Beasts of the East
Four contenders slug it out NFL's toughest division
Posted: Thursday August 24, 2006 12:03PM; Updated: Thursday August 24, 2006 6:37PM
As Joe Gibbs rang in the new year with that old sinking feeling, Washington's 65-year-old coach suddenly remembered why he'd gotten out of the business the first time around. Why did I take this job? Gibbs must have asked himself as he paced the visitor's sideline of Lincoln Financial Field last Jan. 1, watching as his revived Redskins scrapped for their first playoff berth since 1999.
The Skins had won five consecutive games, including a victory over the NFC East-leading New York Giants the week before; now they needed only to subdue the last-place Philadelphia Eagles to secure their place in the postseason.
On paper, to give an analogy that Gibbs can appreciate, it looked like more of a lock than Ricky Bobby beating Cal Naughton Jr. to the checkered flag. The Eagles' season had degenerated into a nightmare long before, and instead of Donovan McNabb going deep for Terrell Owens, it was MikeMcMahon heaving rainbows for rookie Reggie Brown.
Make that Touchdown Reggie Brown: With two first-half trips to the end zone, he and the Eagles jumped out to a 17-7 lead, and Gibbs -- whose team would ultimately rally for a 31-20 victory -- was reminded what it's like to play in a division in which no game is a breather.
When Gibbs ended his 12-year coaching sabbatical in January 2004, some hinted that the NFC East wouldn't pose nearly as much of a challenge as it had during his earlier stint as Washington's coach. At that point only the Eagles had put together back-to-back winning seasons in the 21st century and were in the midst of a run in which they captured each of four consecutive division titles by at least two games.
Gibbs didn't buy the "NFC Least" propaganda for a minute. "What you'd like to do is be in a division with poor ownership and bad coaching," the legendary coach said earlier this month while reclining in his Redskins Park office after a training-camp practice. "Not this one."
Sure enough, as we head into the 2006 season, the East is a beast once again. Two teams that made the playoffs in '05 (the Giants and the Redskins) and another that just missed (the Cowboys) all seem to have gotten stronger, and the Eagles believe they're a lot closer to the unit that won the NFC in '04 than the one that produced last year's 6-10 disaster.
If you think Gibbs, one of the greatest coaches in modern football history, took an easy path to the Hall of Fame, a quick replay review is in order. While coaching Washington to three Super Bowl triumphs and 11 winning seasons from 1981 to '92, Gibbs routinely battled Giants, Cowboys and Eagles teams that were physical, unrelenting and superbly coached. (The Cardinals were in the division as well, but let's not go there.)
Consider that during a 14-year stretch beginning in 1982, the NFC East produced an astounding eight Super Bowl winners, with the Skins also losing one to the Raiders in '84. In three of those seasons a team from the division fell in the NFC Championship Game.
In the 10 years since, the NFC East has produced zero Super Bowl winners, with only the 2000 Giants and '04 Eagles getting to the Ultimate Game.
Now, however, with proven winners Gibbs, BillParcells, Andy Reid and Tom Coughlin wearing headsets while working for four reasonably aggressive owners, a renaissance is upon us. Can you think of a single NFC East game in 2006 that won't, at the very least, be hard-hitting and competitive?
Who knows how this season will actually play out -- if Nostradamus were forecasting today's NFL, he'd have been the guy printing T-shirts for a Vikings-Raiders Super Bowl at this time last year -- but if I had to rate the strongest top-to-bottom division in football going into September, there's no way I'd consider any of the other seven.
A quick assessment:
•The Redskins gave the Seahawks a run in their divisional-round playoff game last January. Had cornerback Carlos Rogers held on to what looked like a sure second-quarter interception for touchdown, the Skins would have held a 10-0 lead against a team known for postseason shrinkage. Washington made its usual aggressive push in the offseason, most recently trading for big back T.J. Duckett to complement the tremendous Clinton Portis. The Redskins' defense is relentless, led by an emerging superstar in third-year safety Sean Taylor. And with the retention of assistant head coach/defense Gregg Williams and Gibbs' ego-suppressing hiring of associate head coach/offense Al Saunders, Washington now boasts one of the greatest coaching staffs of all time. "We know we got better," Portis says, and if quarterback Mark Brunell can manage even a decent season at 36, watch out.
