Philadelphia Eagles Predicted To Be One-And-Done
By Erik Lambert
The Philadelphia Eagles are in unfamiliar territory. For the first time in 58 long years, they’ll be entering a season as the defending champions.
People are more than ready to believe this team isn’t going anywhere. They have one of the most balanced rosters in the entire league with talent across the board, especially in the trenches. Not only that but their star quarterback Carson Wentz will be returning from his knee injury. So the team that beat the mighty Patriots is slated to get even better.
Under these conditions it’s easy to buy into the belief they’ll be winning championships for years to come. Then again people always think that right after a team has done it. They soon find out though that winning the Super Bowl is hard. Really hard. A perfect example is the Seattle Seahawks. They dominated on their way to the title in 2013 and looked like a budding dynasty. Now last year they missed the playoffs entirely.
That’s how quickly such dreams can vanish. It would seem not everybody is buying into the idea that the Eagles are slated to go back again either.
Eagles grip on the NFC predicted to be short-lived due to division
Dan Graziano of ESPN made 25 bold predictions for what will happen by the year 2021 in the NFL. One of the biggest was the statement that Philadelphia would fail to win a second Super Bowl in that timespan. He explained himself in detail, primarily blaming the sheer difficulty of getting through the NFC East division and the NFC in general to reach the big game.
"“This is nothing against the Eagles, who should have a very good team again and stand as a legitimate threat to become the first repeat NFC East champion since 2003-04. This is just to make a point about how hard it is to repeat and sustain the kind of success Philadelphia had last year. In 18 NFL seasons since the turn of the millennium, there have been 12 different NFC champions.Of those, the only one that’s returned to the Super Bowl within three years is the Seattle Seahawks, who played in back-to-back Super Bowls following the 2013 and 2014 seasons. Carson Wentz is a young superstar quarterback, the roster is well built and well coached, and if there’s a team built to buck history, this could well be it. But it’s really hard to buck that kind of history.”"
It’s true. While the Patriots, Steelers, and Broncos have enjoyed a monopoly on the AFC championship for a long time, the NFC has been a massive battle royale by comparison. Since 2000, five different teams from the AFC have won the Lombardi trophy. In that same time span, six different teams have done it from the NFC. Keep in mind the AFC teams have won 11 of those Super Bowls while the NFC won seven.
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That’s how insanely stacked and competitive the conference is. To say nothing of the division the Eagles play in. Since 2008, every team in that division has won the crown at least twice. No other division in the NFL can make the same claim. This is not to say the Eagles can’t be different, but history is not on their side.