Dolphins LB Zach Vigil blocks P Donnie Jones. Photo Courtesy of Andy Lewis Photography.

Eagles Head Coach Chip Kelly
 
Q. What happened to you offensive line after the first quarter?

CHIP KELLY: It looked like we struggled at times to handle the inside guys, specifically Suh [Dolphins DT Ndamukong Suh], but we had a little momentum going there for us. We didn’t capitalize on that third drive, and then we ended up missing the field goal. Then after that a lot of it was trying to get the quarterback away from them; that’s where we ran a lot of nakeds and bootlegs to try to get the quarterback out of the pocket and try to stay away from that rush.


Q. What happened on the missed field goal? Was it a low snap?


CHIP KELLY: Yeah, that’s what I saw. I mean, I’ll have to see the tape to see specifically what, but it looked like it was a low snap.



Q. What about the touchdown and the interception that QB Mark Sanchez threw; what should he do there?


CHIP KELLY: Yeah, we had a couple other guys. We were hoping he would just take a peek if you don’t have it because they’re in coverage. It looked to me like [TE] Brent [Celek] was open underneath, just dump it down, play the next snap and get a positive yardage. We were already in field goal range; that would have put us up. But you obviously want to try to score a touchdown because there’s obviously time left in the game.

But I haven’t talked to Mark specifically about that play, but we had some other options for him underneath.



Q. Do you have an update on QB Sam Bradford’s condition?


CHIP KELLY: No, I don’t have any updates. I know he had a concussion, that’s all I’ve been told. But I don’t meet with the trainers until after this. I think him and [RB] Ryan [Mathews] both had concussions, but I don’t have anything else besides that.



Q. The touchdown that got called back on TE Zach Ertz, it is the second time this year it has happened with a penalty, why do these things —


CHIP KELLY: I don’t know what the first one is that you’re referring to, but I know on this one we weren’t set in the formation. We didn’t get lined up as fast in terms of snapping the football, and you know, that’s what I think is the game; we didn’t play smart. We had too many penalties that I think negated big gains for us. A lot of them, I think there are only seven when you look at the game sheet, but there was a lot of them that were offsetting, so we obviously had more than that. But we had way too many penalties on the offensive side of the ball to be productive.



Q. Why couldn’t you run the ball against a run defense that came in ranked second to last?


CHIP KELLY: I think, again, I think it looked like we weren’t doing a good job handling those guys in the middle.



Q. It looked like Sanchez and RB DeMarco Murray got twisted or tied up together on a few hand-offs. Is that a timing thing there?


CHIP KELLY: No, I mean, obviously when Mark practices during the week, he’s only going to get X amount of reps because you need to get your starter ready. But those are things that aren’t excuses. We need to be able execute when one guy goes down.



Q. There were two occasions where it looked like WR Miles Austin wasn’t ready for the ball to come to him. Are they taught to look at a certain point in their route?


CHIP KELLY: Yeah, they are. One of them was a shallow cross, and he should have been looking for the football. I can’t remember the other one, but I know on that one, he should have been looking for it.

The other one I think you’re talking about with [QB] Sam [Bradford] is he was uncovered, but he was just going to block his guy, it was a run play. Sam tried to pull up because the defense wasn’t set and tried to throw one to him. So they just weren’t on the same page. We had a run play called. I think Sam just saw no one covering Miles and tried to throw it to him, but Miles was doing what he was supposed to do; Miles is going to block that near-high safety.



Q. How do you think Bradford performed before the injury?


CHIP KELLY: I think he was up and down. I think the rush got to us a little bit, but I think the whole offense was like that.



Q. What did you see on the blocked punt?


CHIP KELLY: Looked like another snap issue. And then it looked like they got [S Chris] Maragos, the linebacker on Maragos that came in real quick, and I don’t think Chris could anchor well enough. It looked like that was the guy that got his hand on the ball, I think, No. 47 or 42.



