Eagles Aren’t Dead Yet

Sunday’s most stunning NFL development is not that Kyle Orton and the Chiefs beat the previously unbeaten Packers, nor that Dan Orlovsky and the previously winless Colts derailed Tennessee’s playoff hopes. It’s not even that the Bears thought there was a chance Caleb Hanie could pass off as a competent quarterback, though I must tip my hat to Hanie for possibly becoming the first quarterback to throw Pick-Sixes to two different extremely fat defensive linemen in his career.

No, to me the most amazing thing to come out of the day is that the Philadelphia Eagles have a very real chance of making the playoffs. Like Monty Python’s Black Knight, somehow they’ve stayed alive despite repeatedly having limbs chopped off.

The Eagles’ playoff scenario is not nearly as complex as you’d expect for a 6-8 team that has underachieved so much that its coach has supposedly been on the hot seat for about two months. The Eagles need to win their remaining games, of course — next week at Dallas and then at home against Washington in the season finale.

They’ll also need help — the Giants need to lose to the Jets next week, then beat the Cowboys in the season finale, which would set up a three-way tie atop the division which would give Philly the tiebreaker.

All of those scenarios are quite believable — at least a heck of a lot more so than the Chiefs beating the Packers or the Colts beating the Titans were. The much maligned, much laughed-at “Dream Team” might not be done just yet.