NOTE: this post will be updated each year until the streak is broken. Unitalicized comments are from the original post, dated June 27, 2023. As we all know, the 2023 Eagles failed to break the curse.
“No team has won back-to-back NFC East championships since the 2004 Philadelphia Eagles”.
You have certainly heard some version of that phrase a lot over the last few years, especially since the offseason began and the Eagles became the latest to attempt to break this curse. The streak of those that have tried and failed to pull this off is now 19 years long, beginning with the 2005 Birds. I went back to 2003 (the first year that winners of the new four team divisions had the chance to repeat) to find out how frequently teams actually win these divisions back-to-back; of the 160 attempts, only 68 (42.5%) did so successfully. I'll spare you the mathematical details, but based on that analysis, the chances of a division failing to produce a repeat winner 19 years in a row is a pretty small number (it turns out it's one in 36.839). Statistically, that's a rare event but not so rare that it can't necessarily be chalked up to randomness. My tasks today are:
I will review the 19 teams that failed to repeat, give you their final record, and briefly summarize what went wrong, as I see it
I'll categorize the common causes to see if any pattern develops
I'll draw from the experience of these other teams to see if any predictable cause for this phenomenon exists, or if this is a truly random event (hint: as Eagles fans, we want it to be random)
I'll see what the pitfalls we should be hoping to avoid are.
We'll lead off with one of the more painful seasons in modern Eagles history:
2005 Philadelphia Eagles
Final Record: 5-11 (previous year: 13-3, 2-1 in playoffs)
What happened? Drama and injuries, injuries more injuries. Philly actually began its division five-peat quest with a 5-2 record, including wins over the 12 win Chargers and 10 win Chiefs. The Birds had arguably the most dynamic QB-RB-WR trio in the league in McNabb-Westbrook-Owens; both McNabb and Westbrook ended the season on IR, and we all know what happened with TO. On top of all this, top shelf contributors like Tra Thomas, Hank Fraley and Lito Sheppard suffered season ending injuries, and a host of other key players missed time. This is still the only time Philly has gone 0-6 in the NFC East since it went to four teams.
2006 New York Giants
Final Record: 8-8, 0-1 in playoffs (previous year: 11-5, 0-1 in playoffs)
What happened? Kind of a host of things, from a tough schedule (nine of their opponents made the playoffs), an inconsistent year from Eli Manning (#19 in ANY/A and #18 in passer rating) and a top heavy approach to offense (69% of their total offensive yards came from only three players). The Giants still backed into the playoffs on the last day of the season but got bounced by division champ Philly in a January downpour.
2007 Philadelphia Eagles
Final Record: 8-8 (previous year: 10-6, 1-1 in playoffs)
What happened? Similar to the '06 Giants, Philly faced an over-the-top schedule (all three divisional rivals made the playoffs, plus Philly faced the unbeaten Patriots, the thirteen win NFC runner-up Packers and the NFC West champion Seahawks). Neither Donovan McNabb nor the defense were quite the dominant forces they were in the early part of the decade. Still, in a normal year this would have been a playoff team (they finished 7th in SRS and 11th in DVOA).
2008 Dallas Cowboys
Final Record: 9-7 (previous year: 13-3, 0-1 in playoffs)
What happened? Similar to most Dallas teams in recent memory, this squad was more hot air than anything. Still one of the most talented teams ever to miss the playoffs (the previous year's team had sent 13 players to the Pro Bowl and returned mostly intact, added Zach Thomas and Pacman Jones in free agency and a top shelf draft class that April), Dallas looked nearly unbeatable at times in the regular season, but we all remember how things finished for them. At the end of the day, Dallas went a mere 2-5 against playoff-bound opposition with an average loss of 8.4 PPG. Have to do better than that to win a division.
2009 New York Giants
Final Record: 8-8 (previous year: 12-4, 0-1 in playoffs)
What happened? A total collapse, that's what. The G Men started off 5-0 and finished 3-8. Injuries weren't much of a factor, but a 2-6 record against eventual playoff teams proved that this team wasn’t up for a repeat. This team just didn't have it, a surprise considering how competitive they were the previous two seasons (and the next two).
2010 Dallas Cowboys
Final Record: 6-10 (previous year: 11-5, 1-1 in playoffs)
What happened? Tony Romo missed ten games with a broken clavicle, and time finally ran out on the Wade Phillips era. In hindsight it seems strange that Jerry gave up so soon on Phillips, who had run off 33 regular season wins in the previous three seasons, but a 1-7 start saw him out the door and kicked off the Jason Garrett era. We'll come back to him later.
2011 Philadelphia Eagles
Final Record: 8-8 (previous year: 10-6, 0-1 in playoffs)
What happened? Ah, the Dream Team! The 2011 Eagles likely deserve their own blog post, and maybe a miniseries, but in short, here were the issues as I saw them: 1) the lockout didn't allow the team the best opportunity to integrate their offseason additions, 2) Nnamdi Asomugha was not properly used (paying $60 million for a press man corner and using him constantly in zone or soft coverage never made sense to me), 3) an absurd amount of on-the-field bad luck, especially early in the year (Philly outgained and out-first downed each of its first seven opponents, and outscored them by 27 points total, yet somehow started 3-4). The Birds outgained 13 of their opponents in total, out firstdowned another 13, and overall had a net scoring margin of +4.3 PPG. They finished 8th in SRS and 10th in DVOA, and these kinds of statistical anecdotes go on and on. In spite of all of this, Philly only managed a .500 season. 4) The media overreaction to the Eagles' offseason and Vince Young's Dream Team comment placed an inordinate target on the team's back, and a burden in their minds that became evident as the weeks went along. At some point I'm going to write a story that details this week by week, but for now you'll have to take my word that Philly was about a dozen plays away from being 16-0. What a missed opportunity.
