News & Info/Headlines

McCoy Continues To Come Up Short; How Long Do We Wait For Turnaround?
As Profootballtalk.com's Michael David Smith reminded readers this week, during the offseason, LeSean McCoy openly talked about his goal of gaining 2,000 yards this year. Nine games into the season, McCoy has 641 yards, putting him far short of his goal.

So now McCoy is saying that the goal of 2,000 yards was never a big deal.

“The individual goals and achievements are always second,” McCoy said, via CSNPhilly.com. “We’re winning games and we’re being a successful team, so that’s all that really matters at the end of the day. Sure, I would like it different. I think every player would like it different. But the main focus and the main thing that matters the most is that we’re winning.”

McCoy’s numbers have declined dramatically across the board from last year: In 2013, he gained 1,607 yards, averaged 5.1 yards a carry, added 539 receiving yards and totaled 11 touchdowns. This year McCoy is on pace to gain 1,140 yards, averaging 3.7 yards a carry, has gained just 92 receiving yards and has only two touchdowns.

As Smith summed up, "It’s a good thing McCoy thinks individual achievements are secondary, because individually, he hasn’t achieved much this season."

Of course, fantasy owners who burned an early (perhaps even first overall) pick to secure his services won't be as forgiving of McCoy as McCoy is.

So what do we do with him going forward?

Last season, McCoy ran for 155 yards at Lambeau Field. On Monday night, McCoy ran for just 19 yards on 12 carries. His 1.6-yard-per-carry average was below 2.0 for the third game this season. In previous games, the opponent was stacking the box to stop the run. Or the Eagles’ offensive line was adjusting to changes caused by injuries.

In this game, center Jason Kelce and left guard Evan Mathis were back on the field. All signs pointed to a big game for McCoy. It didn’t turn out that way.

Offensive coordinator Pat Shurmur put it down to the presence of linebacker Luke Kuechly.

“We're going to try to be patient and run the football,” Shurmur said. “Then there were times when we had some creases where all of a sudden Luke showed up. I just think, generally speaking, when you leave some meat on the bone in the running game, we can finish better. There are just little things each guy can do better. Then you can have a game where you're back effective again.”

As ESPN.com's Phil Sheridan notes, in an effort to improve their run defense, the Packers moved linebacker Clay Matthews from outside to the inside of their 3-4 scheme. It’s hard to gauge how successful that was in their one game doing it. The Packers jumped out to such a big lead on the Chicago Bears on Sunday, the Bears were forced to throw the ball in an effort to catch up.

“Chicago got down so quickly, maybe their mindset turned into, `We’ve got to throw the ball more to get back into this game,’“ head coach Chip Kelly said. “They [the Packers] did play better inside. We only have a small sample of it. You could see improvement on the tape, though.”

If Matthews is appearing in running lanes the way Kuechly did Monday night, the Eagles are simply going to have to block him better. Controlling the ball and keeping Aaron Rodgers on the sideline is paramount in this game.

“Sometimes we had it blocked up right, and we didn’t hit it,” Kelly said. “Other times there was nowhere for the back to go. Either we don’t block it right or we don’t run it right.”

It would help if McCoy showed some of the burst and elusiveness that made him so dangerous in past seasons.