Q. How close was T Jason Peters to going?


CHIP KELLY: He wasn’t. I don’t put a percentage, he just wasn’t going.



Q. Is this going to be an issue that’s going to keep him out beyond this season?


CHIP KELLY: Not that I know of. I don’t know.



Q. You’ve talked a lot about taking what the defense gives you. Was this just coming down to a question of Miami not giving you guys as much as what Dallas gave you last week?


CHIP KELLY: No, I think we moved the ball. I think we hurt ourselves, and that’s what I told our guys. We ran 80 something plays, but we stalled, and I think a lot of it has to do — I think the penalties kind of put us behind the count where we got an opportunity, we’re moving the football, and then obviously a couple of those penalties were just real big drive killers for us, and those are on us, whether it be a hold inside, a hold on the edge. We didn’t do a good job, I think, in terms of putting ourselves in situations where we can be successful. We knew we could move the football, and we did. You run that many plays and you have that many yards, but we didn’t come away with enough points, and that’s on us.



Q. It looked like Sanchez ran the offense appreciably faster than Bradford did. Is there any adjustment for the offense in that regard?


CHIP KELLY: No, I didn’t see it that way.



Q. Are you confident in handing the offense off to Sanchez?


CHIP KELLY: Yeah, I’m confident in Mark.



Q. You guys had some nice momentum going into the season, building towards it anyway, three out of four.


CHIP KELLY: Yeah.



Q. Obviously it’s a setback because it is disappointing, but can you judge how big of a setback it is? 


CHIP KELLY: No, and we say it all the time, I think everybody wanted to make last week’s game the turning point or whatever, and that’s what — you better come to play every single week in this league, and that’s what it’s all about. You can flush whether you won or lost when you get back to work on Monday and get ready to go play who your next opponent is because they’re going to come gunning for you. And you pick your head up at the end of the season and see if you won enough games to get into the playoffs, and that has always been the way we approach it and always will be the way we approach it.



Q. Are the special teams mistakes too much at this point?


CHIP KELLY: Yeah, any time you have a block, we can’t have that. Those are momentum-changing plays in a game and that’s our second blocked punt of the year. We’ve got to get that straightened out because we’re not going to win when we’re doing things like that. We had a blocked punt for a touchdown, we missed a field goal and had way too many penalties on the offensive side of the ball for us to be successful.



Q. The Dolphins seemed to be really hitting the quick slant a lot today. Was that just–


CHIP KELLY: They were running a little rub route when we were in man coverage, so they’re picking off the guy that’s coming back underneath. So, we’ve got to make some adjustments in terms of when we’re in press and they’re trying to pick you, we’ve got to try to play over the top of the pick or maybe try to run some in-and-out combinations. We ran an in-and-out combination on the goal line, and [S] Malcolm [Jenkins] broke it up. They did the same thing on the goal line, and that was the big break that Malcolm had; we switched off those two receivers. But those other ones were pick plays that we’ve got to get through the pick or we’ve got to try to switch it off.



Q. Those times when Bradford’s getting hit on pressure, does he have to kind of get rid of the ball?


CHIP KELLY: I’d have to look in terms of which ones you’re specifically talking about.



Q. I’m talking specifically about the one where he fumbled it.


CHIP KELLY: We got beat pretty quick, so I think he didn’t really get a chance to get to the top of his drop on that one.



Q. You mentioned the concussion; did they say anything to you about the shoulder?


CHIP KELLY: No, they didn’t say anything else. They just said he had a concussion and he was out.



Q. On their go-ahead touchdown, the jump ball, was that just bad luck?


CHIP KELLY: Well, it’s not good luck the way it is. I think Malcolm was in coverage and had his back to it. I don’t think Malcolm even knew, and I can’t fault him, I don’t think Malcolm even knew the ball was tipped. He’s trying to play coverage, and when you’re down in the red zone you’re trying to play underneath receivers and not on top of them because if you’re on top of them and they catch the ball they’re already in the end zone. You want to try to stay underneath them so the ball is thrown over. I thought originally he was in good coverage. It was a great play by [LB] Connor Barwin. I’ve never been a part of a play like that.



