Grading the Eagles: Jordan Howard, Miles Sanders get high marks in win over Chicago Bears | Paul Domowitch

Handing out Eagles grades following Sunday’s 22-14 win over the Bears, which sends them into the bye week with a 5-4 record:

A week after putting up 218 rushing yards against the Bills, the Eagles rushed for 146 against the Bears, including 81 in the first half. Jordan Howard had 82 yards on 19 carries, including an up-the-gut 13-yard TD run on the Eagles’ first possession of the second half that gave them a 19-0 lead. Howard averaged 6.1 yards per carry on first down. Miles Sanders added 42 yards on 10 carries. The offensive line, including rookie left tackle Andre Dillard, had another solid performance.

Grade: A-minus

Carson Wentz and Zach Ertz reconnected Sunday with Ertz catching nine passes for 103 yards and a touchdown. It was the only TD pass that Wentz threw, but he had his sixth interception-less game and completed 66.7% of his passes, despite three drops by Alshon Jeffery and another by Darren Sproles. He was clutch on the Eagles’ clock-eating eight-minute drive in the fourth quarter, converting four third-down situations, including a third-and-9 (16-yard middle screen to Dallas Goedert) and a third-and-12 (15-yard pass to Sanders).

Grade: B-plus

The Eagles gave up two short rushing touchdowns but held the Bears to 62 yards on 18 carries overall. They gave up just two runs of more than 7 yards, a 17-yarder by rookie David Montgomery in the fourth quarter and an 8-yard keeper by Mitchell Trubisky in the third quarter. Forty-two of the Bears’ 62 rushing yards came on nine first-down carries (4.7 yards per carry).

Grade: B-minus

For the second week in a row, the Eagles got a consistent pass rush, sacking Mitchell Trubisky three times and continually forcing him off his spot. Trubisky completed just 10 of 21 passes for 125 yards. Eighty-three of those yards came on two plays, a 53-yard third-quarter post route to Taylor Gabriel that caught the Eagles secondary napping and set up the Bears’ first touchdown, and a 30-yard catch-and-run by Montgomery.

Grade: B

Jake Elliott stayed perfect on field goals, hitting all three of his attempts. But he missed another PAT, his second. Elliott did a nice job of neutralizing the Bears’ dangerous kick returner, Cordarrelle Patterson. Three of his six kickoffs were touchbacks and the final one late in the game was a pooch kick. The Eagles’ held Patterson to 17.0 yards on the two kickoffs he did return. They gave up a 24-yard punt return to Tarik Cohen late in the third quarter that was made worse by an unsportsmanlike-conduct penalty on Rudy Ford that gave the Bears the ball in Eagles territory. But the defense forced a three-and-out.

Grade: B-plus

DeSean Jackson’s return lasted all of four snaps before he got hurt again, which means the Eagles probably will be without him for the foreseeable future. That’s not good news given the minimal production the Eagles are getting from the rest of the wide receivers, particularly Jeffery, who dropped three passes and looks like he’s running in quicksand. The good news is the ground game continues to be productive, and Wentz has a lot of trust in tight ends Ertz, who had nine catches for 103 yards and a TD, and Goedert. And Jim Schwartz’s defense is starting to play pretty well.

Grade: B-plus