If the the Eagles’ decision to pay Michael Vick a roster bonus of $1.5 million is any indication, it looks like they’re on their way to keeping all three of their quarterbacks. According to espn.com the Birds will make this payment as part of the $5.25 million Vick’s 2010 contract calls for. Andy Reid punctuated the decision by saying “I haven’t changed my decision, and I don’t think they have (the front office) either. They agreed, and mentioned some of the same things I’ve said–that Donovan’s our quarterback.”

Because this story is about Michael Vick’s contract, we’re not completely sure how this signals that “Donovan’s our quarterback.” But perhaps Reid sees his triumvirate of QBs as inexorably linked to each other. Certainly Vick’s value to the team is in a situational role, so he may have been expendable if Reid planned to move the other portion of his package, McNabb, during the off season.

The other side of the coin is that a small roster bonus payment to Vick means that the Eagles don’t have to spend too much to keep all of their trade options open. With nothing on the horizon (at least publicly), the Eagles’ options in trading one or more of their quarterbacks means that they have more flexibility if the right situation presents itself. Or it could simply mean another year with Donovan at the helm, Kolb and Vick playing supporting roles and fans in this town elevating Tylenol stock every Monday morning.

I’d like to kick Inquirer columnist John Gonzalez’s ass, but with the Kumite coming up, no dice. Why? Because his journalistic signature is the publishing of predictable and humorless pieces about topics that are already beat-to-death. Today’s piece about athletes he’d like to tase, entitled “A Stunning List,” is no exception. The only thing stunning about the article is how tired and cliche the list of tasees is. Brett Favre/ESPN. Jerry Jones. Mets fans. Andy Reid. Derek Jeter. Bill Belichick (really, you’re still whining about illegal videotaping?). Why doesn’t he just write something about how surprised he is that his friends enjoy long sandwiches filled with steak, cheese and onions. I mean, if you’re going to try and be the Bill Simmons of Philadelphia you should probably be able to open an article with a movie reference a little less childish and devoid of humor than the taser scene from The Hangover.

In order to establish the taser gun as the article’s motif, Gonzo also references the “don’t tase me, bro” incident from the University of Florida a few years back as well as the recent, alleged tasing of a Jets fan by Indianapolis police (he fails to reference the scene in Bloodsport where Jean Claude van Damme redirects an inbound tase with a garbage can lid). But regardless of how much Gonzo lets us know that he fills his free time by rehashing the cliche treasures of the fraternity lifestyle (”sometimes I re-watch that video to lift my spirits as needed”), the central idea that he’s tired of Brett Favre and that he hates the Mets and Jerry Jones is neither novel, compelling, news-worthy, unique, interesting nor funny.

Readers of my writings on the happenings in the world of sports can certainly relate to the feelings of disappointment with what was just read. But the difference here is that we’re talking about a guy who is paid to write this stuff and who presumably has an audience of tens of thousands. I have an audience of about 100 people who only look at my stuff in between trips to the bathroom to masturbate. Seriously, John, not only are you not the first one to be bothered by steroids users who “lied about it and got offended and overly sanctimonious when accused” but in a world of around 6 billion people, you’re probably the last. Nor is yet another joke about how you don’t like Derek Jeter because of all the tail he gets funny. Please, John, less taser next time.

Wing Bowl IX is just around the corner. This year’s orgy will celebrate fatness, drunkenness and the eternal desire to hang out in a strip club at 10 o’clock in the morning. Naturally, we’ll be doing something special for the event, probably on the order of having a tea party where we dine on finger sandwiches filled with speck and black trumpet mushrooms.

Wing Bowl gives us pause to think about the great tradition of obesity in this town. We’ve got cheesesteaks, pretzels, Tasty Kakes, temples of beer, the schmitter and Andy Reid. News is emerging, however, that at least one prominent Philadelphia sports icon, Charlie Manuel, is bucking the trend.

Thanks to a sensible diet, light exercise and a desire to remain alive, Manuel has dropped 59 pounds. The difference is amazing. The only down side is that his visits to the mound won’t be quite as entertaining but the trade-off seems to be worth it. Just when we thought we couldn’t like Uncle Chollie any more, he goes and does this. Kudos, Chas.

If Philadelphia Eagle fans were Villanova hoops fans, this is what they would probably say.

Let’s not kid ourselves, Jay Wright is never going to win the big one. Yes, Villanova wins regular season games every year, but never the big one. Sweet 16 one year, Final Four the next, who cares? When it gets down to crunch time, Jay Wright is a choker. He is ruining this Villanova basketball team, and they will never really be winners until they get rid of him. He wears too much gel in his hair and he doesn’t say the things I would say if I was coach of Villanova instead of sitting here at Chickie and Pete’s eating Crab Fries. He is a disgrace and joke. I would rather Villanova sucked liked they used to than be good and just break my heart every year. I wish we still had Steve Lappas. He may have never won any important games, but I liked the things he said in his press conferences! Those teams had heart, something these Wildcats under Jay Wright will never have. Plus his suits are too expensive. He could feed the population of Yemen and prevent further terrorist attacks for the price of one of those suits, but you think Jay Wright cares about protecting the American people from terrorism? Hardly. He’s more concerned with breaking our hearts every year.

