You can point to a lot of reasons why the Eagles lost an important game to the Bears yesterday.
You can point to an Asante Samuel-less secondary that gave up four touchdown passes. You can point to a defense that came into the game leading the league in takeaways, and for the first time this season, didn't get a single one.
But as far as Andy Reid is concerned, his team's 31-26 defeat came down to one thing: his offense stunk in the red zone.
Last week, the Eagles converted just 1 of 5 red-zone opportunities against the Giants. But thanks to five giveaways by the Giants, they still managed to cruise to a 27-17 win.
They weren't so lucky against the Bears. This time, another dreadful 1-for-5 red-zone performance resulted in a five-point loss and leaves them in a precarious situation heading into a short-week Thursday night game against the born-again Houston Texans, who will be coming off an impressive, 20-0 win over Tennessee.
"We've got to make sure we score [touchdowns] when we're given the opportunity,'' an angry Reid said after the game. "That answers a lot of things there. There are going to be games when you're not going to get a turnover. When you're down in the red zone, you've got to score touchdowns against good teams.''
Five trips inside the 20 and the Eagles walked away with just 16 points. They lost by five. You do the math.
"It's very frustrating,'' said left tackle Jason Peters. "We left a lot of points out there. We were kicking field goals when we got in the red zone. We've got to correct that. We've got to put seven points on the board.
"I don't know what the problem is. We watched film last week [after the Giants game] and we thought we had corrected it. We've got to go back and readjust.''
Aside from a 4-for-4 red-zone performance in their impressive, could-do-no-wrong, 59-28 win over the Redskins 2 weeks ago, the Eagles have been struggling in the red zone for a while now. Take out the Washington game and they're a lousy 6-for-23 in the red zone in their last five games.
Yesterday's red-zone adventure actually started out OK. Michael Vick capped off a 10-play, 65-yard first-half drive with an 8-yard touchdown pass to Jeremy Maclin.
But that would be the Eagles' one and only red-zone touchdown. Drove down to the Chicago 3 on their next possession, only to have Vick sacked for a 14-yard loss on third down. Had to settle for one of David Akers' four field goals, which pulled them within 14-13.