Q. What happened with C Jason Kelce’s snap that went over Bradford’s head?


CHIP KELLY: I mean, it was high. I don’t know what happened. I didn’t get [to talk] specifically with Jason in terms of what happened, but it was high. Some of those snaps were errant today, and we’ve got to clean that up because it affects the timing of the offense.



Q. Why were your tight ends so productive today?


CHIP KELLY: We just thought those match-ups for us were something we felt like going into the game [with]. We run the ball a lot with [TE] Brent [Celek] when Brent is in there, so obviously we felt like in play-action pass, we could exploit some things there, and I thought Brent did a really nice job with it. They made some adjustments and played a little bit more man coverage than zone coverage to kind of take some of that stuff away, but we felt like those match-ups on the inside with their linebackers and safeties were to our advantage with our tight ends.



Q. Two weeks in a row you’ve had the first half go either way based on whether you decided to move the ball or not. What determines whether you’re going to try to do that?


CHIP KELLY: Depends on where you are on the field and how many time-outs the other team has. If you go three quick plays and are off the field, then you’re turning the ball back over to them, and they have an opportunity to go down and score.



Q. You felt there was enough time to get three today?


CHIP KELLY: The last time we got it? Yeah, we just thought if we could take a shot, get it to mid-field and take another shot, we’d have an opportunity to kick a field goal.

Q. Wasn’t Sanchez’s interception a lot like what he did last year in those situations?
CHIP KELLY: I’m not thinking about last year. I’m just thinking about today, and it hurt us. We’ll work around it, get with him in film and figure out what’s going on.
 
 
Eagles Defensive Coordinator Bill Davis
 
On whether he felt the game was in control after the first quarter:
“No, every drive is a new drive. There was so much football left and you never run away with a game in the first quarter. You have to play one down at a time, and 20 points is too many to give up today. They got the one where they picked or ran into [LB] DeMeco [Ryans] on the one touchdown. The other long one underneath on third down was another rub or pick type of play in man [coverage] that we didn’t recover from. There were three big pass plays and two run plays where they hit us inside and we weren’t in the right spots. We have some work to do because you can’t give up those big ones. You have to make the plays.”
 
On the play of the defense overall:
“We stopped the run. We had two big run plays that were bad. They got us in the middle of our defense, which they shouldn’t have, but they did. In the second half, there was one around the edge that got us. Third down was good, and the red zone was going well until they caught that freak one that went up in the air. It looked like we were ahead of the game in terms of getting them out of the red zone without touchdowns. It was an up and down day.”


On Miami’s fourth-quarter touchdown pass to WR Jarvis Landry off of a tipped ball:
“We blitzed. If [LB] Connor Barwin does not tip it, we probably pick it off because we had two guys sitting right in their route. It went up in the air and I don’t think the guys realized it. They didn’t see it because they were in coverage, and by the time they realized it, they were just fighting for the ball.”

On the strangeness of the Landry touchdown play:
“It just didn’t go our way. They made a play. It was a crazy play.”
 
On whether it was important for the defense to stop Miami on the ensuing drive following the injury to QB Sam Bradford:
“We really have to stop them on every drive, and that’s what our goal is. There is no one drive that is more important than another regardless of the situation. We know that we have to come up with a stop.”

On the defense playing well despite the loss:
“It wasn’t good enough. Honestly, it wasn’t good enough. This game is about winning. It’s not about effort. We didn’t get it done. 20 points is too many.”

On how he evaluates the defense’s performance when it plays well in a close loss:
“At the end of the day, we’re all judged by the wins. It’s about us making a play. I really don’t have an answer other than we have to play better. It’s not about statistics. That doesn’t matter. It’s about that scoreboard and points allowed, and we allowed one more point than they did today and that’s why we lost. That really is the way we look at it. We have to play good enough defense to win the game and we didn’t.”



