Brian Westbrook

You don't spend millions on a top-of-the-line running back only to keep him parked in the garage. But do you lighten his load, as Eagles coach Andy Reid said he would do with franchise tailback LeSean McCoy, because of the hefty investment? McCoy played more snaps that any other running back in the NFL last season - and he sat out the finale. Even before McCoy signed a five-year, $45 million extension last week, Reid suggested that he was going to try and limit McCoy's touches.

Brian Westbrook fumbled the first punt he tried to return last night in the Eagles' penalty-slathered, 16-15 exhibition loss to the Super Bowl champion Patriots. Westbrook also bobbled the first kickoff he returned and dubiously fair-caught another punt on the Eagles 15-yard line - mistakes befitting a rookie playing his first NFL game at length, before a sellout crowd, on the road. But Westbrook also typified what coach Andy Reid said after the game, referring to the young Eagles who played in the first contest at Gillette Stadium, the Patriots' $325 million new stadium.

Their stories entering and leaving college have similarities, and Byron Westbrook hopes that his situation can continue to mirror that of his famous brother as he makes his long-shot bid for a place in the NFL. A cornerback who completed his senior season in 2006 with five interceptions at Division III Salisbury University (Md.), Westbrook faces much longer odds against entering pro football than his older brother Brian, the Eagles' all-purpose running back. Both suffered injuries in their senior seasons at DeMatha High in Hyattsville, Md. Thanks largely to their injuries and their size - short - neither got the chance to play at a Division I-A college.

While waiting his turn to become the next great tailback at DeMatha High School in Hyattsville, Md., Patrick Mealy focused his attention on another swift and tough former DeMatha tailback who was making a name for himself in the NFL. When he finally was named the starter in his senior year, Mealy studied tapes of the star he had grown to idolize to see what made him excel, and glued himself to the television on NFL weekends whenever an Eagles game...

The man who so many believe is vital to the Eagles' Super Bowl hopes did not show up last night for coach Andy Reid's 7 o'clock team meeting at Lehigh University. Running back Brian Westbrook, in yet another stunning Eagles development, did not report to training camp. Wide receiver Terrell Owens, meanwhile, checked into his dormitory room dressed in a camouflage hat and shirt, appropriate attire considering his ongoing contract war with the Eagles and the fact that he was flanked by a media army big enough for an invasion.

The comparisons started in 2003, when Brian Westbrook emerged as the most explosive member of the Eagles' three-headed backfield monster, a weapon equally effective by land or by air. By then, Marshall Faulk's star was flickering in St. Louis. The injuries had added up and his gaudy offensive numbers were headed down, but the damage he had done with the Rams and Indianapolis Colts already was Hall of Fame worthy. Former Eagles linebacker Mark Simoneau described Westbrook as a combination of Barry Sanders and Faulk in 2003.

Villanova coach Andy Talley hears the question wherever he goes, the one that quickly follows, "Hi, how are you?" How are you going to replace Brian Westbrook? The question has popped up often during this month of Villanova spring football practice, which ends today. It comes from the most passionate to the most casual of Villanova football fans, and with good reason. Westbrook is headed to the Eagles, who made him a third-round draft choice last weekend after a college career that saw him rewrite the record books of the Wildcats and the Atlantic Ten Football Conference, make the All-America team three times and win the 2001 Walter Payton Award as the top player in NCAA Division I-AA.

When the trainers got to Brian Westbrook as he lay supine and unconscious on the grass at FedEx Field with his teammates and opposing players standing hushed around him, Westbrook's arms were extended rigidly at his sides, locked in the grip of the event that had just leveled him. The presence of such a reaction indicated a severe medical emergency, one that can be caused by a stroke, brain hemorrhage, a tumor, or some other traumatic brain injury....

Eagles running back Brian Westbrook's latest concussion is more than just an unfortunate setback in a brilliant football career. Westbrook's sidelining on Sunday has broader implications, since it also sends a message to college and high school athletes about returning to the field too soon after suffering a brain injury. While the first concern of everyone - Eagles fan or no - is that Westbrook heals fully, his injury in the game against the San Diego Chargers highlights the many uncertainties and dangers concussion-injured athletes face.

Brian Westbrook isn't happy with his contract, and he's not a big fan of training camp, either. But when you ask the Eagles running back about his football team and the coming season, he immediately becomes optimistic. "I think we'll be a good team," Westbrook said in a recent interview from his horse farm in Upper Marlboro, Md. "I think the last few years our health has been a big problem for us. Keeping everybody healthy, including myself, is important. " The long trek to opening day begins tonight when rookies and assorted veterans, including quarterback Donovan McNabb, are scheduled to report to Lehigh University for the start of training camp.

