Eagles-Giants takeaways: Birds’ struggles no longer appear to be ‘uncharacteristic.’ Still, there’s time to fix it.

The Eagles eked out a win on Christmas Day, but it almost didn’t feel like it. While the 33-25 victory over the New York Giants moves them to 11-4 and halts a three-game losing streak, there’s still an urgency for the team to clean things up with two weeks remaining in the regular season.

Here’s what we learned:

For a good portion of the season, it was fair to refer to a few areas of concern for this Eagles team as uncharacteristic struggles. The negative turnover differential, poor situational decision-making, and a decline in explosive plays all go against areas of emphasis for Nick Sirianni during his tenure as head coach and stand out as a sharp contrast between this year’s team and the ones from the last two seasons.

At this point, those “uncharacteristic” struggles have become the exact opposite. The Eagles lost the turnover battle for the third game in a row against the Giants and the eighth time this season. Jalen Hurts’ 13th interception of the year was a bit unlucky with Dallas Goedert slipping on his route, but any conversation about luck has to include the play prior when Giants linebacker Bobby Okereke nearly intercepted a pass over the middle.

Hurts had three explosive passes (completions of 20 yards or more), which is a slight improvement, but also had a time-management blunder at the end of the first half. The Eagles’ signal caller scrambled to his right and worked up the sideline before dubiously cutting back inside rather than going out of bounds to preserve the final seconds of the half. Hurts patted his chest facing the Eagles’ sideline after the play as if to say, “My bad,” but he was ultimately bailed out by a delay of game penalty on Okereke.

» READ MORE: The Eagles spent Christmas showing everyone they’re just not good enough to be trusted

A few plays earlier, Sirianni had his own time-management blunder, waffling on using a timeout after Kenneth Gainwell fumbled out of bounds on the two-minute drive. Sirianni eventually did call a timeout, but only after about 15 seconds came off the clock.

The Eagles had to settle for a field goal on the drive because of the two mistakes.

“That’s bad on my part. Really bad on my part,” Sirianni said. “And Jalen not going out of bounds. Those combined for us not being able to get a full seven. It starts with me. I make that mistake, then Jalen makes that mistake. We have to be better in that two-minute drive. We’ll learn from that.”

On the season, the Eagles are tied for 26th in turnover differential, they’re 14th in explosive passing plays and they’re coming off a game in which they had several situational mistakes from both the coaching staff and the players.

Compare that to last year: Second in explosive plays, third in turnover differential, and notably disciplined when handling end-of-half and end-of-game scenarios.

Asked at the beginning of the season about the identity of the 2023 Eagles, Hurts said they would discover who they were over the course of the season. Sixteen weeks later, that identity has been largely shaped by the Eagles’ trouble in the important areas, the exact ones that Sirianni has harped on since taking over as the team’s head coach.

Speaking of Sirianni, the heated discussions on the Eagles sideline toward the end of the game feel like par for the coach’s course.

Haason Reddick’s frustration boiled over on the final drive and the Fox Sports broadcast crew caught him running to the Eagles sideline during a timeout to have an animated discussion with edge rusher coach Jeremiah Washburn while Sirianni was in earshot. The cameras caught Sirianni shouting back at Reddick and seemingly pointing for him to get back on the field. Sirianni then had words with Washburn before DeVonta Smith interjected and eventually got into his own pointed discussion with the coach.

Considering Sirianni’s reputation as an intense coach, this shouldn’t come as too big of a surprise. It’s worth noting Sirianni also gave Jalen Carter an earful earlier in the game after the rookie defensive tackle didn’t get off the field in time to avoid a penalty on a fourth-and-4 Giants punt.

“I get animated a lot,” Sirianni said. “There are things that when mistakes are happening or trying to get the communication going, just a little bit of that. That happens throughout a game. It’s going to be between players and players, coaches and players, coaches and coaches. But when you have the relationships that we have and the connections that we have, we’re able to move on quickly.”

To be fair, not all sideline arguments are a big deal. Some can fester, while others can amount to very little in the end. The Fox Sports cameraman who shot the sideline arguments said Smith and Sirianni eventually hugged each other after the game to tie up any loose ends. Whether these particular conversations will linger remains to be seen.

Either way, players often take on the personality of their coach. Reddick and Smith seemed to do just that as the game ended on Monday night.

The Eagles’ pass rush turned in one of the most concerning performances of the season.

The defensive front, which is supposed to be the engine of the entire group, managed just one sack against a Giants offensive line that has been so bad this year, the team still ranks dead last in sacks allowed (77) by a wide margin after the game.

The only sack was managed by linebacker Shaquille Leonard, cleaning things up after Brandon Graham and Josh Sweat flushed Tommy DeVito out of the pocket. According to Pro Football Focus, Reddick led the team with six pressures while Sweat managed just three. Sweat hasn’t had a sack since Week 9 and has been held to three or fewer pressures in each of the last five games.

Perhaps the increased snap counts for the first wave of Eagles rushers across the board has caught up to them, but the lack of a dominant rush spells trouble for the defense going into the final two games of the season.

For as much as there is to clean up, the Eagles are still 11-4 and have time to flip the switch and play their best football. They’re in firm control of their own destiny in the NFC East and the 49ers’ loss to the Baltimore Ravens keeps them in the hunt for the No. 1 seed with two games remaining.

Hurts’ 32-yard completion to A.J. Brown was one of his best plays of the season in a big moment, and the quarterback looks like the knee injury that limited him earlier in the year is now behind him. If Hurts can help sustain the running game, the Eagles offense could experience a revival just in time for the postseason.

On the ugliness of the win, just listen to Brandon Graham: “Playing in the NFC East man, these games, you know how it is. We know each other. There were some stuff we could clean up, but I’m happy with the win at the end of the day, just getting back. I felt like we had fun on the sideline. Things don’t always go like you want them to go sometimes, but I’m happy we could come out with the win. … That’s the type of team we are, we fight to the end.”

» READ MORE: Eagles won, but Nick Sirianni’s sideline eruptions and the locker room tenor still suggest a team that is tense

The margin of victory for the Eagles on Monday night, against a Giants team that ranked 32nd in DVOA going into the game, was alarmingly thin. Mistakes have been plaguing the Eagles all season and they haven’t shown the ability to turn things around thus far.

If Tyrod Taylor started Monday night’s game, do the Eagles win it? Even if two wins against checked-out teams gives way to the playoffs, the Eagles aren’t playing good enough football to beat a true contender right now and time is running out.

From Smith: “We’re not playing good football right now. As an offense, we’re not where we want to be. I’m not satisfied. Yeah, we got 11 wins. I’m not happy. It needs to be better for what I want to do, what everybody else in here wants to do, what we want to be. We’re nowhere near that so, no, I’m not happy.”