Eagles' Week 1 win highlights Jalen Hurts' skills and Matt Ryan's struggles
Liz Loza and Matt Harmon share their main takeaways from the Eagles' Week 1 win over the already struggling Atlanta Falcons.
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Video Transcript
LIZ LOZA: Matt Ryan's play was real gross. I kind of don't get it. The last season, the Falcons were on a five game losing streak. And they just kept going. Here we go again. This is like game six in a row. And with Arthur Smith, there's a lot of questions here. I mean, I guess you could say the silver lining of this is Jalen Hurts seems to be real and nobody's worried about DeVonta Smith's BMI right now.
MATT HARMON: Yeah, I think-- I mean, I don't know what the hell happened to the Falcons' offense other than their line is not good. Their defense is going to put them in bad positions, their offensive line has not that good. And Philly is still rather deep in the front seven.
LIZ LOZA: But why are they so inefficient? Pitts and Ridley both get eight targets. And Calvin Ridley only converts five of eight for 51?
MATT HARMON: Yeah, I mean, the problem with this offense right now is that again if the protection's bad, I feel like Matt Ryan is not the type of guy to compensate for that. He still knows this style of offense well from the year that he won the MVP with Kyle Shanahan. But that's a situation worth monitoring for sure. But I feel like the take mostly here is just I'm not too worried about Pitts, or Ridley, or anything like that, just kind of a situation to monitor. Mike Davis, this does kind of show you the floor of Mike Davis, six targets, 15 carries.
Cordarrelle Patterson, much more involved than anybody expected I think. Seven carries for--
LIZ LOZA: More efficient by the way. C-Pat is averaging over 7 yards per carry. Meanwhile, Mike Davis can't even hit 3.5.
MATT HARMON: Yikes. Tough scene. Tough scene. Yeah, this is not the type of game script that you want for Mike Davis. And this whole Falcons offense is a little strange because you'd think that they'd want to have a more aggressive running game. But Mike Davis is just a guy that they're banking on. It is a little strange. On the Eagles side though, Jalen Hurts extremely encouraging performance. I know it was against the Falcons defense that I make fun of all the time and I will continue to make fun of all the time because it's just not a good unit.
But this is the type of passing performance you'd have wanted to see out of Jalen Hurts. He was great. He was like a bottom five quarterback in completion percentage above expectation last year. He was over 9% completion percentage over expectation last year. He was accurate, he was getting the ball out on time. DeVonta Smith was immediately-- the presence was felt there. Yeah. Eight targets, led the team, obviously. He can get open where no one else can really get open.
And then that allows Jalen Reagor to do things like get a screen pass where he just runs after the catch. That's what Jalen Reagor should be doing as your number two receiver. I do think Smith is just kind of a skeleton key for this entire offense. And I was really encouraged by Jalen Hurts. If he keeps this up, if he keeps passing that officially and still rushing for 60 yards a game, he's going to be a top five quarterback this year. But we have to see I think. We do want to wait and see him against a real defense, a real actual with NFL players on it. That would be nice.
LIZ LOZA: I was also encouraged by Miles Sanders, frankly. It was not as crowded of a backfield as I think a lot of people anticipated. And Sanders-- I mean, if you watch the game, he showed really good patience. And he was involved in the passing game. He converted four of five for almost 40 yards. So I think Sanders, again, similarly to swift, one of those players that fell a lot heading into the draft for a glut of reasons, and is holding his value if you drafted him where you had to.
MATT HARMON: Kenny Gainwell might be a guy to still take a look at on waivers if he just needs some insurance. Because he did get a touchdown, was getting involved in the game prior to straight garbage time too. So he might be a little-- rookie Kenny Gainwell might be a little more involved too.