We won’t have a full understanding of the Eagles offensive and defensive systems until January. At that point, the regular season will be over and we will have 16 games under our belt and plenty of statistics and other evidence to study. For now, we’re still guessing.

The offense is up-tempo. We know that for a fact. The Eagles lead the league in plays per game, with 75. They are 2nd in yards, at 435 per game. Houston is the leader (450) and the Saints are 3rd (way down at 396). The Eagles are only 11th in scoring, which is no surprise with Red Zone turnovers and some blown chances.

The offense stretches the field horizontally more than it does vertically. This has allowed WR screens to be an effective weapon. It also limits the number of defenders in the box. This has helped the run game. The Eagles are 3rd in the league in rushing (and 4th in attempts). The offense isn’t gimmicky. There aren’t a bunch of insane formations and crazy tricks. This is real simple football. Kelly gives the defense some looks and the offense responds by attacking what the defense doesn’t cover.

Chip lied when he said he wasn’t an option coach. The key here is that the QB has the option to do just about anything. On a given play, the QB can hand-off, run or pass. That allows him to adjust to the defense while the play is happening. Andy Reid frustrated fans because he was slow to adjust during the game. Kelly has his players adjusting on the fly. That’s like bringing the Wright Brothers back to life and throwing them in an F-16. Mind = blown.

There are still plenty of standard NFL passing plays. I’ve pointed out that corner routes to the TE were a favorite play of Andy Reid’s and they’ve been used on a regular basis this summer. There are still plenty of checkdowns to RBs.

Chip has actually been somewhat conservative on offense. That will change in September. No WR has run the ball yet. There have been no Wildcat looks. There have been no flea flickers. I don’t expect this stuff to be common, but it will be mixed in.

Many people wonder about TE James Casey and how little he’s been used. Casey is going to be a big part of the offense due to his versatility. His ability to be a TE, H-back, FB, slot and WR makes him a valuable chip for Chip. Kelly has played Zach Ertz a lot with the starters. My guess is that he’s trying to help Ertz catch up since he missed the spring. Kelly knows what Casey can do. Also, Casey is an X-factor for the offense so why not hide his role to a certain extent and let the opponents see him on Sept 9th.

I’m very impressed with the offense so far.

The defense has grown by leaps and bounds each week. It was a rudimentary 3-4 vs the Patriots. And the results were ugly. The players did a better job vs the Panthers. Last week we finally started to see the defense get creative. There were some exotic blitz looks. We saw some 4-3 Under. We saw the 3-3-5. They did creative things from the base 3-4, with slants and things like that.

We still don’t know exactly what Bill Davis will do in September. He’s used this summer to evaluate his players. He’s tried to find out who can and can’t do certain things. You have to put players in awkward positions at times. Who thought we’d ever see Trent Cole line up over a slot receiver?

It won’t surprise me to see Davis run a lot of 4-3 Under during the season. I think that scheme fits this set of players more than the true 3-4. There are talented 1-gap players. When you ask some of these guys to cover 2-gaps, the results are interesting. They have little experience at it so it is new from a technique standpoint. Some don’t have the skills for it. Some have it so ingrained in their history to attack gaps that it is second nature to fly up the field. Sitting back and reading the play feels completely foreign to them.

Vinny Curry has jumped off the screen to anyone who has watched the first 3 games. He is in the backfield constantly and is very disruptive. Yesterday Chip’s praise for Curry was very muted. Curry might not be executing his assignments, but rather falling back on his 1-gap instincts. Or maybe Chip is being quiet on Curry since he’ll be a key weapon in the season opener and Kelly wants that to be a secret. We just don’t know how he operates quite yet.

The defense may seem a little conservative right now, but that will change. Davis is trying to test his players, not his scheme. If he calls the perfect blitz and someone gets a sack, all that tells Davis is that the play works. He would rather call generic plays and see who is able to make things happen within the framework of the defense.

The 3-4 is a blitzing scheme. We’ll see that in full force this season. For now, there is limited blitzing and the stuff we do see is simple. The other day Mychal Kendricks ran a simple delay blitz. He just pauses at the snap and then fires upfield. Kendricks hit the QB because of his upfield burst. The play itself is basic football. You’ll see loops and stunts and zone blitzes next month that will allow the coaches to be very creative now that they know which players have the movement skills to execute them.

As for STs…Dave Fipp still is in the lead for Assistant Coach of the Year. Just keep doing a great job.

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A few new readers have asked about why I refer to Jimmy Kempski as Jimmy Bama.

We first met down in Mobile, AL at the Senior Bowl. Jimmy was driving us home from practice one day and somehow we got lost. I think we were busy telling jokes and not paying attention. We end up somewhere we’ve never been. Jimmy then figures out where we were and finds the right street, as if he actually knew the neighborhood we were in. So I started joking about how Jimmy, who is from NJ, knew Alabama like the back of his hand. That led to Jimmy Bama and the name just stuck.

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