7 individual matchups the Eagles have to win to beat the Commanders

The Philadelphia Eagles have their most important and most difficult game in Week 11 when the Washington Commanders come to Lincoln Financial Field. Both teams have seven wins, but each only has one win over a team with a winning record. 

Not only is the winner of this game going to sit at the top of the division, but the loser is also going to get the most vile insult hurled at them: ‘Frauds.’

While the Commanders are a familiar team, THIS Commanders team is not; This team is good. They have a bright and shiny new quarterback who has been lighting it up. They have a new offensive coordinator in Kliff Kingsbury, a new defensive coordinator in Joe Whitt Jr., and a new head coach in Dan Quinn. They changed a whole lot over the offseason, and it’s paying off for them.

That being said, the Eagles are the Eagles. They’re more talented all over the field, they just need to bring it all together to put the Commanders back in their place. These are the matchups that can make that happen.

Quinyon Mitchell vs. Terry McLaurin:

Terry McLaurin is the Commanders’ leading wide receiver, by kind of a lot. He’s been targeted 66 times, and has 47 catches for 711 yards and six touchdowns. Noah Brown is in second with 38 targets, with 25 catches for 351 yards and one touchdown. 

McLaurin is Jayden Daniels’ guy, and for good reason. It’s scary to watch how good he’s been now that he has a real quarterback to throw to him. 

Ever since Darius Slay came to the Eagles in 2020, McLaurin has been the one receiver who has consistently been able to dominate him. In Kliff Kingsbury’s offense, that matchup isn’t going to happen all that often.

The peculiar way that this Commanders’ offense works, is that they have their wide receivers stick to one side of the field for the vast majority of the game. Per Next Gen Stats, McLaurin has lined up wide to the left a whopping 75.8% of the time. That means he’s going to be lined up on Quinyon Mitchell all night long.

Quinyon has rightfully earned the nickname ‘Quinyonamo Bay.’ He’s had to deal with CeeDee Lamb, Ja’Marr Chase, Malik Nabers, Mike Evans, Drake London, and Amari Cooper. Every single one of those players has been absolutely locked up by the Eagles’ rookie. 

McLaurin isn’t the best wide receiver that Q has had to cover, but he’s going to be the best receiver that Q will have to cover play-in and play-out. A huge key to the Eagles winning this game will be Quinyon locking up the division's best non-Eagle wide receiver.

Safeties vs. Jayden Daniels:

Jayden Daniels has been playing really well this season. Despite throwing the ball 262 times for over 2,000 yards and six touchdowns, he’s only thrown TWO interceptions. That’s pretty remarkable. 

While the Eagles' defense has been doing much, MUCH better at getting turnovers recently, the safeties are the only defensive backs with interceptions. Jayden Daniels likes throwing the ball deep on vertical routes, so Reed Blankenship and C.J. Gardner-Johnson should be able to keep up their ball-hawking tendencies. 

It’ll go a long way toward an Eagles’ win if the defense can turn one or two of Jayden’s deep shots into turnovers. It’s going to be tough for them to do that, but if they can, it can be considered a big win.

Edges vs. Jayden Daniels:

The Eagles haven’t played a real scrambling quarterback yet this season. Sure, Daniel Jones can scoot when he pulls the ball, but he stinks so it doesn’t really matter.

Jayden Daniels has 464 rushing yards on 85 carries, which is the second-most rushing yards by a quarterback in the league (behind Lamar Jackson with 521 yards). Jayden is totally fine with tucking the ball and running, and when he does it, he likes to take it to the outside. 

That means there is going to be a lot of pressure on Brandon Graham, Josh Sweat, Nolan Smith, and Bryce Huff to set and hold the edge. B.G. and Nolan are good at that, but Huff and Sweat can be had. 

If the Eagles are going to limit a huge part of Jayden’s game, it’ll be on the edges to make sure he doesn’t go crazy. The less crazy we see, the better.

Jalen Carter vs. Jayden Daniels:

Jalen Carter and Jayden Daniels have a history. They played each other in the 2022 SEC Championship game, and Carter had one of the funnier, non-violent, and aesthetically pleasing sacks of all time. 

