The Philly-Houston Sportspocalypse Night: Eagles Stay Unbeaten In Workmanlike Win

Sing The Song

In one of those rare occurrences when an NFL game played second fiddle in sports, the Eagles went to Houston and ground out a 12-point road win on short rest. Here's the takeaways.

> Philly Fan has totally taken over the Texans' home stadium. Jalen Hurts praying on the field doesn't seem like the kind of thing you should televise, but there it is.

> If you were worried about the absence of rookie DT Jordan Davis making this defense susceptible to the run, you were right to worry. Houston rookie RB Dameon Pearce is good, but he's not as good as they made him look.

> Worst game of the year for CB James Bradberry... still ends with a Bradberry pick to clinch it. Nice year he's having.

> Also a pretty bad game for CB3 Avante Maddox. First time this year the Texans scored on their opening drive.

> On some level, a 17 play drive for a touchdown is impressive... and when you are undefeated and facing a 1-5-1 team, maybe closer and longer than it needed to be. They also benefitted from multiple missed calls by the refs, who really didn't have a good night.

> Guys were running wide open all night, whether from poor coverage or good work by the Eagles receivers. It covered for another less than inspiring night of pass blocking, with LT Jordan Mailata having one of his worst games against DE Jerry Hughes. Hughes is a fine player, but Mailata should never be a turnstile.

> A rare game in that the Eagles didn't lead at the half, blow their opponent out in the second quarter, or totally shut down a shaky QB working with third-string WRs. We're clearly deep into style point land for the league's only undefeated team, especially when playing on Terrible Night for Football.

> Nice work by DE Robert Quinn tonight, but the stud of the game was DT Jason Hargraves. He was absolutely impossible for the Texans.

> Weird effort by the running game tonight. Holes were either immense or non-existent, and they weren't really able to put this away late. Very uneven work.

> Looks like they dodged a bullet from DT Fletcher Cox getting not hurt. I don't think Fletch is all that great any more, but he's helping Hargraves stay clean.

> One of the better games for the special teams, with the exception of K Jake Elliot missing the long one at the end of the first half. They weren't exceptional, but they also weren't a clear problem. Encouraging!

> The game turned on a turnover and Hurts finding Brown for a cotton-soft easy score. You could watch a lot of football and not see guys more open than this game.

> If you are an Eagles fan and not in the bag for GM Howie Roseman at this point, I don't know what to do for you. This year is just a festival of his moves paying off, with more of it tonight.

> The more you see of S Kevon Wallace, the less you think he's going to have a decent career. He's never part of positive plays for the defense.

> The Eagles are 8-0 for the first time in their history, and won a road game by 12 when they couldn't stop the run and didn't even seem all that interested in taking care of business. We are well into Style Points Time for these guys, honestly -- and the schedule isn't hard. Focus will be the challenge.