Philadelphia Eagles – 31, Atlanta Falcons – 35
Rhett Davis: A great Sunday night game that resulted in the Falcons pulling ahead. Matty Ryan threw 4 TD’s a career high and Michael Turner ran for over 100 yards to complete the rampage including a TD of his own. The Eagles couldn’t contain Atlanta, but ultimately it was probably the injury to Vick late in the 3rd quarter that did in the Eagles.
Grey Scherl: Talk about one hell of a game that everybody wanted to win and nobody wanted to lose. Touchdowns, turnovers, brutal hits, blood, and multiple players knocked off the field or amazingly not knocked out of the game. Both teams needed wins here, though Atlanta couldn’t start 0 and 2 if they wanted to be serious going for the playoffs. Vick put up more yards, 242, with 2 TD’s and a pick, while Ryan didn’t break 200 yards and had 4 TD’s and 2 picks. Neither team seemed able to get the ball to their ‘star’ receiver (something I felt as I had both DeSean Jackson and Roddy White starting in my fantasy league), and while both teams broke 130 yards rushing, Phillie was getting better results. Oh, yeah, Vick went out hurt and was replaced with Mike Kafka who was actually really impressive in his NFL debut. Obviously he’s not going to be replacing Vick, but he may wind up giving Vince Young some competition for the backup spot.
Daniels: The Eagles are built to outscore you this season. Without Vick, they’re going to have a hard time outscoring you, even if they only lose him for a few minutes. However, not having Vick going in to their first divisional game next week could be huge. The Falcons aren’t quite dead yet, as the supremely overrated results from Week 1, as usual, teach us.
Glazer: Wait, are we seriously giving the Falcons that much credit for this? They played a great game, with a perfect game plan and were still going to lose this if Vick played. Hell, if Vince Young was healthy they might have still lost. This is a team that played great and showed the Eagles big weakness – their linebackers and against tight ends – but weren’t really good enough to beat the Eagles at their best. The Falcons should be a wildcard team and decent in the playoffs, but they are simply not better than New Orleans this year. I also fully expect Michael Turner to slow down as the year goes on. Mortgaging the future was a really, really poor idea in a stacked NFC.