You don't spend millions on a top-of-the-line running back only to keep him parked in the garage. But do you lighten his load, as Eagles coach Andy Reid said he would do with franchise tailback LeSean McCoy, because of the hefty investment? McCoy played more snaps that any other running back in the NFL last season - and he sat out the finale. Even before McCoy signed a five-year, $45 million extension last week, Reid suggested that he was going to try and limit McCoy's touches.

There is ample time for the Eagles and LeSean McCoy to agree on a contract extension, with 74 days left until the start of training camp. But is July 25 - the day veterans are to report to Lehigh - really a deadline or an arbitrary date in negotiations? If McCoy plans on holding out, then yes, it would be a deadline of sorts, although the Eagles may not view it that way. The Pro Bowl running back has one year left on his contract and the team may consider that all the leverage it needs to get him into camp on time.

Sometimes, coaches can exaggerate about players they've just drafted. But Andy Reid wasn't kidding when he said defensive end Vinny Curry "might be the biggest Eagles fan ever. " When the second-round pick from Neptune, N.J., met reporters Saturday, he displayed all the emotion, passion, sense of history and pride of the thousands he'll soon play in front of at the Linc. His eyes welled as he talked about meeting Brian Dawkins and Mike Vick. He name-checked Randall Cunningham and Troy Vincent, and insisted that it was Freddie Mitchell who originated the championship belt celebration.

LeSEAN McCOY has always known his place. He deferred to Brian Westbrook, when McCoy was a rookie and Westbrook was the established star. You'd still have a hard time getting McCoy to acknowledge he has surpassed Westbrook. This season, as it became apparent McCoy was going to shatter every franchise benchmark for a running back in his first 3 years in the NFL, McCoy has talked about benefiting from all the weapons around him, and from defenses having to watch out for the scrambling of quarterback Michael Vick.

Two hundred eleven running backs have carried the ball for the Eagles in their 79-year history. LeSean McCoy is on pace to run for more yards in his first three seasons than any of them. He already has accounted for the most yards from scrimmage, running and receiving. And the Eagles' go-to back, is still just 23 years old. This has been a terribly disappointing season for Eagles fans, but McCoy hasn't disappointed. His effort has been consistent, his outlook positive, his focus on the team, even on days when the Eagles lost at least in part because they somehow neglected to give him the ball enough.

YOU WANT TO know what the difference is between you and me and LeSean McCoy, other than the business about McCoy having 20 touchdown this season and a spot in the Eagles' franchise record book? It is this: You and I have pored over the standings and the upcoming NFL schedules, and taken notes with a Dixon Ticonderoga No. 2 pencil and a pristine yellow legal pad, and determined that after the Giants lost their 1 p.m. game yesterday, and after the Eagles won their 4:15 p.m. game, what all of the playoff scenarios might be. But McCoy?

ONE OF the great shames of this disappointing Eagles season is that it likely is going to waste what could be a record-breaking year by running back LeSean McCoy. While we've been rubbernecking at the wreck on the other side of the ball, and contemplating the number of losses it might take for Jeff Lurie to pink-slip Andy Reid, and debating the all-inness of DeSean Jackson, and wondering how high the Eagles' turnover total will climb, McCoy has quietly put together one of the finest performances by a running back in franchise history.

   With two touchdowns Sunday against the Dolphins, Eagles running back LeSean McCoy moved to within one touchdown of Steve Van Buren's team records of 18 touchdowns in a season and 15 rushing touchdowns in a season. Here are the lists: Most touchdowns in an Eagles season:   Player              Year TDs Van Buren 1945 18 McCoy           2011 17 Brian Westbrook 2008 14 Terrell Owens     2004 14 W. Montgomery 1979 14 Van Buren        1947 14 Most rushing touchdowns in an Eagles season: Player              Year TDs Van Buren        1945 15 McCoy           2011 14 Ricky Watters     1996 13 Van Buren        1947 13

DANIEL Te'o-Nesheim might have been doomed here from the moment the Eagles selected him in the third round of the 2010 draft. The team hasn't really taken a third-rounder it ended up liking since Brian Westbrook in 2002. The litany of disappointment since then includes Billy McMullen (2003), Matt Ware (2004), Ryan Moats (2005), Tony Hunt (2007) and Bryan Smith (2008). Stewart Bradley (2007) was a decent player who quickly fell out of favor following a knee injury. Te'o-Nesheim was signed off the Eagles' practice squad yesterday by the Tampa Bay Bucs.

The Eagles wasted no time tagging the Giants' shiny new football palace. For more than three decades, the place across the parking lot from MetLife Stadium was haunted by the ghostly image of Herm Edwards' scooping up Joe Pisarcik's inconceivable fumble and scooting for an impossible game-winning touchdown. The Eagles never set foot in Giants Stadium again without the original Miracle of the Meadowlands coming to mind. It stood as the emotional backdrop for every big Eagles moment there, from Clyde Simmons' rumbling for a game-winning touchdown with a blocked Eagles field goal to Brian Westbrook's incredible punt return to win a game in 2003.