Jalen just picked Jayden up. Like a baby. He just yoinked him off the ground like a dad keeping his kid from running into the street. That’s awesome. The world would only be so blessed if Jalen was able to recreate something like that, but chances are it won’t happen. 

If the edges are able to contain Jayden, there will be opportunities for the oft-double-teamed Carter to get some touches on a potentially panicky rookie quarterback who is scrambling behind the line. 

It’s been a while since we’ve seen a game-wrecking performance from Jalen Carter. A divisional game, in prime time, against a quarterback that he has a history with seems like as good of a time as ever for it to happen again.

Zach Ertz vs. Morals and Ethics:

The second leading pass catcher on the Commanders' offense is none other than Zach Ertz, who has 381 receiving yards and a touchdown off of 37 receptions. This will be his first game back in Philadelphia since he was traded back in 2021. 

This matchup isn’t an indictment of Zach Ertz's ethics and morals. He’s a great guy and the Ertz Family Foundation does a lot of good things around Philadelphia. This matchup is about Zach’s ethics and morals conflicting within himself, moreso, will he be ‘a real one?’

We’re talking about the guy who won the game-winning touchdown in Super Bowl LII. He’s a hero… but will he be a hero this week? In Week 10 he came centimeters short of getting a first down to keep a Commanders’ potential game-winning drive going. Obviously, he did that because he wanted the Eagles to be in first place in the NFC East.

If he’s in that same kind of situation in this game, he’s going to have a mental civil war going on in his brain. Does he go down short again? If he does, it helps out the team that he experienced the ultimate success with, but it’ll also blow his cover as a saboteur. If he doesn’t it’ll help him out in the long run, but it’ll make the Eagles fans sad. 

It’s internal strife that no one should have to deal with, but he knew what he signed up for when he went to the Commanders. He’ll make the right decision.

Dan Quinn vs. Kellen Moore:

Kellen Moore’s revenge game against the Cowboys was more of a revenge game against the Cowboys players and Mike McCarthy. This week’s revenge game will be against his counterpart from his time in Dallas.

Dan Quinn and Kellen Moore overlapped in Dallas for two years: in 2021 and 2022 Quinn was the Cowboys' defensive coordinator while Moore was their offensive coordinator. On top of that, the Commanders’ defensive coordinator Joe Whitt Jr. was the Cowboys' defensive passing game coordinator and secondary coach at that same time.

This game has to mean something for Kellen Moore on a personal level. This is his opportunity to show that he was the better coordinator on those Cowboys’ teams. 

Now, while Kellen probably knows Quinn’s tendencies, it also means Quinn knows Kellen’s tendencies. On a scheme and play-calling level, this game is going to be a hell of a chess match against two guys who are very familiar with each other.

Nick Sirianni is very in touch when it comes to letting his players have their revenge games. Hopefully, he has that same attitude for his coaches as well. Also, hopefully, he doesn’t interject on the play-calling and make more boneheaded decisions on fourth downs. Let Kellen cook, Nick. He knows what he’s going up against better than you, and he can use that to win this game.

A.J. Brown vs. Benjamin St-Juste:

The Commanders made the biggest splash at the trade deadline when they sent a third, fourth, and sixth-round pick to the New Orleans Saints for cornerback Marshon Lattimore. There’s a good reason he had that price tag: he’s really good. The Commanders need a really good cornerback because everyone else they have is really not good... too bad Lattimore is still hurt and he's not going to play. Bummer.

Remember when A.J. Brown destroyed cornerback Emmanual Forbes Jr.’s career last year? That was awesome. Unfortunately, A.J. won’t be lined up against the 180-pounder this week. Instead, he’ll probably be seeing Benjamin St-Juste. Fortunately, St-Juste stinks. 

BSJ has drawn the ire of Commanders fans over the past couple of weeks. In Week 10, he allowed three catches for 69 yards and a touchdown, in Week 9 he allowed six catches for 61 yards, and in Week 8 he allowed four catches for 32 yards. 

The other corners that will be out there are Noah Igbinoghene and rookie Mike Sainristil. There’s no reason to believe that throwing at any of those guys will be anything short of extremely fruitful.

Also, this is Jahan Dotson’s revenge game. He’s had a huge catch in each of the past two weeks. Maybe Kellen Moore dials something up for him, and then after the game they tabletop Dan Quinn.