Eagles QB Mark Sanchez

On what happened on the pick:
“I think it was just a miscommunication between me and [WR] Miles [Austin]. I thought he was going to do one thing and he was thinking another. So I put the ball [there] expecting, trying to anticipate where he was going and it didn’t pan out very well.”
 
On whether the interception was a combo route for Austin:
“I don’t want to say too much about the scheme. Just another play we’d like to have back.”
 
On what happened on some of the handoffs with RB DeMarco Murray in the backfield:
“Just different quarterback footwork. I think it’s something we will get ironed out this next week in practice. But every guy is different, and depending on how you run some of those inside zones and outside zones and reads and all that, the footwork is a little different.” 
 
On whether timing was an issue for him:
“Yeah, I think I was ready to throw the ball a couple times and anticipating certain looks. And they just didn’t pan out so that’s too bad. We will work on those and we will correct them on film. That’s the good thing about it: we have a good week of practice ahead of us and we will be just fine.”
 
On how the game seemed faster with him in and whether he was cognizant of that and wanted to speed things up:
“That’s how I’ve always tried to run it. You just get up and get going as fast as we can. I thought we moved the ball really well, and unfortunately, we weren’t set on one of them and then Miles was just out of bounds on another one. And then we turned the ball over. It’s really too bad, we just have to finish one more of those drives and we end up winning the game”
 
On how there are different targets from last year and whether those are guys he doesn’t get much practice time with:
“I don’t know. I’m not going to make excuses for that. I am in charge of the job just like anybody else, whether you get the reps in practice or not. It’s my job to go in and there should be a seamless transition. And I thought at times there was. At other times, I’m sure can we get a little more familiar, of course. Is that only going to get better with repetition and practice? Of course. But the point was just get in and win the game and unfortunately that didn’t happen. But we have a long season ahead of us and we just have to be ready to play.”
 
On what he saw with QB Sam Bradford’s injury:
“I have no idea. I just saw him go down. I was charting stuff and looking at defensive stuff so I didn’t see exactly what happened. All I heard was left shoulder.”
 
On whether he got to talk to him QB Bradford when he came off the field:
“I didn’t. I was trying to hustle over and get some throws in.”
 
On whether he is approaching this week as if he is going to be the starter next week:
“I mean, you have to do it every week. You have to be ready to go every week. So I don’t know. You never want to see a teammate go down. That’s never the circumstance in which you want to play. But when you do get a chance to play, you have to make the most of it and that’s what I was trying to do.”
 
On whether there is an advantage to going in mid-way through the game as opposed to going in fresh from the very start:
“I guess there are advantages and disadvantages either way; the pros and cons. But I don’t know. The point is you have to come in and win the game and unfortunately we didn’t.”
 
On the throw to TE Zach Ertz, a touchdown called back, and whether he knew Miami had 12 players on the field at that point:
“I saw someone running out of the corner of my eye, making sure we’re set and I guess we moved on the edge. But while I was making sure we were set, I’m seeing someone trying to run and they were just confused. They didn’t know, they were trying to make their calls and so that’s when you know we can really go. And we got them on it a couple times during those drives in the fourth quarter where they were out of position or running somebody on, somebody off and unfortunately we weren’t set.”
 
On the issues on the final drive:
“Well we got the drive started and then two quick passes to [RB Darren] Sproles and then you know I am trying to avoid defenders [on the pass] to Zach and it’s a little high and I think I missed that throw a little bit. And then I was expecting Miles a little quicker and he was running something. We were just on the wrong page.”
 