•The Giants had a surprisingly strong regular season in '05 but flamed out in the playoffs against Carolina. New York's 23-0 defeat can be blamed on injuries (I think Sam Huff was playing linebacker against the Panthers), EliManning's inexperience and -- get this -- artificially low expectations. That's what All-Pro halfback Tiki Barber says in my scouting report that will appear in next week's NFL Preview Issue of Sports Illustrated. The bosses wouldn't like it if I were to give you the actual quote, but Barber basically says that winning the division was the team's main goal, so the Giants were self-satisfied heading into the playoffs.
Weirdly enough, Coughlin, the man responsible for enunciating the team's goals, seems to agree. "We didn't play with the same kind of fervor that we had played [with] down the stretch," he says. "I look at that from a million different ways. It's important to win the division -- in this day and age, it's your only pure way of getting into the playoffs. So that's obviously your goal. But it's not your final goal."
This year the coach is talking Super Bowl, and if Manning makes a big jump, it's not entirely implausible. With rookie wideout Sinorice Moss joining an already impressive group of offensive playmakers and LaVar Arrington adding spice to a fierce pass rush, this is a very dangerous team.
And I love what I'm hearing from wideout Plaxico Burress, who we last saw sulking miserably after failing to catch a pass in the Carolina game. "Either I wasn't good enough to catch a football or they couldn't get me the football," Burress says. "I looked at it like they couldn't get me the football, and I basically took a 3½-month layoff and got my head right, then came back and told myself I was going to dominate. People are gonna be in for a rude awakening when it comes to me. I ain't lying."
•We've heard all about Dallas, a trendy Super Bowl pick -- at least until T.O. started reminding Parcells on a daily basis that his checks are signed by Jerry Jones. Assuming America's Hamstring heals enough for Owens to make his usual impact on game days and Mike Vanderjagt cures the Cowboys' placekicking problem, a team that narrowly missed the playoffs last season should be right there in the mix in '06.
Meanwhile, Jones stepped into the booth with the new Monday Night Football crew during the team's preseason victory over the Saints and essentially ended the quarterback debate by declaring his devotion to Drew Bledsoe, reminding Parcells that his checks are signed by Jones too.
•Don't sleep on the Eagles, who have the division's best quarterback and more focus and determination than they've had in years. Defensive end Jevon Kearse tells me he's driven to re-establish himself as a pass-rushing phenomenon -- for more on the Freak, check out AshleyFox's compelling profile in the Philadelphia Inquirer -- and five-time Pro Bowl safety Brian Dawkins promises that the '06 Eagles will be an emotional, passionate group.
"Last year pretty much everything that could have gone wrong did go wrong," says Dawkins, "so I feel like we got it all out of the way. When people talk about our division, everybody's clumped together -- besides us. Everybody's saying we're at the bottom, and I can dig it. When the time comes, we'll see."
Now here's something to ponder: Does such a seemingly balanced field ultimately help or hurt the team or teams that survive to reach the postseason?
Is it better to be match-tough, like the 2000 Ravens (they battled Tennessee, which won the AFC Central, and Pittsburgh, which finished third, before launching their Super Bowl run) and the '02 Buccaneers (they fought off Atlanta, New Orleans and Carolina -- the only one of the four with a losing record -- in the NFC South en route to a championship)? Or is it better to cruise unchallenged through the regular season like last year's Seahawks, who won the NFC West by seven games, or the Patriots, who slogged their way through the fall before mustering the energy to subdue Miami?
We could offer countless examples in support of either scenario, but I think the optimal one is somewhere in the middle: A team that vies for division supremacy with one reasonably well-matched foe but enjoys the benefit of some easy games along the way. You know, like last year's Steelers, who can thank both the Bengals (for helping them to summon their mettle) and the Browns (against whom they won two games by a combined 75-21 margin) for enabling them to conserve precious energy.
However this season plays out, the NFC East should provide some titillating theatrics. One thing I love is that before a single game has been played, the chest-beating has already begun.
"Everybody's talking about Dallas, and they don't even have us in the playoffs," says the Giants' Burress. "That's sad. This is our division. Our defense is better than a year ago, and our offense is going to be more physical."
I hear you, Plex, but I think I'll end up picking the Skins, if only because I'm convinced that their coach and his brainy cadre of assistants (Jerry Grey as a cornerbacks coach? Are you kidding me?) will figure out a way to prevail.
Remember all that talk during the '04 season that the game had passed Gibbs by? Right, and Jane Fonda forgot how to act, too.
"Those people don't know what they're talking about," Redskins wideout Santana Moss says (of the Gibbs-bashers, not the Fonda-haters). "After last year he just got a whole lot younger."
Same old Coach Gibbs, same old problem: The East is a beast.
