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00:00All right, everyone, it's Adam Kaplan here for SportsGrid, and it's Super Bowl 59.
00:04And a guy to my right, number 81 in your hearts, the great Eagle, Jason Avant.
00:10Great to see you, my friend.
00:11It's good to see you, Adam.
00:12Yeah, good to see you, buddy.
00:13All right, man.
00:14So from the Q&A show with Quentin Michael and yourself on Inside the Birds, and you're
00:18here for another Super Bowl, man.
00:20So this is what I find interesting.
00:22So you're a former Eagle, right?
00:24You love the team, but you're a former head coach's coach in Kansas City.
00:29So I know you're rooting for the Eagles, but Andy also drafted you.
00:34So how do you handle all that?
00:36I don't think about it.
00:37Philadelphia's been my home for so long, and the fans have treated me well, the organization
00:42have treated me well.
00:43So I want Coach Reed to have success, just not this game.
00:46Right?
00:47Got it.
00:48So I root for him, but just not in this game.
00:49All right, let's break down the game.
00:50So you were just telling me off camera, I know you're watching tape, anything for your
00:55Eagles you're concerned about in this game?
00:57I think that the way that Coach Reed has figured out a way to negate or to help his offensive
01:04line by running a lot of RPO stuff, and they're better at the pass option than we are, and
01:12we run the ball better than them, is that Mahomes can see the field so much better than
01:18most quarterbacks.
01:19So he's able to pick up on a guy off outside, oh, I'm going to throw this hitch, oh, this
01:24guy is off inside, I'm going to throw this slant, oh, here's a screen back side off RPO,
01:29oh, I'm going to keep it around the edge.
01:31So the way that they're able to generate offense and being Xavier worthy, how much attention
01:36that he gets from Coach Reed, like besides Travis Kelsey, that's the number one guy that
01:41he is trying to get the ball to, and he's an explosive player.
01:44So there's some cause for concern there.
01:46So speaking of that, I'm looking at the Super Bowl two years ago, and Kansas City got him
01:50twice with, I don't know if you want to call it gadget plays, but quick plays inside the
01:55five-yard line.
01:57Sky Moore got him, Gadaris Tony got him, and I would be worried about, I know Oren Burks
02:04is playing well the last couple weeks, but that's a guy who's 6'3", I don't know if he
02:07moves all that well, he's rangy, but he's not explosive like a N'Kobe Dean.
02:12Do you worry about anything like that?
02:13Well, it all depends on if they can catch him in man.
02:16Our team is not a high man team.
02:19They play man when they need to, but they're not a high man team, and usually those plays
02:23to the flat when you're going through defenders and things like that, you have to catch the
02:27team in man-to-man in order to get that.
02:30And our team needs to do a better job, and yes, me and Quentin talked about that on the
02:33Q&A show, is that when we are in man, we tend to call lock.
02:38And what lock is, is that you guard the man that is right in front of you.
02:42You don't pass anything off, you don't make adjustments.
02:45Against the Kansas City Chiefs, you cannot run lock.
02:47You have to make adjustments.
02:48You either go in or out, or the guy that's on the ball takes the lower guy.
02:53So you have to communicate more than just, okay, I got this man, you got that man.
02:59So if you do that, you'll be fine, or you play zone.
03:01Okay, let's get to the start of the season.
03:04What were your expectations for the football team?
03:06The start of the season?
03:08I would say, I had the Eagles, once they made all the trades and Saquon and all of those
03:13things that happened, and Vic Fangio, I had them winning, I think, over 11 games.
03:19But I didn't know that they would be this good.
03:22I didn't think that the defense could turn around, because no one knew who Zach Bond
03:26was.
03:27No one did.
03:28Literally no one did.
03:29And no one knew who Zach Bond was.
03:30We didn't know what the rookies would be.
03:31We didn't know that Quinion would be locked down from day one.
03:34We didn't know Cooper Dejean would be the guy that turned the defense around when he
03:38got implemented into the defense.
03:42So we didn't have these expectations of the defense, and now that the defense came around,
03:47we saw that this can be special.
03:49All right, so let's look at Sunday.
03:52How do you break this down?
03:54Well, let's look at it from this.
03:57The Eagles are going to, of course, try to run the ball.
04:00Spagnuolo is going to have a huge ego and say, hey, we can't allow you to run the ball.
04:05So what we'll do is bring an extra guy into the box, which is either a bigger defensive
04:09lineman, so five down, or you add a linebacker up.
04:13Your linebackers are small, so I would tend that they probably would go with five down.
04:17So you add that guy to the line of scrimmage.
04:18You try to limit the Eagles' run game, and now they're at least one-on-one outside.
04:24Can Jalen Hurts make throws?
04:26And will we connect on the fade balls that he loves so much?
04:29He loves to.
04:30He loves those.
04:31When he sees single high safety, that ball's coming out, right?
04:34It's coming out.
04:35So will we make an adjustment there?
04:37Here's the matchup that I think we can win pretty consistently.
04:40Jalen Watson vs. Devontae Smith.
04:43Trump McDuffie vs. A.J. Brown.
04:45A.J. Brown can win that, but that's good on good.
04:47Jalen Watson is a good player, but he's not Devontae Smith good.
04:52So I think that matchup, not jump balls, but just basic routes outside, Devontae has to
04:58win this one-on-one matchup.
04:59And also Dallas Goddard will have Justin Reed or Brian Cook.
05:03I think he can win that matchup.
05:04So I'm assuming you're picking your Eagles, correct?
05:07I definitely am.
05:08You have a score?
05:09I don't have a score right now.
05:10Give me a little bit later on.
05:11All right.
05:12You got your Eagles.
05:13All right.
05:14Here's the thing.
05:15I will say about that before we go.
05:16Yeah.
05:17It's either a close game.
05:18It can go either way.
05:19Yep.
05:20Or it's the Eagles blow out.
05:21The Chiefs do not have the ability.
05:22By the way, you're like the third person who said that it wouldn't be surprising if the
05:24Eagles blew them out.
05:25I know the Chiefs have trouble scoring, but really?
05:26No, the Chiefs don't have the ability to blow the Eagles out.
05:29Right.
05:30But the Eagles could.
05:31Yes, yes, yes.
05:32That's what people are saying.
05:33Okay.
05:34That's what people are saying for 81.
05:35Jason Vaughn, I'm Adam Kaplan.