On how tough is it for the guys in the locker room to lose a game after having a lead:
“Whether you are up a bunch or down or almost winning, a loss is a loss. It’s just too bad because the defense played really well, and unfortunately, we hurt ourselves with some of those penalties and the turnover there. So we will assess it and just come back and play smarter and play better next week. We have a big one next week here at the Linc so it’ll be fun for us.”
 
On being in the same situation last year and what he learned from coming in there:
“I think the most important thing is just to take it one week at a time and to learn from the mistakes each week and continue to build. I think we have a chance down the stretch here to be a really good football team so we will do our very best.”
 
Eagles RB DeMarco Murray
 
On his thoughts regarding today’s game:
“They played well. We have to give credit to those guys. We didn’t play our best game today. We have to go back to the drawing board, look at the film, make corrections and move on.”
 
On whether he expected to have a bigger impact on the running game today:
“You expect to win the game. You expect the hard work you put in to carry over. They outplayed us today. We have to give credit to those guys. We have to look ourselves in the mirror and go from there.”
 
On how he thinks QB Mark Sanchez played today:
“I thought he played well. We perimeter players and running backs have to give him some bigger plays to help him settle down. I thought he did well for the most part.”
 
On whether he envisioned having stronger rushing numbers today against a defense that has struggled to stop the run in past games this season:
“You can’t just come in and expect anything. This is the NFL. They have great players on their side. We just have to come and put in the work to continue to get better. They obviously played better than us today.”
 
On whether the team was frustrated they could not keep the momentum after a strong start:
“We just have to finish drives. We are moving the ball, moving the ball and then it’s up to us players to finish drives.”
 
On not getting many practice reps with Sanchez and how much he thinks that affected the offense:
“We have to clean stuff up. That is all we can do.”
 
On whether he will be ready to carry the full load if RB Ryan Mathews cannot play next week:
“I am ready to go every week, no matter whatever they ask me to do.”
 
Eagles WR Jordan Matthews
 
On the play he appeared to get injured on:
“Just the wind knocked out of me. I am good.”
 
On why the offense was not as effective in the final three quarters as they were in the first:
“I really have to go back and look at the film. The first thing that jumps out to me is that we had a lot of penalties. We can’t have those self-inflicted wounds, like [head] coach [Chip] Kelly says. There were a couple of times that we had really positive plays, but we had penalties. That is top to bottom, not just the offensive line. It’s execution across the board. It’s something we all have to focus on and get better at. When we come out that hot, we have to keep putting our foot on the gas petal and to continue to keep a team down. We are capable of doing it, now we just have to finish drives and games. We can’t finish a drive if we don’t start it.”
 
On whether guys on the team showed frustration today:
“It can be frustrating at times. I am a positive person, so I look at it like there is something we can fix. There are things we are doing right and we just have to build on those. At the same time, in all seriousness, we want to get this season going. We have to be able to get on rolls. We have to win games and string wins together. This would have been a great one to start with. It’s over now, so we have to figure out what we did wrong and get ready for the Buccaneers.”
 
On what he saw from QB Mark Sanchez when he came into the game:
“You know how I feel about Mark. Mark and I have a great relationship. He is always coming in and working hard. We watched film this morning before the game. He will tell me some stuff that I need to look at and get ready for. He always has good energy and wants to make plays. He is going to come in and give guys opportunities. He made a couple of plays out there. Now, with a full week of preparation with the first team, he can come out and give us a great game against the Bucs.”
 
 
Eagles TE Brent Celek
 
On the difficulty of this loss:
“It stings bad. You can’t lose games like this, especially how we came out and then kind of fell off for a few quarters. We were just making too many mistakes and killing ourselves. You can’t do that in this league and expect to win games. It doesn’t matter who you are playing.”

On the offense getting off to a quick start:
“That’s what we need, but we have to continue it throughout the game. Just because you come out fast doesn’t mean you’re going to win. That’s what happened today.”

On whether some elements of the offense change when QB Mark Sanchez is at quarterback as opposed to QB Sam Bradford:
“I don’t think they change that much. We’re still running our offense and Mark is a good quarterback. We all have faith and trust in him.”

