Why Eagles run game is struggling

LeSean McCoy practiced with pink cleats this past week. The Eagles running back will run in them Sunday against the St. Louis Rams while the league promotes breast cancer awareness, so McCoy wanted to train the way he plays.

"Hopefully I'll get 100 yards when I wear them," McCoy said. "And then you won't ask the same damn questions."

After leading the league in rushing yards last season, McCoy is ranked No. 23 this year with 192 yards through four games. His 2.7 yards per carry are almost half of his average from last season.

It has contributed to a steep nosedive for Chip Kelly's rushing offense, which led the NFL last season with 160.4 yards per game. That was 11 percent better than any other team. Even with the addition of Darren Sproles, the Eagles are ranked No. 27 this season with 87 yards per game.

The reasons are varied. One year after the Eagles used the same five starters on the offensive line for every game, nine linemen have started and 10 have played. There will be a new quintet Sunday for the fourth time this season.

Defenses are also playing the Eagles differently than in 2013. Defensive coordinators were determined to stop McCoy last season, but McCoy has seen those strategies intensify this season. It has left the Eagles searching for ways to improve what they did best a year ago.

"You can't sit there and point to one group," running backs coach Duce Staley said. "I hope you're not looking for the answer of me pointing at the offensive line. I hope you're not looking for the answer of me pointing at McCoy. It's a group, collectively, that needs to do the job."

The first sign of trouble for the offensive line came on July 23, when Lane Johnson was handed a four-game suspension. The problems were exacerbated in the season opener against Jacksonville, when Pro Bowl left guard Evan Mathis and replacement right tackle Allen Barbre left with major injuries.

After Jason Kelce suffered an abdominal injury in Week 3, the Eagles were down three starters. They totaled only 76 rushing yards on 37 carries during the last two games. Kelly admitted the Eagles were "whupped up front" by the San Francisco 49ers.

"I only missed one game, and we really haven't run the ball effectively all season," Kelce said. "I think there's a lot of reasons why we've been unsuccessful running the football. It still comes down to everybody blocking a little better, obviously. It's really close. If you watch the tape, some of the runs we did have, they were one block away from being 15-, 20-yard carries in some instances."

Offensive linemen rely on continuity. McCoy said that he knew how the starters blocked last season. With mismatched parts throughout the first four weeks, McCoy was less sure of the blocking.

When Johnson returns this week, the right side is stabilized because Todd Herremans can move back to right guard. The Eagles averaged 4.55 yards per carry behind the right tackle and 5.29 yards per carry around the right edge last season. This season, they averaged 2 yards per carry behind the right tackle and 3.6 yards per carry around the right edge.

Kelly saw the problem as the blockers, not the rushers. That's why he did not think Sproles or Chris Polk would have any more success than McCoy.

"We're banged-up up front, so it's not the ballcarrier," Kelly said.  "We're not generating what we need to do in the run game at all, so it doesn't matter who we're handing it to."

Staley believes the way his star pupil is rushing has not changed during the worst stretch of his career.

"He's not doing anything different, and there's nothing he can do better," Staley said. "He has some of the best vision I've seen before in my life. So he has to understand . . . as a guy with great vision, you have to go and see the hole before it presents itself. And that's what we're working on now."

Those holes are not as big. During the preseason, Kelly emphasized the elimination of negative plays, "where maybe the hole is not exactly there. But 2d and 9 is better than 2d and 14, where all of a sudden every play he's trying to run has to be a home run."

Neither Kelly nor McCoy thought that was the problem this season. Kelly said "there wasn't a lot there" while McCoy said that too often this year he has needed to accept the short gain instead of trying for a big gain.

Kelly said the Eagles have not been able to spring McCoy to the second level. That's where he is most dangerous.

McCoy insisted that he is "just not getting it done," but that he remains confident. He is encouraged by Johnson's return, although there's still the problem of defenses determined to stop him.

"A lot of it is just executing, getting the guys we want on each other, and get the backs on one-on-one matchup, where we work best," McCoy said. "That's as simple as I get."

Aware of how defenses are playing the Eagles, McCoy said earlier this season that the team "can beat you the old way or the new way."

The "old way" helped McCoy to 1,607 yards. The "new way" has quarterback Nick Foles averaging 293 passing yards.

The score has been a contributing factor, but the Eagles average 41.5 pass attempts per game this season and only 24.25 rushing attempts. In 2013, the Eagles averaged 31.75 passing attempts per game and 31.25 rushing attempts.

"That's the reality of it," Staley said. "As a defensive coordinator throughout the offseason, you're wondering, 'How the hell am I going to stop one of the best backs coming into the next year?' . . .They want to take the guy who's giving problems to other defenses and take him out. So you're starting to see it. It's not going to change."

The Eagles are seeing more linebackers in the box and fewer cornerbacks in the defensive backfield. In two games against Washington last season, the Redskins played nickel or dime defenses almost 90 percent of the game. The Eagles averaged 194.5 rushing yards. In this year's meeting, Washington stayed in its base defense nearly two thirds of the game. The Eagles rushed for 54 yards.

With more defensive players closer to the line, the Eagles linemen cannot double-team as effectively. There are fewer gaps for McCoy to navigate, making the inside zone play less productive.

"Last year, our inside zone, we probably got six yards a carry on that," Johnson said. "A bunch of guys are loading in the box and try to take that away and try to make us throw the ball and run outside. That's a big change from last year."

Some players believe that as the passing game excels, defenses will need to pay it more respect. Kelly said that the Eagles do not want balance just for the sake of balance, but that they cannot become one-dimensional. So the running plays are not going away.

Until they do, Kelly and company will be left answering questions about why the team's strength has produced so little. McCoy is hoping he can quiet the questions in his pink shoes on Sunday.

"Mike Tyson said, 'Everybody has a plan until they get hit in the face,' " Kelly said. "We got hit in the face, and we've got to respond to it."

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