And Scottie Reynolds, can we run this guy out of town already? Sure he hit the big shot against Pitt last year but then what did he do against North Carolina? Nothin’. He’s a bum. Can’t wait until he’s gone and we can hand the point guard responsibilities over to someone with no experience. That’s the only way this team will get better!

If this Villanova team had a real coach like John Wooden on the sidelines, they’d win some championships. Now that guy could coach. He won 12 championships! Compare that to Jay Wright, who’s won zero. 12-0. It’s not even close. Does that Nova team from last year lose to UNC in the Final Four with John Wooden on the sidelines? Hardly. You know who else Villanova could’ve used? Michael Jordan. That guy can play some basketball. I mean, if Nova had him instead of Scottie Reynolds……

If the Oxford English Dictionary had pictures, right next to the word “ingrate” would be a sobbing infant wearing an Eagles bib. The collective lack of gratitude this town has for the Eagles franchise is embarrassing and insulting to fans in every other NFL city. For some strange reason, Eagles fans believe the team is entitled to win the Super Bowl every year which, of course, they never do. Despite the irrationality of this belief (the very definition of irrationality, as this belief has no basis in empirical reality), at the end of each season those unfortunate enough to be in the company of Eagles fans are treated to temper tantrums seldom seen outside of the homes of spoiled children.

Yes, we get it. You’re upset that you’ve never won the Super Bowl. That’s understandable. But think about what life would have been like had Andy Reid never taken this team under his wing. You could be like Cleveland. Or Buffalo. Or Jacksonville. Or Carolina. Or Detroit. Or on and on and on.

The reason the Eagles have been relevant for the past 11 years is because Andy Reid has been the coach (and like him or not, he’ll be around for at least another few). Don’t believe me? You think Reid can’t win in the playoffs? Well, there are only two active NFL coaches who’ve won more playoff games than Reid. They are Mike Shanahan and Bill Belichick. We all know what they’ve done (with the assistance of John Elway and Tom Brady, two luxuries Reid has never enjoyed) and we all know how good they’ve been.

In fact, Reid is tied with Belichick for regular season winning percentage at .617 (Shanahan is slightly behind with .615). And Andy Reid has translated that regular season success to 8 playoff appearances in 11 years as the Eagles head coach. Shanahan hasn’t even made the playoffs in 50% of his seasons coaching. And Belichick has made the playoffs in 53% of his seasons. How do those numbers compare? You do the math.

The presumption among Eagles fans is that Reid should just snap his fingers and win a Super Bowl. But it’s not that easy. Making the playoffs in 73% of his seasons? Not good enough. 6 Division titles in 11 years (his percentage of division titles per season-coached is better than Mike Holmgren, Tony Dungy, Mike Shanahan, Chuck Knox, Tom Landry and Bill Parcells)? That’s not good enough either.

Yes, I get it. You want Reid and the Eagles to win the Super Bowl. All those coaches listed above have managed to do it, so why can’t Andy? That’s a tough question to answer. But at the end of the day, Reid gives Eagles fans season-after-season of a football product that is as competitive or more competitive than any other franchise in the NFL.

When will the big one come? Who knows, but the fact that it hasn’t isn’t a sign that Reid is incapable of winning. So stop whining and enjoy the fact that you’ve been able to watch an Eagles team over the past 11 years that makes the playoffs in just about every one of those seasons. And up until this past Saturday, Andy and the Birds have never failed to advance out of the first round once they have qualified for the postseason. So when you look at it like a reasonable person, you get to cheer for a team who’s been in it every week and every year for the past decade. And that’s pretty good.

We don’t want to spend a whole lot of time talking about the game Saturday, because, quite frankly, we don’t want to spend much time thinking about it. It was one of the worst football games I have ever seen. Not just as an Eagles fan. As a football fan, it was essentially unwatchable. Penalties on almost every single play, and two teams who were not evenly matched. This was evident five minutes into the game. When the first quarter ended, I wrote on twitter, “most lopsided 0-0 game ever.” The 34-14 final made the game seem a lot closer than it really was. I mean, this was sheer domination across the board. Needless to say, listening to WIP these days is a treat, as the Andy-bashing is intense and McNabb hunting is in season. Which is to say that, as usual, Eagles fans are completely divorced from reality.

