Eagles LB DeMeco Ryans flew high against the Ravens. See what I did there? Eagles? Fly high? Never mind (Associated Press)

I can’t lie. Yesterday’s Ravens-Eagles game was one of the most intense regular-season games I’ve been to in a while. Lots of hitting — not all of it between the whistles – lots of questions, lots of drama, and an absurd finish.

In the end, it was Eagles 24, Ravens 23. What stood out to me? That Philadelphia defense is just nasty. Tough, creative, swarming, suffocating. It was nothing like we came to expect last year.

Sure, they were ranked decently high last year by the end. But as CB Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie pointed out after we discussed his green mohawk, it never felt like that.

“We had some time where we were like, ‘Man, what’s going on?’ ” DRC told me yesterday. “Especially with the guys that were on the roster. You look at names and stuff you’d tend to think we’d play better, but this defense, this year, it’s been a lot more fun. You can see we’re flying around, stopping them.”

Last week, we debuted a new feature on NFL.com called Rap Sheet Rundown. This week, well, we do it again. I led with my thoughts and analysis on an Eagles defense that will put them in every game, dominating some of them. But, of course, I had a lot of other thoughts, too.

Check out the Week 2 edition of the Rap Sheet Rundown.

Posted in: Rap Sheet  |