel.
Ratto says: “Doug Pederson caught the virus, which he definitely won't ever be reminded of by Eagles fans. These are folks who will cheerfully tell you that winning Super LII wasn't nearly as big a deal as going 9-7 in the next two years. Totally. The big off-season story was DeSean Jackson ranging out of his comfort zone to repeat someone else's beliefs without vetting them himself. But Philadelphia only holds grudges of its own choosing, and Jackson not leading the team in receptions since 2013 eats at them far more. It also doesn't help the local mood that the coach they ran out of town is now the reigning Super Bowl champion.”
HEAR IT FROM EAGLES FANS!
Taylor:
Derrick Henry has more touchdown passes in the playoffs than Carson Wentz.
Jeff:
I just know a commentator will say “He’s struggled to stay healthy, but this year he put a lot of effort into bulking up and coming back tougher than North Dakota tough” only for Wentz’s tibias to get vaporized on the next play.
John:
Carson Wentz is a country bumpkin whose favorite pastime is shooting animals for fun, and somehow he's the only player NOT peddling insane conspiracy theories this offseason.
Ben:
Fuck DeSean Jackson with a giant shofar.
Brian:
Fuck Freddie Mitchell with Todd Pinkston's T-Rex arms.
Rick:
Everyone in Philly will sprain their fingers keeping them crossed that Carson won't get hurt again. By Week 7, Roseman will be on the phone offering Chicago twice what Jacksonville paid to get Nickfolean Dynamite back. It's that or Mark Sanchez will be back.
Patrick:
Our fanbase sided with Freddy F#¢%ing Mitchell over the great quarterback in franchise history.
Kyle:
They won a Super Bowl and tried to go all Patriots by not being afraid to turn over their roster, except they still ended up old and crappy.
Nick:
Our beloved wide-receiver thought Hitler had a point! Fucking Hitler! The guy the world has almost universally agreed is the worst person who ever lived, and DeSean Jackson was trying to hear him out. Maybe he can redeem himself by playing more than one game this year.
Dylan:
There are currently 20,000 Eagles fans who are excited that Doug Pederson got COVID because it will give him "more time to watch tape while he's laid up in bed." Also are two best wide receivers are our tight ends.
Nick:
I want to raise my 1 year old son to be a responsible, ethical person. I also want to raise him to be an Eagles fan. I’m pretty sure those two are directly oppositional aims.
Matt:
Jalen Hurts is going to play one game of decent football and Angelo Cataldi will demand we trade away Carson Wentz for the next decade.
Bert:
The Eagles Super Bowl parade was the biggest gathering of Kensington Suboxone addicts and South Jersey trash this side of a MAGA rally. We don’t deserve to win anything ever again. Carson Wentz is one injury away from spending the remainder of his days in an iron lung.
Max:
I think Doug Pederson is a good coach despite going 9-7 the past two years while calling nothing but bubble screens.
Stevie:
There are two types of Eagles fans, those who will scream at you if you offer the mildest critique of Carson Wentz and those who die a little inside with every errant screen pass. I am part of the latter.
Our best receiver last year was our rookie running back. The front office correctly realized the team needed a wide receiver in the first but somehow chose a guy who only managed 600 receiving yards in 12 games in the Big 12. The Big 12! The conference where just existing as Oklahoma’s quarterback gives you a Heisman nomination! This pick sucks!
Brian:
Remember when we won the Super Bowl a couple years ago? Remember the Philly Special? Remember sad Tom Brady? We shot our wad that day. We'll definitely never do anything that cool again.
Mark:
Back in 2018, I clerked for the judge who handled all the Megan's Law hearings for our county in New Jersey. Basically, anytime a sex offender gets released or (if they're already out) changes jobs or addresses, the court assesses their likelihood of re-offending to determine who has to be notified. (If they're low risk, only local police and schools may be informed, whereas high risk offenders might have to notify all their neighbors.) Various factors weigh into the equation, like drug use, family support, employment, and parole status.