Listen, I’m not going to argue that McNabb can be excused for his performance the past two weeks. He can’t. He stunk, almost as bad as Andy’s play-calling. But that’s not really the point. The point is this: The Cowboys are a much, much better team than the Eagles. However, there is no-one on earth who thinks that Wade Phillips is a better coach than Andy Reid. And sorry, McNabb haters, but Donovan is a better QB than Tony Romo (If McNabb was Dallas QB, he would have thrashed that patchwork Eagle defense too). Therefore, the Cowboys superiority lies elsewhere. The Cowboys have a far superior running game, they have more dependable receivers, they have a far better defensive line and a far better offensive line. Their linebackers are far superior (though that has a lot to do with injuries for the Birds this season). Their defensive backs don’t run alongside opposing runners because they are scared to tackle them (Here’s looking at you, yet again, Asante “Sissy” Samuel). In other words, when you look at the matchups, the only place on the field where you undoubtedly check a box in the Eagles column is next to Quarterback and Head Coach. Did those two suck it up on Saturday? Sure. But getting rid of them is insane. Because if you get rid of McNabb, yet another check mark goes to the Cowboys. 

It is understandable that Eagle fans are tired of the same old result every year. And the two constants are McNabb and Reid. I get that. But there is another way to look at it:  McNabb and Reid have lifted the Eagles from being a really bad team year after year to being a pretty good, but not great, team year after year. When every other facet of your offense and your defense are inferior to the opposition, does it really make sense to expend 100% of your energy blaming the two people who actually got the Eagles to the playoffs in the first place?

The Eagles 11-4 record this year has been nothing short of remarkable. No team in the NFL has been hit harder by the injury bug, and yet somehow they still keep on winning. Andy Reid certainly deserves a lot of credit for both building a deep team in the salary cap era and coaching a winning team whose offensive line and linebackers are seemingly brand new each week. The offensive line injury reports have been as thick as In Search of Lost Time. Kevin Curtis missed the majority of the season, and Jeremy Maclin missed time as well. Brian Westbrook was rendered essentially useless due to concussions. They went into the season thinking that Stewart Bradley would anchor their defense. He never played a game. It was the start of a long line of injured and ineffective linebacker play that got so bad that they re-signed Trotter, who hadn’t played since 2007. The defensive secondary tackle like they are trying out for the Lingerie Football League. The big knock on both Reid and McNabb was that they couldn’t win close games, yet they won their last four games decided by a TD or less. The simple fact is that the Eagles have been hit by both injuries and ineffectiveness, and yet have somehow found a way to win. According to football insider, about 20% of win changes year to year are attributable to injury alone, so they really should be worse than 9-6-1, not better. Keep in mind that they also lost the heart of their defense, B-Dawk, and longtime O-line stalwart Jon Runyan, before the season began. They have overcome tragedy as well as injury and defection, as Defensive Coordinator Jim Johnson lost his battle with cancer before the season began.  And yet, here they are, one win away from a first round bye in the playoffs. Nothing short of remarkable.

Of course, part of this has been an easy schedule. They are 11-1 against non-playoff teams. Meanwhile, they are 0-3 against playoff teams. So our vote for Andy Reid comes with a caveat. He must win this Sunday at Dallas. It won’t be easy, especially after losing Jamaal Jackson. But the fact is that this team has effectively fought off injuries all season long, and they will come prepared for this game on Sunday.

If Reid leads the team to victory, I don’t know of any coach in the NFL who is more deserving of the crown. Sean Payton’s team has been healthy, and yet they are floudering. Brad Childress has two of the best weapons in football, and yet they seem to be imploding down the stretch. Jim Caldwell should not win it, as it should only be given to coaches with spines. Norv Turner is a bum, and will blow it in the first round of the playoffs. The only other coach I see who really can even be in the discussion with Reid is Marvin Lewis, who has turned around a really bad franchise despite tragedy. I will understand if he wins the award. But if it’s anyone else besides Reid, it will be an outrage…provided he wins this Sunday.

We’re introducing a new category here at iSportacus: the WIP Watch. This segment will be devoted to the loyal fans of Philadelphia sports who call in to the radio station and say things that only a homer could say. Installment #1 was inspired by a call I just heard where the caller said that last night’s game made him certain of three things.

One, that Andy Reid is the coach of the year.

Two, that the Eagles will win the Super Bowl.

And three, that there is no player in the NFL that the caller would rather have than Desean Jackson.

Sometimes I just want to put the thoughts I hear on WIP onto paper and look at them for a few minutes, trying to figure out how many levels of irrationality go through the mind of a sports fan. Is there any other realm of human activity where people rely solely on their own assumptions and desires for their sense of reality with absolutely no regard for what anyone else is trying to accomplish?

Tony Dungy is out there. Mike Holmgren is out there. Mike Shanahan is out there. Bill Cowher is out there. And the Eagles re-up Andy Reid for another 3 years.

Eleven years in

He’s the poor man’s Marv Levy

Eat a chalupa

Fellow average American big man, Mark Mangino, is out as the Kansas football coach after physically abusing players by sitting on them. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t room for at least one contract extension for football’s big boys. It was announced today that Andy Reid has been extended (his contract, that is) by 3 years. Reid will make between $5 and $6 million per year while remaining head coach and Vice President of Football Operations.

There are plenty of folks around town who don’t think Reid is suited for the job, largely because of his inability to win the Super Bowl. Reid is, however, one of the winningest coaches around and someone who fields a legitimate contender just about every year. Now if he can just get a quarterback, something may be afoot.