Posted: Thursday August 24, 2006 12:03PM; Updated: Thursday August 24, 2006 6:37PM
As Joe Gibbs rang in the new year with that old sinking feeling, Washington's 65-year-old coach suddenly remembered why he'd gotten out of the business the first time around. Why did I take this job? Gibbs must have asked himself as he paced the visitor's sideline of Lincoln Financial Field last Jan. 1, watching as his revived Redskins scrapped for their first playoff berth since 1999.
The Skins had won five consecutive games, including a victory over the NFC East-leading New York Giants the week before; now they needed only to subdue the last-place Philadelphia Eagles to secure their place in the postseason.
On paper, to give an analogy that Gibbs can appreciate, it looked like more of a lock than Ricky Bobby beating Cal Naughton Jr. to the checkered flag. The Eagles' season had degenerated into a nightmare long before, and instead of Donovan McNabb going deep for Terrell Owens, it was MikeMcMahon heaving rainbows for rookie Reggie Brown.
Make that Touchdown Reggie Brown: With two first-half trips to the end zone, he and the Eagles jumped out to a 17-7 lead, and Gibbs -- whose team would ultimately rally for a 31-20 victory -- was reminded what it's like to play in a division in which no game is a breather.
When Gibbs ended his 12-year coaching sabbatical in January 2004, some hinted that the NFC East wouldn't pose nearly as much of a challenge as it had during his earlier stint as Washington's coach. At that point only the Eagles had put together back-to-back winning seasons in the 21st century and were in the midst of a run in which they captured each of four consecutive division titles by at least two games.
Gibbs didn't buy the "NFC Least" propaganda for a minute. "What you'd like to do is be in a division with poor ownership and bad coaching," the legendary coach said earlier this month while reclining in his Redskins Park office after a training-camp practice. "Not this one."
Sure enough, as we head into the 2006 season, the East is a beast once again. Two teams that made the playoffs in '05 (the Giants and the Redskins) and another that just missed (the Cowboys) all seem to have gotten stronger, and the Eagles believe they're a lot closer to the unit that won the NFC in '04 than the one that produced last year's 6-10 disaster.
If you think Gibbs, one of the greatest coaches in modern football history, took an easy path to the Hall of Fame, a quick replay review is in order. While coaching Washington to three Super Bowl triumphs and 11 winning seasons from 1981 to '92, Gibbs routinely battled Giants, Cowboys and Eagles teams that were physical, unrelenting and superbly coached. (The Cardinals were in the division as well, but let's not go there.)
Consider that during a 14-year stretch beginning in 1982, the NFC East produced an astounding eight Super Bowl winners, with the Skins also losing one to the Raiders in '84. In three of those seasons a team from the division fell in the NFC Championship Game.
In the 10 years since, the NFC East has produced zero Super Bowl winners, with only the 2000 Giants and '04 Eagles getting to the Ultimate Game.
Now, however, with proven winners Gibbs, BillParcells, Andy Reid and Tom Coughlin wearing headsets while working for four reasonably aggressive owners, a renaissance is upon us. Can you think of a single NFC East game in 2006 that won't, at the very least, be hard-hitting and competitive?
Who knows how this season will actually play out -- if Nostradamus were forecasting today's NFL, he'd have been the guy printing T-shirts for a Vikings-Raiders Super Bowl at this time last year -- but if I had to rate the strongest top-to-bottom division in football going into September, there's no way I'd consider any of the other seven.
A quick assessment:
•The Redskins gave the Seahawks a run in their divisional-round playoff game last January. Had cornerback Carlos Rogers held on to what looked like a sure second-quarter interception for touchdown, the Skins would have held a 10-0 lead against a team known for postseason shrinkage. Washington made its usual aggressive push in the offseason, most recently trading for big back T.J. Duckett to complement the tremendous Clinton Portis. The Redskins' defense is relentless, led by an emerging superstar in third-year safety Sean Taylor. And with the retention of assistant head coach/defense Gregg Williams and Gibbs' ego-suppressing hiring of associate head coach/offense Al Saunders, Washington now boasts one of the greatest coaching staffs of all time. "We know we got better," Portis says, and if quarterback Mark Brunell can manage even a decent season at 36, watch out.
•The Giants had a surprisingly strong regular season in '05 but flamed out in the playoffs against Carolina. New York's 23-0 defeat can be blamed on injuries (I think Sam Huff was playing linebacker against the Panthers), EliManning's inexperience and -- get this -- artificially low expectations. That's what All-Pro halfback Tiki Barber says in my scouting report that will appear in next week's NFL Preview Issue of Sports Illustrated. The bosses wouldn't like it if I were to give you the actual quote, but Barber basically says that winning the division was the team's main goal, so the Giants were self-satisfied heading into the playoffs.
