A winning machine: Unbeaten Eagles are coldly efficient as ever

INGLEWOOD, Calif. — Nick Sirianni charged off the sideline and pumped his fist like he’d chugged down five energy drinks and the caffeine was just kicking in. The sight of Haason Reddick sacking Matthew Stafford once in the closing minutes Sunday, then again on the next play, was simply too much for the coach to contain himself. It doesn’t take much to get Sirianni fired up, but his combustible temperament is the most ironic aspect of his tenure so far with the Eagles. His emotion is forever spilling out, but his team is as even-keeled as it gets.

“Nick does a great job of showing us situational football each and every week,” Reddick said, “whether it’s a situation that we could be in, things that go wrong, teams that get penalties late in games, or when it’s going right. He does a great job preparing us and letting us know, ‘Hey, we have to be smart football players.’ High football IQ — that’s one of the No. 1 things that he preaches. Don’t do anything dumb.”

Maybe we’ve been looking at the Eagles the wrong way so far this season. Five weeks, five victories, and maybe what we’re looking at isn’t a team that should be expected to be a dominant force just because it reached the most recent Super Bowl. Maybe what we’re looking at instead is a team that is coldly efficient, that is good enough to beat any opponent in any manner it must, that won’t come by its wins easily but will win nonetheless, and with relatively little to complain about in the end.

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That perspective, that reminder to remember how the Eagles perform and stack up compared to the rest of the NFL, is important. There’s nothing easier — or, in Philadelphia, nothing more enjoyable — than to nitpick the Eagles’ mistakes and flaws in any game. And they had their share here at SoFi Stadium in beating the Rams, 23-14.

They struggled in the red zone, settling for three Jake Elliott field goals when a touchdown or two would have put the Rams away earlier. Their slot cornerback situation remains an issue; for a while there, it appeared that Cooper Kupp might catch a dozen passes Sunday. Quez Watkins cost the Eagles a first down by failing to cut inside on a third-down reception, then later jumped up and down in frustration after Jalen Hurts didn’t notice he was wide-open in the end zone, as if Watkins had done much of anything this season to regain Hurts’ trust.

So yes, they made those errors … then spent most of the second half not making them. Stafford is the best, most accomplished quarterback the Eagles have faced this season, and they shut him out after halftime. Hell, the Rams’ offense never crossed midfield in the game’s final 30 minutes. Hurts threw for 303 yards and appeared faster, more decisive as a runner, rushing for 72 yards and feeding the theory that the Eagles want him carrying the ball only so much, that they want him to be as healthy as possible when the regular season winds down and the playoffs begin. And when all else fails, they can just throw the ball to A.J. Brown or call another quarterback sneak — the two plays that rarely, if ever, let them down.

“Like everything, we have things to clean up,” Sirianni had said Friday. “On offense, on special teams, we all have phases of the game that we need to clean up. But I think they are doing a good job of — and the run game’s been outstanding as well — doing it a couple of different ways.”

It is the hallmark of the sort of team that is tough to beat — tougher to beat than just about any team. Look around the league. Most teams don’t play football in the modern NFL; they commit it. The quality of play is ragged everywhere. This team that destroyed that team just got beat by this other team that was shut out by what had been the worst team. The outcomes of most games are completely unpredictable. Except those games that Hurts is under center for the Eagles. They have won 22 of the last 23 regular-season games that he has started. Their coach has a powder-keg personality, but these Eagles are as predictable, and just about as successful, as it gets.