On whether he would have scored if he was targeted during the play that resulted in Miami’s endzone interception:
“I don’t know if it would have been a touchdown, but I probably would have had a decent gain. That’s how football goes. You have to overcome some of that stuff and we still had an opportunity at the end of the game to win and we just didn’t do it.”

On staying in the NFC East race despite the loss:
“We have to pick it up. It doesn’t matter about any other team. We’re worried about ourselves and we have to fix the mistakes that we’ve made. In all of these games that we’ve lost, it’s really been us beating ourselves. Until we get ourselves fixed, nothing else matters, and that’s what we’re going to be focused on.”

On the offense operating at a faster rhythm at different points during the game:
“I think at the beginning, we were really pushing the tempo because we were getting positive plays on first and second down. That’s what really gets us going. For a few quarters there, we weren’t getting positive plays. That’s what really hurts an offense, no matter who you are. You can’t have penalties and dumb mistakes. We have to fix it.”

On the possibility of losing QB Sam Bradford to injury for a period of time:
“That’s part of the NFL. We have a good quarterback in Mark and he’ll step up. If he has to go, he’ll go. That’s all part of the game.”

On why the offense bogged down at different times during the game:
“Mistakes. You guys see it. We get first downs, and the next thing you know it’s coming back because of a penalty. We have touchdowns called back because of a penalty. You can’t expect to win football games like that. That’s the stuff that we really need to fix. It’s got to happen, and it’s got to happen fast.”

On his personal strong receiving performance:
“Honestly, it doesn’t matter. I’m going to go home and I’m not going to be happy about this. This is a team game, and if we don’t win, nothing else matters. It doesn’t.”
 
On why he was able to be an effective target in the passing game:
“They were biting on some of the play-action, so I was able to get over the top of them.”
 
 
Eagles WR Miles Austin
 
On Eagles QB Mark Sanchez:
“Mark does a great job at practice of being attentive in meetings and with everything we do. Everyone gets reps. I need to personally do a better job and our team as a whole has to do a better job.”
 
On the Eagles’ missed opportunities:
“Anytime you get a loss like this, it’s a tough thing to go through. Regardless if we would’ve won today, we would still have to shake it off and go into next week, the same way as if you lose. We just have to shake it off and come back ready to work. The next team is not going to feel sorry for you.”
 
On the pass intended for him in the fourth quarter that was intercepted:
“It was a play action and I was coming over to the left side. You are supposed to expect the ball to always come your way. Their guy made a play.”
 
On the team’s fast start and slow finish:
“It’s rough. I feel like we were moving the ball for most of the game. We just weren’t able to translate it into points late in the game. It’s just the way it was going.”
 
 
Eagles WR Riley Cooper
 
On the illegal procedure penalty that nullified an apparent touchdown pass to TE Zach Ertz:
“I wasn’t set. That was my fault.”

On whether the offense was moving too fast at that point for him to get lined up in time for the snap:
“No, it was completely, completely my fault. Everyone else did everything great and Ertz made a great catch.”
 
On the play of QB Mark Sanchez:
“I think he did great. I thought he looked really good.”

On whether Sanchez appeared to be rusty from not playing to this point in the season:
“Mark has been in this league a long time, and with what we do in practice, Mark gets a ton of reps. He gets just as many reps as [QB] Sam [Bradford], or maybe a tad bit less. If Sam does not play, and I don’t know what happened to Sam because I haven’t talked to him, I think Mark will do a great job. I don’t think he’s rusty. He’s always in the facility super early studying film. He’s been doing that all year. I don’t expect Mark to be rusty at all.”

