Andy Reid was in a festive mood as he met the media today for his usual Monday press conference. While he didn't dress up for the press, the Eagles coach did don a Halloween hockey mask for his weekly sit down with Eagles web guy Dave Spadaro. It's a sharp contrast from the somber and sometime irritable we've seen from Andy earlier this season as the Eagles struggled.
It was revealed that RB LeSean McCoy showed up to the Eagles Tuesday "blitz meeting," which RBs don't typically attend. Andy asked if that had anything to do with his dominant performance?
"Well listen, you guys know him, he's got a smile on his face when he comes to work, he loves to play the game, and he wants to be the best. This particular week you're going to see a lot of different looks, maybe more than you see throughout the year, with ones that you'll tape. Until you play them again, right? It was important that he came in and he wanted to make sure he stayed up on that, and that's a compliment to LeSean."
Reid also praised Michael Vick for how he handled the Cowboys blitz packages and pre-snap looks. In fact, he says that two of the Eagles TDs, the first one to Maclin and the second of McCoy's TDs, were as a result of audibles that Vick called.
"Well really, two of the touchdowns were plays that he either changed the play or got rid of one, where we had two of them called in the huddle and you could switch them over to the other. I thought he played a fine football game. I think you've got the numbers, as far as the quarterback rating goes, and so on, that show that, but the little things like you're talking about here, switching either protections or switching from play to play, I think he's becoming very comfortable."
He also highlighted how outstanding Nnamdi Asomugha has been now that he's had some time in the system and is really grasping how it works.
"Well, yeah listen, it was new concepts for everybody, but in particular for the new guys coming in. So a lot of the terminology was the same and things that were being done before are the same for the guys coming back. But for the new guys coming in it was a little though. And Nnamdi, listen, he wants to do it all. He studies like crazy [and] he's highly intelligent. But the bottom line is we probably were giving him too much too soon so we backed off him, and then we just added to it. [Defensive coordinator] Juan's [Castillo] added to it every week and given him a little bit more, a little bit more. And he has great feeling for Nnamdi [and] they have great communication between the two of them. And Nnamdi's very honest now with what he feels comfortable with and what he doesn't feel comfortable with, and that's important [and] from a coach's standpoint, that's important. And there's a trust factor there and some of the guys who are new they're understanding that, and even better coaches get to know the player, the player gets to know the coach and you can share things."
But the coach certainly isn't going to let his team be complacent or too happy themselves. As he said last night, "We still don't have a winning record."
They can get to .500 however next week as they host the Bears on Monday night football.