NFC East Week 2 Preview: Return of Micah, get-rights, and a Super Bowl rematch

It’s a big Week 2 for the NFC East. The Washington Commanders started everything off by failing a real early-season test against the Packers and losing 27-18, but the real sicko juice comes on Sunday. 

The Dallas Cowboys and the New York Giants are playing each other, and one of them is going to walk away with not just an 0-2 record, but an 0-2 record against divisional teams. Then on Sunday evening, the Philadelphia Eagles get a Super Bowl rematch against the Chiefs. 

Washington opens a window for the Eagles

With the Commanders dropping to a 1-1 record, the Eagles have a chance to grab an early divisional lead with a win against the Chiefs… But that’s much easier said than done. Before we get to watch that game (it’s America’s Game of the Week on FOX, so you don’t really have a choice), the Giants are heading down to the Big D.

There’s a good (read: really good, almost 100%) chance that the Cowboys and the Giants are absolute non-factors in the 2025 season… but it’s NFC East football and that means early season wins end up meaning something pretty significant by the end of the season. 

Takeaways from the Commanders game

Well. The Commanders haven’t looked that bad since two games ago.

Every single thing looked entirely too difficult for the Commanders' offense, and shocker: it all started with Micah Parsons. This is the first time three-quarters of the NFC East has actually been rooting for him to have a good game… and boy was that a good feeling. 

The Packers’ games had the Commanders’ offensive line in a blender, and Jayden Daniels only had a handful of plays where it actually looked like he was moderately comfortable. And on those plays, the Packers’ coverage gave him almost zero room to actually put the ball on his receivers. 

It was a terrific and terrifying game by the Packers’ defense. 

To cap a terrible night off, it looked like Austin Ekeler popped his Achilles on a meaningless drive at the end of the fourth quarter. 

It wasn’t just offensive problems; the Commanders’ defense was wildly inconsistent the whole night. They either shut the Packers down and got off the field in three plays, or they let them walk right on down the field. 

Before the game started, Marshon Lattimore must have tried to slug either Jordan Love or Matt LaFleur in the nards, because for the Packers’ first few drives they hammered him with targets. The guy was living in a nightmare and he could not wake up.

If there are things that both Commanders and Eagles fans can agree on, it’s that Zach Ertz still rocks. He ended the game with six catches for 64 yards and a touchdown. It’s not a sexy stat line, but he was pretty nasty with it.

The other thing is that it’s awesome that Micah Parsons isn’t in the NFC East anymore. Could you imagine if he was? Woof, that would stink. He’s a good football player. 

New York Giants (0-1) @ Dallas Cowboys (0-1):

The only real juice with this game is the inevitability of Jaxson Dart for the Giants. Earlier this week, Brian Daboll said that Russell Wilson is going to be their QB1 against the Cowboys… which… okay, whatever. 

I guess it makes sense not to make the change until their offensive line shows a semblance of competency, or until John Mara literally says, ‘Hey Brian, you’re fired if you don’t beat the Saints this weekend.’

Other than that, this is a get-right game for both of these teams, but at different levels. The Giants' defense (specifically their defensive line) can’t allow 220 yards on the ground with 60 of those coming from runs inside the tackles (per NFL Pro). The Cowboys' offense (specifically their passing game) needs to be more effective.

It should be pretty easy for the Cowboys’ offense to do their thing for two reasons: CeeDee Lamb's drops at the end of the Week 1 game were super uncharacteristic for him. Correcting that means that he just has to play football. That’s an easy fix, and it’s going to be made even easier because the Giants' defensive backs are ROUGH.

That group consists of Dru Phillips, Jevon Holland, Tyler Nubin, and, who could forget, Cor’Dale Flott. Dak Prescott is going to bully those guys because: A. He’s not going to have anyone to spit at, and B. There’s no way that the Cowboys are going to try to win on the ground.

The Giants' defensive line severely underperformed in Week 1, and they have more than enough talent to not get bullied out of their gaps. Once they establish themselves, jam the Cowboys on early downs, and make them throw, they’ll be able to give Prescott a delightful slice of humble pie.

The key there is, “be able to.” That’s different from “will.” When the Cowboys are on offense, this game will be a beautiful display of how incomplete these two teams are.

As for the Cowboys defense and the Giants offense? Well… woof.

At Monday’s practice, Dallas’s cornerback Daron Bland did something to his foot, and there’s a chance that he’s out for a couple of weeks. They’re already super weak in the secondary, and now it’s a wasteland. 

Now that group is Donovan Wilson, maybe Malik Hooker, maybe Markquese Bell, Reddy Steward, Kaiir Elam, and Trevon Diggs. That might be even worse than what the Giants are throwing out there… especially since Diggs is still working his way up to a full workload. 

