Wednesday Links

- nice win by the phils last night, beating up on some awful marlins pitching. injuries continue to be a bugaboo for the team, but they certainly haven't been as impactful as they could have been considering the team is 7-4 since utley went down. probably squashes utley's MVP campaign, but i'm sure he cares more about the team remaining in contention.

- les bowen says last year's potentially dominating defense was derailed by lack of depth (most notably by jevon kearse's injury), but this year's team has considerably greater depth and should be able to absorb the usual attrition better.

- my biggest concern with reggie brown continues to be his hands. in his rookie season, reggie was third worst in the nfl in drop percentage according to kc joyner, and unfortunately it didn't appear to get much better last season. now a note from training camp indicates that he is continuing to show inconsistency in catching the damn ball. even worse, according to garry cobb, it wasn't limited to just reggie.

After Reggie Brown dropped a pass from quarterback Donovan McNabb, coach Andy Reid uttered the words, "Way too many drops." Brown, wide open in the middle of the field, dropped another pass right in his hands on the next play.

- matt mccoy is trying to get back into the mix at linebacker. while we all remember how horribly he played right before he got benched, he did play pretty well prior to getting hurt last season. i recall that mccoy did seem to have a lot of speed and was especially good at breaking up screen passes to his side. however, i also recall that we had another undersized linebacker that played well for just about half a season before wearing down -- mark simoneau.

- seems odd that ryan moats is reducing his role on special teams as he's in a similar position to greg lewis -- a veteran with inconsistent performance history. seems like he should be doing everything he can do to make the roster as he certainly is no lock. it's unfortunate for him that he's so mistake prone because he can really run the ball.

- garry cobb wonders why trotter is still doing two-a-days. could it be because he's still fatter than the eagles wanted him to be?

- seems odd that a redskins team with santana moss, antwaan randle el, brandon lloyd, and clinton portis had a noted lack of offensive big plays. let's hope they don't fix this problem any time soon. i'm a big fan of gibbs 2.0.

- interesting article by rick gosselin comparing the eagles under big red to a college football factory

- concern in dallas about the age and health of their wideout corps