You can imagine the film sessions with Defensive Coordinator Vic Fangio watching and re-watching the game last Friday against Chicago. Mistakes were made, no doubt, but in the way that Fangio presents to his Eagles team, he no doubt will turn a disappointing performance into a long-term positive response.
This is what the great ones do – they look for solutions instead of assigning blame. The Eagles’ defense, outstanding for much of this season, looks to bounce back in a big way on Monday in Los Angeles against the Chargers.
That begins with Fangio, the premier defensive coordinator in the NFL.
“We just didn’t play it well enough, both from a technique standpoint and I didn’t coach it well enough,” Fangio said of the Bears’ rushing attack. “We’ve got to play with better technique. We’ve got to fit things better. I’ve got to coach it better.”
He has that chance this week and Fangio will take advantage of the moment. Every team has a down cycle in the course of a long season and the best ones come back stronger. This is Fangio’s goal, with an eye on a Chargers offense that has a question at quarterback – will Justin Herbert start after having surgery on his broken non-throwing (left) hand? He did not practice on Wednesday with the team – but otherwise is built around a powerful running attack, variety and depth of talent at wide receiver, and a tight end who is a defense-beater in the red zone.
“We’ve got to play the run well enough to where they just don’t run it a bunch,” Fangio said. “They run it, and like most teams that run it well, they have a good play-action (passing) game, and not give up the shots in the play-action passing game, which they do a good job of.
“They’ve rushed for 200 yards on two teams this year. (Chargers Offensive Coordinator) Greg (Roman)’s always done a good job running the ball schematically. They have a big tight end, big fullback, pretty big O-line, good backs. They run it very, very (well).”