On losing QB Sam Bradford to injury at a point in the season when he was playing well:
“It’s sad. You never want to see one of your teammates or anyone on the other team get hurt. This game is violent and physical. I hope Sam is okay. It’s tough because we were starting to get into a groove and make some plays. I think the wideouts did good in the first half. We didn’t get a whole lot of opportunities in the second half for whatever reason. Our run game was doing fantastic so we kind of stuck with it, which is great. But you never want to see your starting quarterback go down.”
 
Eagles WR Josh Huff
 
On how losing QB Sam Bradford hurt the offense today:
“We practice with both quarterbacks at all times. Everyone gets reps, so with Sanchez coming in, it really didn’t bother us as much. Obviously, losing a great leader like Sam Bradford hurts.”
 
On whether he thinks the offense was moving faster with Sanchez at quarterback:
“It was moving fast when Bradford was in there, too. We had too many self-inflicted wounds, including a turnover in the end zone.”
 
Eagles LT Lane Johnson
                                                          
On whether he thought the quarterback change affected the team’s tempo in the second half:
“All I know is that from our side, it was a dog fight the whole game. We did some good things with tempo. We could have been stronger in pass protection. I feel like we had a chance to win the game and just didn’t. It was at our fingertips.”
 
On how much of a missed opportunity today was:
“It was big. I felt like we had this game won. We let it slip out of our fingers. That was the toughest part about it.”
 
On whether he thinks the offense should have relied more on the run game:
“I don’t know. I felt like we did do some good things in the run game. It’s tough when you’re are playing to see exactly what his happening. When I watch it, we can reevaluate it and see. I think we did some good things. We could have run the ball more, but who knows.”
 
On what position the team is in for the rest of the season:
“We have Tampa Bay next week. I wish we could have gotten a win today. It is tough going down to the wire and feeling like you have the game won and lose it. It was tough. We ran a lot of plays. It was a battle. One of the sloppiest games we have had. We just couldn’t finish it at the end, that was the toughest part.”
 
Eagles T Dennis Kelly
 
On the Eagles’ game plan to run the ball today:
“We really just look at the film. Sometimes stats can be deceiving, but we were just worried about what we could do. We thought that we should be able to run the ball. We’ve had a lot of success over the last month or so. We just didn’t get it done today.”
 
 
Eagles S Malcolm Jenkins
 
On the play of the defense overall:
“I thought we did a pretty good job other than the first drive, and they had one big play on another drive. They ended up scoring on a play on which the ball bounced off a defender’s head and they end up coming down with it. That part is frustrating. This was a day that we didn’t take the ball away as well. We had a couple of opportunities, and looking back, those could have been the difference in the game.”

On the Miami touchdown pass to WR Jarvis Landry off of a tipped ball:
“I kind of turned and looked to where he was trying to throw. He was trying to throw to the guy that [CB Byron] Maxwell was covering in the back of the end zone. I didn’t realize that Maxwell was kind of running at me, I turned around, and Landry had already kind of located the ball. At that point, I was just trying to get the ball out, but he came down with it.”
 
On whether he would have played the play differently that resulted in the Landry touchdown if he had known the ball was tipped:
“If I see the ball there, I’m not going to try to go get it myself, and in a worst case scenario, I’ll just slam [Landry] down because it was a tipped ball and there is no such thing as pass interference on a tipped ball.”

On whether a team can have a good defensive unit that doesn’t come up with takeaways:
“In terms of being a good defense, the easiest way to affect the game is to take the ball away. That’s the stat that affects the game more than anything. You can be mediocre on everything else, but if you take the ball away, that changes the game. You can be a really good defense that doesn’t take the ball away if you’re good on third down, good in the red zone, and good in two-minute, but the easiest way to affect the game is to take the ball away.”

On the frustration of this loss:
“It’s a frustrating loss because it’s obvious to a lot of people that we did things on our own to lose the game. We’re at home and we have the advantage, and we had control of the game for the most part. Then all of the sudden, we started doing things to give it to the Dolphins. They’re a team that did a good job of not making mistakes themselves, and that kept them in the game. They didn’t turn the ball over, and they made a big play on special teams that put them back in the game. They basically just sat back and watched us mess it up. That’s the frustrating part. From a record standpoint, regardless of what happens tonight, we’re still in it. It sucks because we lost, but the way this division is setting up, we’re still in it. We have to fix some things and we can’t beat ourselves.”

