Eagles Offensive Line is No Longer a Strength, and it Shows

The Eagles left Nashville 2-0 this week because Darius Cooper caught a three-yard touchdown pass with less than 15 seconds left after a masterful drive schemed by Offensive Coordinator Sean Mannion and executed by Jalen Hurts. The 24-20 win over the Tennessee Titans covered up the same problem from the opener: the offensive line.

The passing game came through in spades. DeVonta Smith caught 10 passes for 117 yards, Dontayvion Wicks added 74 yards on five catches, and the offense converted 11-of-18 third downs, completely turning around the narrative of last season. But the third quarter needs to be addressed.

The Eagles had three drives in the third, and gained five yards with only one first down. Two ended in three-and-outs, and the last drive only lasted 50 seconds; the quarter closed with an Eagles punt. This was the same script with the Eagles in their Week 1 win over the Washington Commanders, which included three straight three-and-outs in the third.

The offensive line is at the root of both third-quarter stalls. They allowed three sacks in each of the first three games, plus six quarterback hits in Nashville. Landon Dickerson played through a knee injury in the opener, and is on injured reserve. Cam Jurgens had two costly penalties against the Commanders; Dickerson and Jordan Mailata each drew one, and Jurgens added his third holding call of the season against the Titans.

The true trouble showed itself on the first offensive play of the game. Tight end Johnny Mundt lost his footing on the kickout block against Jeffrey Simmons; Lane Johnson was late to recover, and Simmons got to Saquon Barkley before a hole could materialize, leaving him no room to move, causing Barkley to take an awkward hit, resulting in him leaving the game until the third quarter with a stinger.

The Eagles even reshuffled the line to try and help against Simmons, moving Jurgens from center to left guard and starting Drew Kendall at center. Jurgens allowed a sack and three pressures in his first start at guard, and the Eagles’ running backs carried 24 times for 65 yards, which equates to 2.7 yards per carry, an area that used to be a point of pride for the offensive line. The Eagles have only one run of more than 10 yards, and that was Barkley’s 42-yard run against Washington.

“We didn’t have any big explosive gains in the run game,” Johnson said postgame. “It was mostly through the air.”

The earlier in downs, the worse the Eagles are. They average 2.9 yards on first downs, worst in the NFL, and 4.9 yards on second down, 21st in the league. They are the best on third down in the league with 9.3 yards, which included three third-and-12 conversions, not something that is sustainable.

It may be time to make a painful admission: the Eagles offensive line is no longer a strength of this team. Johnson has announced his retirement at the end of the season, Dickerson’s durability is becoming a concern, and Jurgens is getting beaten regularly off the ball. There are options, but all are unproven commodities, including Tyler Steen and Markel Bell, the latter of whom can play at the right guard position, though he played mostly tackle in college.

There will be people pointing at Hurts for the second interception, but he was hit on a ball that needed to be delivered perfectly; due to the hit, Marcus Harris was able to jump the route and intercept a pass with a little too much air under it, stalling another late drive with less than two minutes left. It didn’t matter in the end, but it took a superhuman performance from the passing game to get there.

“We shouldn’t have been at that point,” Jurgens said. “We shouldn’t have, but a win’s a win.”

The last drive is masking many of the issues, because the offensive line played incredibly well in that last drive where the Eagles went six-for-eight for 61 yards in the air on a 65-yard game-winning drive. The fact that Hurts was able to have time to let routes materialize is a key element in that success. Head Coach Nick Sirianni pointed to the protection in the final drive as a main reason that the Eagles left Nashville with a win.

“I’ll take a tired o-line over a tired d-line all day because I felt like the protection on that last drive was outstanding,” Sirianni said.

Part of the reason that former Offensive Coordinator Kevin Patullo was excused from his job was that the offense led the NFL in three-and-outs. They hired Mannion to install a new scheme to address this. Mission accomplished. But the offensive line failing to win on first down, typically a running down, which should be a massive cause for concern.

Dickerson will miss at least three more games, so Mailata, Jurgens, Steen, and Johnson should get some more time together and will be tested against the Chicago Bears on Monday night. They need to gel sooner rather than later, because coming from behind magic isn’t a sustainable plan for a team hoping to contend for a title. Protecting Hurts and giving Barkley room to gash the defense on first down, on the other hand, is just what is needed to compete in a stacked NFC this season.

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