Nate Burleson: Foles' Energy Could Give Eagles Little Extra Edge Against Saints
(CBS Philly/CBS Local) The Philadelphia Eagles run continued with a last-second win over the Chicago Bears in the Wild Card round last week. Thanks to Bears kicker Cody Parkey's partially blocked "double-doink" missed field goal in the waning moments, the Birds get the chance to avenge their worst loss of the season. In Week 11, the New Orleans Saints handed Doug Pederson's crew a 48-7 beatdown to drop their record to 4-6.
The result, while embarrassing enough, was made worse by the fact that the Saints continued to throw early in the fourth quarter while already up 30+ points. That decision by Sean Payton left a lingering bad taste in the mouths of some of the Eagles players including tackle Jason Peters, who said this week that the team has an "appetite for revenge".
With the game set for Sunday at 4:40 p.m. Eastern Time, we caught up with CBS' The NFL Today studio analyst Nate Burleson to get his thoughts on whether the result of the first game will give the Eagles a little more motivation this weekend.
CBS Local Sports: In the NFC, the Eagles face the Saints after New Orleans routed them in the regular season. The Eagles have talked a lot this week about New Orleans running up the score. As a player, does something like that give you an extra edge heading into these games?
Nate Burleson: Yeah it gives an extra edge because you still feel the bumps and bruises on your soul. There is still that frustration. I make the analogy of a street fight. If you get caught off-guard and punched in the mouth and your butt whooped and you go home with blood dripping out of your nose. Your mama asks, 'What happened?' and you have to lie to her about the shiner you got on your eye. But, the next time you see that bully, you are going to know where the punches are coming from.
It isn't saying that you are going to be able to defend those punches. But at least you have a gameplan going into the next fight. The prime example was the Chargers going to Baltimore. Baltimore handled the Chargers in L.A. They came back and said, alright, I know how you like to fight and the Chargers were ready for all of the Ravens moves.
In this game, the Philadelphia Eagles are going in knowing that they got their butts whooped last time. But, there is something different about this fight. We learned a few new moves. It's like when you played your favorite video games as a kid and you learned those few special moves. It made you more confident going into the next round. I feel like that special move for the Eagles, that little something extra, is Nick Foles.
It isn't just the way he's playing football either. It's the fact that they (the Eagles) are in the tournament. Nick Foles, in the tournament, is as good as anybody. We might not see too many big shots from Robert Horry during the regular season. But, we knew once the NBA Finals came around, "Big Shot Bob" was coming out. With Nick Foles, there is a something about that energy that he has walking on the field knowing that he has been there and done that.
That is a very distinct advantage that certain quarterbacks have. In a matchup with the Bears or the Rams or whoever else is going into New Orleans to play the Saints, Drew Brees can look across to the other sideline and say, 'You don't know what it's like to play in a Super Bowl'. He can do that to Mitch Trubisky or Jared Goff. He can even say that to Carson Wentz. He can't look across the field and say that to Nick Foles.
Nick Foles can look across the field at him and say, 'Not only do I know what it's like, but I have as many rings as you. So I can talk to my team about what it's like just as much as you can.' The question is, whose message will translate and hit home when it comes to gameday?