On why the team has struggled with self-inflicted mistakes:
“If I had the reason, we would have corrected it already. We work hard and this team prepares, and I know that it means a lot to everybody that goes out there. Week in and week out, we’re giving it our all throughout the week, but for whatever reason when we get to the games, it’s just not translating. Injury-wise, we have to see who is in. Regardless of who is in there, it has to be executed. We need to do things to not put ourselves in a bind. When we don’t hurt ourselves, we’re a pretty good team and we usually have control of our games. When we create problems and light fires on ourselves, we lose.”
 
 
Eagles LB Connor Barwin
 
On the team’s performance today:
“I don’t want to take away from [the Dolphins]. They have good players and made some plays at the right time. We didn’t do what we’re capable of doing and what we should do. We didn’t execute and that’s not how we’ve played in the last month. The first quarter was good and we had control of the game. Mistakes started to creep in and we had some uncharacteristic plays. This is the NFL. If you make mistakes like that, teams are going to take advantage of it. Before we knew it, the game was over.
There were mistakes made all over the place. We’re usually pretty good at keeping the momentum and finishing. We’ll go back and look at the tape to see what happened, but we didn’t play our best for four quarters. [Eagles defensive coordinator] Billy [Davis] called the game the way he usually does. He does a great job. They had trouble with a few of the blitzes that we ran. We had plenty of opportunities to make plays throughout the game. Obviously, we didn’t finish. We’re 4-5 and it is what it is. We’re not out of this thing. We have seven games left which is a lot of football, but if we play like we played today we’re not going to win games.”
 
On his deflected pass that turned into a Dolphins touchdown:
“That’s kind of how the game went. It was in the air for four seconds; it has to be a pick. There were a couple of plays there that rolled their way, but that’s how the game goes sometimes.”
 
 
Eagles LB Brandon Graham
 
On the team’s loss:
“They beat us because they made plays when they needed to. We know that we didn’t put ourselves in the best position possible to win this game.”
 
 
Eagles S Walter Thurmond
 
On the team’s loss:
“It always comes back to us. We had a lot of missed opportunities. Their record might not show it, but the Dolphins are a good team. They have a lot of weapons on the offensive side of the ball, but I think we beat ourselves today. A team hasn’t really come out and beaten us down for four quarters. It’s always been in our control. Whether it’s been a certain technique, a false start, an interception, a deep ball, a blocked punt, it’s always something that we can control. It’s one of those things where we just need to snap out of it, get back to work and make the necessary adjustments.”
 
On the Eagles defense:
“It’s one thing if you get three-and-outs. That’s pretty good and it’s kind of what the standard is for the league, but we hold ourselves to a high standard. We want to be great and get the ball back. We have to get turnovers and we have to be able to put points on the board as well. We want to be an elite defense. We fell short of that and weren’t able to get turnovers after the first quarter. Even though we had some sacks, we weren’t able to force the turnovers. It’s one of those things where we could’ve done more on our end, especially on the tipped ball for a touchdown. Those things are a part of the game.”
 
 
Eagles K Caleb Sturgis
 
On his missed 37-yard field goal:
“On the one that I missed right, I pushed the ball a little bit right. I have to do better. The wind was blowing left to right, and I have to start it further down the middle. I just started it too far right and it missed. It’s something that I have to get better at.”

On whether he wishes he could have the missed kick back:
“As a kicker, you have to forget fast. Obviously, right now, I wish I could have it back. By tomorrow, I have to forget it and move on.”

On kickers having to have a short memory after a missed kick:
“It’s important because you can’t make a bad thing worse.”