So it's March or April, and I'm looking at the files for that month's hearing. I see this one offender has a recent parole violation for leaving the state without permission. Mildly curious, I keep reading, and BOOM, there it is -- the parole officer notes that the guy made an unauthorized trip from Jersey to Philly. For what reason, you ask? Why, to attend the Eagles' Super Bowl parade, of course.
Joe:
In 2015 the Pope was visiting Philly and during that time the Eagles were hosting the Cowboys. There were several fake Popes in the crowd, the section next to us was lucky enough to get one. During the game he engaged in the usual assortment of Papal activity: swearing, drinking, condemning random Dallas players to eternal damnation, etc. In the 3rd quarter a Cowboy had to be stretchered off with an injury. Our Pope decided to excommunicate the. For some reason he turned around to our section and started yelling for us to support his decision. No one did, so he told us to "fuck off" and excommunicated us all, too. Well, a few Christians must have taken umbrage with this decision, because two seconds later he was hit by about five beer bottles then several pairs of fists.
That was the story of how I saw a bloody Pope escorted out of a game by security, by far the MOST PEACEFUL experience I've had at an Eagles game.
Sean:
I love Big Dick Nick. I would let Big Dick Nick have sex with my wife for the joy he brought to our lives. I want to poison my dog so I can get a new dog and name it Big Dick Nick. That being said, I do not need to hear Marco from Packer Park call in every Monday after Carson Wentz has a game with a passer rating under 90, despite throwing to a former gas station attendant and a guy who just stumbled upon Louis Farrakhan’s youtube channel, and pointing out that he knew we should have kept Foles because Wentz prays too much, is soft and isn’t a winner. “Foles would have sensed Clowney diving at him at 134 mph and rolled out of the way, avoiding a concussion.”
Nathan:
When one of my sons was 7, he fell in love with football and asked for an Eagles jersey. We got him a Riley Cooper jersey. Before we had a chance to give it to him, Cooper dropped the N-bomb at a concert. That jersey disappeared quickly.
My youngest is now 7. He fell in love with football last fall and this winter, for his birthday, received a DeSean Jackson jersey to match the DeSean picture on his older brother’s wall. We’re Jewish.
I’m never buying the kids Eagles shit again.
RD:
DeSean Jackson shared an anti-Semitic fake Hitler quote, which kicked off a cycle of defenses and apologies (or non-apologies) that included this line from Marquise Goodwin: "In NO WAY do I condone anything Hitler related, AS I STRONGLY BELIEVE HE WAS IN THE WRONG."
Never a good sign when you have to clarify that! Also, he couldn't come up with stronger language than "in the wrong?" Was "party foul" already taken?
Pat:
Our coach looks like the guy on your bar softball league team who has played the same position for 20 years and STILL tells everyone the story about how one time in high school he got a hit off some Major League pitcher no one has ever heard of.
Patrick:
In Week 1 of 2019, we were all in on DeSean Jackson, a 32 year old who hadn't made the Pro Bowl since 2013 and whose touchdowns-to-misattribtued Hilter quotes ratio since then is a healthy 2:1. By Week 17, we were all in on Boston Scott, a man whose name perfectly fits with the Doomed Civil War Brigade vibe of this team.
I once went to Xfinity Live with some friends for karaoke night. Despite the bar's aggro douchebag reputation, I was having a lot of fun and thought "maybe I was wrong about this place." Then a couple got onstage and sang their sexiest version of "Remix to Ignition." The crowd went wild. It was January 2020.
Alex:
We're Bears fans now, just without the 30 years of worthless seasons turning us into bigger assholes than we already are. Desean already said something incredibly stupid again, for which people will forgive him until he's out for the season with a sprained pinky toe in week 2. We theoretically made upgrades to our secondary, which is still going to give up 400 yards passing a game. Even though we won a Super Bowl by making damn sure we had a talented backup quarterback, people will not stop raving about how awful the Jalen Hurts pick was.
