WHY DOES BEING A LIFELONG EAGLES FAN have to feel so much like being the parody of a bad cliche? After Sunday's solid and workmanlike victory against the best team in football I found myself apeing that sourpuss mug of "Miami Steve" Van Zandt playing Silvio Dante from the Sopranos apeing Al Pacino playing Michael Corleone from Godfather III, "Just when I thought I was out, they PULL me back in."
The Eagles knocked the defending world champions flat on their asses at Giants stadium by doing what the Eagles haven't been able to do against an NFC opponant all season -- run it down their throats -- and I react like a made man swearing eternal fealty to a mob boss who just arrived fresh from the federal witness protection program.
Why am I such an easy gabbone? Loyalty to this green "thing of ours" has caused me more agita in recent years than decades of rooting for losing Phillies teams, mediocre Sixers teams or overmatched Flyers teams. I don't claim to understand the dynamic of this peculiar hold over my better senses enjoyed by the Eagles. Since adulthood I have tried to school my emotions with a hard-learned maxim about the nature of the National Football League: "On any given Sunday the Eagles can defy the odds and lose."
The reverse is true, of course, just take Sunday's upset over the Giants. But for every Miracle in the Meadowlands there's been a Fogbowl in Chicago and, most recently, a Clinker in Cincinnati. Let's face it, Philadelphia, both the fans and the sports media, treat the Eagles like the city's legacy and premier professional sports team. This despite the fact that every other major league franchise in Philadelphia has won two world championships apiece -- not to mention the titles by the Phantoms, Wings, Soul or Kixx --since the Eagles last NFL championship in 1960. You could look it up.
So knowing all this, why am I actually allowing myself to, you know, believe that the Eagles can run the table? Can steal a wild card? Can beat Dallas away? All based on this infuriatingly inconsistent team's performance last Sunday? My answer is simple. I've seen them do it before. With backup quarterbacks. Jim McMahon in 1991, Rodney Peete in 1995 and Jeff Garcia in 2006.
I figure this is Donovan's year to do the impossible. And that's why they keep pulling me back.
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