In Week 1, he only played 27 defensive snaps. This week, he said that he’s looking to play more, but it’s probably not going to be a full game just yet. 

Luckily, the Giants' offensive line is just about as bad as it gets, and the Cowboys' defensive line will be able to do whatever they want. If they can get to Russell Wilson (which they will), the bad defensive backs won’t matter nearly as much. 

This game is ripe for a blowout. If it’s not, it’s going to feel a hell of a lot like a loss for the Cowboys. 

Philadelphia Eagles (1-0) @ Kansas City Chiefs (0-1):

There aren’t a whole lot of interconference rivalries. There’s the Giants and the Patriots, but that feels like it’s dying off a little bit. There’s the Bills and the Cowboys, but that’s even older. There’s the Cowboys and the Steelers, but that’s even, even older. Now, it’s the Eagles and the Chiefs. 

The Chiefs' offense looked rough in Week 1. The running game wasn’t really there outside of Patrick Mahomes’ scrambles, and the pass-catching group is hurt/suspended/looking old/not great to begin with.

The Eagles' defense looked all kinds of messed up in Week 1, but it made sense because Jalen Carter was ejected from the game before he took a single snap. That being said, there’s a huge weakness at CB2 when they are in Nickel… which is a whole lot.

If there’s a quarterback and head coach duo that you trust to be able to pick on a weakness on a defense, especially one on the outside, it’d be Mahomes and Andy Reid. You have to think that the stuff they scheme up to go after Adoree’ Jackson can only be considered as ‘aggravated assault.’

However, the Eagles’ stud cornerback Quinyon Mitchell can shadow receivers now. Last Week, he did exactly that to the Cowboys’ George Pickens rather than CeeDee Lamb because Lamb does a whole lot of work from the slot. That’s important here.

Last week, Xavier Worthy jacked up his shoulder on the Chiefs' first drive of the game, and Hollywood Brown ended up being Mahomes' favorite target. He ended up getting targeted on a whopping 34 percent of Mahomes’ dropbacks. 

You would think that Quinyon Mitchell would just shadow Brown, but he, like CeeDee Lamb, does a whole bunch of work from the slot. This seems like it might be a game where Mitchell sticks to one side of the field like he did in 2024.

That is, unless Worthy does end up playing. Which is somehow a possibility. He was limited in practice on Thursday, so if he does play, you have to think he’s still going to be messed up. Maybe they could still use him for those jet sweeps and gadgety plays, but who knows? 

The Eagles' defensive line and linebackers will have to be the units to win this game. We saw them get after Mahomes in Super Bowl LIX with a disgustingly effective four-man rush. That’s going to have to be what they try to emulate here.

The Chiefs' offensive line is probably better than what they threw out there in February. In that game, they had Joe Thuney, Mike Caliendo, Creed Humphrey, Trey Smith, and Jawaan Taylor. Now, it’s rookie Josh Simmons, Kingsley Suamataia, Humphrey, Smith, and Taylor. 

If there are spots for the Eagles to win, the targets should be Suamataia, then Taylor, and then Simmons. Luckily, they can all be beaten at once. 

As far as the Eagles' offense and the Chiefs' defense, Kansas City did a great job of stopping Saquon Barkley in the Super Bowl. That’s probably going to be their No. 1 priority again on Sunday. 

That means that the Eagles are going to go through the air again, which falls pretty well in line with a bounce-back game for A.J. Brown and Devonta Smith. Those two guys were targeted a total of four times in Week 1. 

In the past, Eagles players who were neglected in Week 1 games got the spotlight in Week 2. In 2022, Devonta Smith went from zero catches to seven catches for 80 yards. In 2023, De’Andre Swift went from one carry to 28 carries for 125 yards. In 2024, everyone came out firing. 

If there is a bad spot on the Eagles' offense right now, it’s that Dallas Goedert is already dealing with a knee injury. In the past three games he’s played against the Chiefs, he’s had 14 catches for 143 yards and a touchdown. When Jalen Hurts is getting some heat (and even when he’s not), Goedert’s been one hell of a target for him. If he’s out, it’ll be a big loss. 

Hurts is probably going to be under a little bit of heat in this game. The Chiefs love themselves a blitz, and one of the things that the Cowboys did in Week 1 to throw off Hurts was to toss in some blitzes.

It seems kind of weird that the Eagles are burning a Super Bowl rematch in Week 2, but whatever. It’s here and it’s going to be great.

A few other things to note:
The Chiefs have never lost three games in a row with Mahomes.
The Chiefs have never started a season 0-2 with Mahomes.
The Chiefs have the highest win rate as a home team since 2018 (77.5%).

Everything might look like it’s set up for the Eagles to win this game, but after getting burned in Super Bowl LVII, I can never sincerely feel comfortable… unless…

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