For Eagles' defense, a mixed verdict

So much pressure was on the guy responsible for putting together the Eagles' pressure packages this season.

Like it or not, Sean McDermott was - and will continue to be - compared to the late Jim Johnson, who spent a decade as coach Andy Reid's defensive coordinator.

It doesn't bother McDermott because he knows his mentor was an elite defensive coordinator and that's what he aspires to be.

The regular-season evaluation is now complete. McDermott's defense met the Johnson standard in many ways and came up short in others.

It should be noted that McDermott dealt with some extraordinary circumstances, including the loss of team leader Brian Dawkins to free agency and a season-ending injury to starting middle linebacker Stewart Bradley early in training camp.

The Eagles didn't do a great job of replacing either one. Other injuries have also forced McDermott to shuffle defensive alignments much more than he would like, but there also have been times when he has shown a lack of patience at certain positions.

"Sean wasn't given the bible on how to be a defensive coordinator," safety Quintin Mikell said. "He's made mistakes, but we've all made mistakes. I've made mistakes. Asante [Samuel] has made mistakes. But he has done about as well as he could have with the cards that he has been dealt.

"That's what people need to understand. It's hard to dial up things when you have a lot of new people that are basically in their first year in the scheme. Not only players, but we have coaches that it's their first year in the scheme."

Regardless, we have arrived at the final examinations, also known as the NFL playoffs, and it is McDermott's defense that may be the greatest concern as the Eagles prepare for tomorrow night's first-round game against the Dallas Cowboys.

The Eagles finished the year with the NFL's 12th-ranked defense in yards allowed, and that's respectable. Twelve NFL teams go to the playoffs, so to finish in the top 12 is no disgrace.

The Eagles' defense finished in the top 10 in that category in six of Johnson's 10 seasons as the defensive coordinator. The high-water mark was last season, when the Eagles had the top-ranked defense in the NFC and the third-ranked defense in the NFL.

The scoring defense this season, on the other hand, was not acceptable. The Eagles allowed 21.1 points per game and finished 19th in the NFL. Under Johnson, the defense ranked in the top five in that department five times and in the top 10 seven times.

It's the Eagles' inability to stop the other team from scoring that is of the greatest concern going into the playoffs. Johnson always stressed that if the defense surrendered 17 or fewer points, the Eagles would win more often than not.

During Johnson's decade as the defensive coordinator, the Eagles held opponents to 17 or fewer points 88 times in 160 regular-season games and nine of 17 playoff games. The Eagles were 71-16-1 in the regular season when they met Johnson's "17 standard" and 8-1 in the postseason.

This season, the Eagles held the opposition to 17 or fewer points eight times in 16 games and were 7-1 in those games, with the lone loss coming at Oakland.

Here's the big concern: The Eagles have held the opposition to 17 or fewer points just twice in the last nine games. By contrast, the Cowboys, who finished second in the NFL in scoring defense and are coming off consecutive shutouts for the first time in franchise history, allowed 17 or fewer points 10 times this season, including eight of their final 10 games.

The Eagles clearly do not have the hotter defense going into tomorrow's game, and if you look back just one season, you'll realize how important that can be.

At 9-6-1 and having qualified for the playoffs only because all the planets aligned in some miraculous fashion, the Eagles didn't seem like a team capable of making a deep playoff run. But they had a hot defense, and it remained that way in the playoff victories over Minnesota and the New York Giants.

The place where McDermott's first defense more than met the Johnson standard was in the takeaway department, and that may be the Eagles' best chance to pull off an upset of the Cowboys.

With 25 interceptions and 13 fumble recoveries, the Eagles had 38 takeaways to rank third in the NFL this season. Believe it or not, that was often an area of weakness during the Johnson years.

The Eagles' first defense under Johnson led the NFL with 46 takeaways, including 28 interceptions, but ranked in the top 10 just two other times in the next nine years. As recently as 2007, the Eagles were last in the NFL in takeaways.

For all the complaints you may hear about the Eagles' pass rush, McDermott's first defense finished tied for third in the league with 44 sacks, four fewer than last season. The Eagles finished in the top 10 in sacks during seven of Johnson's 10 seasons.

Five days ago at Cowboys Stadium, the Eagles had just one interception, and their two sacks came after Dallas had already secured the victory. In Game 3 of this series, the Eagles will need more takeaways and sacks or their season is likely to be over.

Read The Inquirer's Eagles blog, Birds' Eye View,

by Bob Brookover and

Jeff McLane,

at http://go.philly.com/sports.

Subject: Spadaro spits on star.

Blog response by ArtMooney at 9:56 p.m. Wednesday:

"And then the Eagles spit on their fans."EndText