Weirdly enough, Coughlin, the man responsible for enunciating the team's goals, seems to agree. "We didn't play with the same kind of fervor that we had played [with] down the stretch," he says. "I look at that from a million different ways. It's important to win the division -- in this day and age, it's your only pure way of getting into the playoffs. So that's obviously your goal. But it's not your final goal."
This year the coach is talking Super Bowl, and if Manning makes a big jump, it's not entirely implausible. With rookie wideout Sinorice Moss joining an already impressive group of offensive playmakers and LaVar Arrington adding spice to a fierce pass rush, this is a very dangerous team.
And I love what I'm hearing from wideout Plaxico Burress, who we last saw sulking miserably after failing to catch a pass in the Carolina game. "Either I wasn't good enough to catch a football or they couldn't get me the football," Burress says. "I looked at it like they couldn't get me the football, and I basically took a 3½-month layoff and got my head right, then came back and told myself I was going to dominate. People are gonna be in for a rude awakening when it comes to me. I ain't lying."
•We've heard all about Dallas, a trendy Super Bowl pick -- at least until T.O. started reminding Parcells on a daily basis that his checks are signed by Jerry Jones. Assuming America's Hamstring heals enough for Owens to make his usual impact on game days and Mike Vanderjagt cures the Cowboys' placekicking problem, a team that narrowly missed the playoffs last season should be right there in the mix in '06.
Meanwhile, Jones stepped into the booth with the new Monday Night Football crew during the team's preseason victory over the Saints and essentially ended the quarterback debate by declaring his devotion to Drew Bledsoe, reminding Parcells that his checks are signed by Jones too.
•Don't sleep on the Eagles, who have the division's best quarterback and more focus and determination than they've had in years. Defensive end Jevon Kearse tells me he's driven to re-establish himself as a pass-rushing phenomenon -- for more on the Freak, check out AshleyFox's compelling profile in the Philadelphia Inquirer -- and five-time Pro Bowl safety Brian Dawkins promises that the '06 Eagles will be an emotional, passionate group.
"Last year pretty much everything that could have gone wrong did go wrong," says Dawkins, "so I feel like we got it all out of the way. When people talk about our division, everybody's clumped together -- besides us. Everybody's saying we're at the bottom, and I can dig it. When the time comes, we'll see."
Now here's something to ponder: Does such a seemingly balanced field ultimately help or hurt the team or teams that survive to reach the postseason?
Is it better to be match-tough, like the 2000 Ravens (they battled Tennessee, which won the AFC Central, and Pittsburgh, which finished third, before launching their Super Bowl run) and the '02 Buccaneers (they fought off Atlanta, New Orleans and Carolina -- the only one of the four with a losing record -- in the NFC South en route to a championship)? Or is it better to cruise unchallenged through the regular season like last year's Seahawks, who won the NFC West by seven games, or the Patriots, who slogged their way through the fall before mustering the energy to subdue Miami?
We could offer countless examples in support of either scenario, but I think the optimal one is somewhere in the middle: A team that vies for division supremacy with one reasonably well-matched foe but enjoys the benefit of some easy games along the way. You know, like last year's Steelers, who can thank both the Bengals (for helping them to summon their mettle) and the Browns (against whom they won two games by a combined 75-21 margin) for enabling them to conserve precious energy.
However this season plays out, the NFC East should provide some titillating theatrics. One thing I love is that before a single game has been played, the chest-beating has already begun.
"Everybody's talking about Dallas, and they don't even have us in the playoffs," says the Giants' Burress. "That's sad. This is our division. Our defense is better than a year ago, and our offense is going to be more physical."
I hear you, Plex, but I think I'll end up picking the Skins, if only because I'm convinced that their coach and his brainy cadre of assistants (Jerry Grey as a cornerbacks coach? Are you kidding me?) will figure out a way to prevail.
Remember all that talk during the '04 season that the game had passed Gibbs by? Right, and Jane Fonda forgot how to act, too.
"Those people don't know what they're talking about," Redskins wideout Santana Moss says (of the Gibbs-bashers, not the Fonda-haters). "After last year he just got a whole lot younger."
Same old Coach Gibbs, same old problem: The East is a beast.
posted by The Gryphon at 6:28 PM
<< Home