But none of this matters. Why? Because the stupid motherfuckers that inhabit this city are incapable of putting a fucking mask on. I drive down Kelly Drive every day, and out of the hundreds of people milling around on the Schuylkill River trail, you can count on one hand how many of them wear a mask. Which, sure, they're outside, but no one makes any effort to space themselves out. And it's the same no matter where you go, no matter who lives in that part of the city.
Baseball is probably already looking at having to cancel the season, and all those guys can stay reasonably far apart from each other. Football is going to be a disaster. But, in a way, I'm glad. The NFL is garbage, and maybe taking a year off from it will remind people there are other things they can do on their fall weekends.
Who am I kidding? We'll all be back watching even if they create a league for Covid-19 positive players. And that is why we suck.
Nicholas:
Because of us. Not because we fucking threw snowballs at Santa Claus or batteries at Dallas-connected people, though that does suck. We suck because we’re racist, ungrateful little shits who think we deserve(d) success due to a long championship drought.
Because there always, ALWAYS has to be a scapegoat and it’s usually someone who “doesn’t know his place.” Draw your own conclusions.
Because our memory for good luck and amazing plays is about fifteen seconds but we will never forget a single instance of poor officiating or a bad bounce.
Because we’re basically Patriots fans only without the success. God forbid we should appreciate going to the NFC championship game for all those years because we never won. We suck and we deserve less happiness than we get. Also, fuck the Patriots and all their awful fans.
DJ:
I was given a Ricky Watters jersey shortly after taking my first steps. I attended a game at the Vet when I was 9 years old, and asked my dad why someone would pee in the sink. One of my prized possessions as a teenager was a Jevon Kearse jersey. The list goes on and on and on.
During undergrad, I majored in biology; I also did the classic college move of dabbling in labor theory. The NFL seemed increasingly grimy to me during these years for their suppression of research, their labor practices, and their entirely random code of conduct (basically, all of the things that make the NFL the NFL). My awareness of the grime made me smug. I still vaguely followed the sport; my family’s social gatherings centered about the Birds. But I wasn’t like those other Eagles fans. I was an enlightened, casual NFL fan. This insufferable self-regard persisted for years.
Recently; with some hard work and a fair bit of luck, I was able to start grad school. I moved to Canada and began a neuroscience degree last fall. My school has a fairly large international student population, so conversations often start with “where are you from?” I generally say “The States, the greater Philadelphia area.” People recoil a bit, give me a side-eye, and follow up with “So are you an Eagles fan...?” I usually answer something to the (intolerable) effect of “Haha, yeah, I guess, but I’m not one of those Eagles fans.”
But there is only one type of Eagles fan. Despite understanding exactly how shitty the NFL is, despite consciously distancing myself from it, and despite devoting my life to understanding the body system it most insidiously destroys, I am that type of Eagles fan. I was cursed from the moment I was born. Fuck me, I guess.
Jake:
The pickup-driving, tattooed, Marlboro Menthol-smoking, "Lemme get $5 regular" trash that would gladly fondle this team's vomit-covered balls with Freddie Mitchell's hands, all while complaining about players kneeling to protest police brutality, never ceases to amaze me.
Our fanbase ruined an historic Super Bowl win against the most evil team of all time with shitty Rocky Balboa paintings and repeated drunken renditions of the worst fucking fight song ever. Don't even get me started on the fat fucks who order their favorite soggy sandwich from Goosey World every fucking day, on the way back to their IT job or some shit.
Fuck Chip Kelly, Riley Cooper, Kiko Alonso, Ruben Amaro Jr., Bryce Harper, Andrew MacDonald, Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie, Comcast, Kellyanne Conway, Joey Bologna, Frank Rizzo's dead fucking corpse, and BlueCross/BlueShield. Quadruple fuck Jon Runyan with his own tax-deductible mules for winning the electoral district I used to live in. Who knew a football player with Campbell's Chunky CTE Chowder for brains would make for such a shitty Congressman?
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