Philadelphia Eagles: Birds would never live down a loss to Giants

After scratching and clawing their way to the brink of an NFC East title, the Philadelphia Eagles have to finish the job against the New York Giants, or it will be an all-time disaster.

The Philadelphia Eagles have done what they needed to do.

Shorthanded or not, Carson Wentz and the Eagles have taken three games in a row against division opponents to push their record to 8-7 and bring them to the cusp of an improbable postseason appearance.

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Only a rematch with the New York Giants stands in their way.

The Eagles are just 60 minutes of, let’s be honest, pretty average football away from an NFC East crown and a home game at Lincoln Financial Field next week.

Meanwhile, it’s probably in the Giants’ best interests to lose so that they can maintain a top-five draft pick, maybe even nudging up to the #3 or #4 slot, depending on the results of other games on Sunday.

There is absolutely no logical reason, seemingly no legitimate way, that the Eagles lose to the Giants on Sunday.

And that’s exactly the problem.

The pressure is on, and the Eagles have to rise to the occasion just as they did in last week’s “dirty but good” 17-9 win over the Dallas Cowboys. And even though they’ll be facing a decidedly inferior team on Sunday, that just means that the “danger factor” is ratcheted up even further in Week 17.

I could give you keys to the game or go through the various head-to-head matchups that we’ll see on Sunday, but none of that matters. Bringing home the W, whether by a single point or by 40 points, is the be-all and end-all.

It certainly would be nice to build up an early three-score lead and then coast the rest of the way, soaking in a division title for as long as possible. But does anyone actually expect it to happen this way?

No, we should all be fully anticipating a white-knuckle experience like we’ve been privy to all season with these Birds.

From gut-punch losses to dregs like the Atlanta Falcons and Detroit Lions to a thrilling win against the Green Bay Packers, the Eagles have seen ten of their games decided by one score. It’s really eleven games, but the fumble return touchdown at the end of the game against the Washington Redskins provided a 10-point margin of victory. A technicality.

The point is, don’t expect an easy game with this team. Just buckle up and hope against hope that the Eagles manage to win this game. The team simply won’t be able to live it down if they lose. More importantly, the fans will have to deal with it for a long, long time.

That is, unless the Cowboys manage to lose to the Redskins, allowing the Eagles to back into the division title at 8-8.

Come to think of it, I actually might prefer things to play out that way.