2012 New York Giants
Final Record: 9-7 (previous year: 9-7, 4-0 in playoffs, Super Bowl XLVI champs)
What happened? Nothing, really. New York is one of three teams on this list to match their record from the previous year, so you can’t really say they notably regressed. They were the defending Super Bowl champs, but the case could be made that the '11 Giants were the worst champ in the last 30 years. Had Philly taken care of their business in a couple key moments the previous year, New York would have missed the playoffs and we're remembering the careers of Eli Manning and Tom Coughlin very differently. This version of the Giants was probably better than the previous year's edition but came up just short of the playoffs.
2013 Washington Redskins
Final Record: 3-13 (previous year: 10-6, 0-1 in playoffs)
What happened? Mostly, the unfortunate injury to RG3 exposed how overrated the previous year's Redskin team had been. No one doubted the special nature of that team's story, but it did not seem sustainable even before Giffin's injury. That winter, I went as far as to make a wager with my one serious Redskin fan friend that the Eagles would win more games in '13 than Washington (at that time that seemed like crazy talk). I cashed in on that wager before Thanksgiving.
2014 Philadelphia Eagles
Final Record: 10-6 (previous year: 10-6, 0-1 in playoffs)
What happened? Meet the second team to match their record from the previous season! Philly sat in pole position after a 33-10 beating of Dallas in Texas Stadium on Thanksgiving night, and in the early version of my column I proclaimed the division race to be over. What a dummy! Instead, Philly stumbled mightily to a 1-3 finish while Dallas swept their remaining games (including returning the favor with a 38-27 win in Philly two weeks later) to win the division easily. Philly lost a Wild Card spot to the Lions somehow and missed the playoffs despite arguably being a better team than the year before. They won ten games despite featuring a fading Nick Foles and a retread Mark Sanchez at QB (both players threw for more than 2,000 yards).
2015 Dallas Cowboys
Final Record: 4-12 (previous year: 12-4, 1-1 in playoffs)
What happened? Some of the good luck Dallas enjoyed in catching the Eagles the previous year caught up to them, but the biggest deal here was season ending injuries to Tony Romo and Dez Bryant. The defense was passable but the offense was one of the worst in the league as the eight game dropoff the Cowboys sustained represents the biggest single season regression of anyone on this list.
2016 Washington Redskins
Final Record: 8-7-1 (previous year: 9-7, 0-1 in playoffs)
What happened? Similar to the '12 Giants, the ’16 Redskins improved by any objective measure you prefer, but had the misfortune of playing what was easily the best division in the league that year (the Giants finished #10 in DVOA that year and were the lowest ranked team in the NFC East). Washington finished third in the NFC East and missed the playoffs by a half game.
2017 Dallas Cowboys
Final Record: 9-7 (previous year: 13-3, 0-1 in playoffs)
What happened? Some regression to the mean is generally expected after being one of the top teams in the league the previous year (Dallas dominated the brutal NFC East in Dak Prescott and Zeke Elliott's rookie seasons). Still, the biggest issue was that the Eagles were too good in their championship season. I genuinely don't think any NFC East team could have caught them that year (they were 5-0 in division games that the starters played in).
2018 Philadelphia Eagles
Final Record: 9-7, 1-1 in playoffs (previous year: 13-3, 3-0 in playoffs, Super Bowl LII champs)
What happened? Philly became the second team on this list to get back to the playoffs and the first to win a postseason game. The injuries this team sustained were hideous; the 2018 Birds are still #17 overall in FBO's Adjusted Games Lost metric over the ten years that statistic has existed (that's out of 320 teams total). That's the second highest of all playoff teams in that time frame and the highest of any team that won a playoff game. There were more issues with this team than the injuries but had this team sustained even average injury luck, one can only dream about what may have happened.
2019 Dallas Cowboys
Final Record: 8-8 (previous year: 10-6, 1-1 in playoffs)
What happened? Not a scientific reason, but this is a classic example of the Poser Dallas Cowboys. This was actually a pretty good team that probably should have made the playoffs, but despite their talent and relatively good health that year, they managed to lose enough games to force a winner-take-all matchup with a banged up Eagles team in a cold Lincoln Financial Field three days before Christmas. Philly's 17-9 win in that game all but finished off the Cowboys (and finished off the Jason Garrett era, it turned out).
Few individuals I can think of embody the Poser Cowboys phenomenon like Jason Garrett, who clearly wasn't an awful coach (finished a respectable 85-67 in the regular season, with only one losing season in ten years), but his teams always left their fans wanting more somehow. Garrett was a guy with some talent but no heart, a coach that everyone loved and no one feared. Regular season success was consistently matched with playoff failure, and it's clear with the benefit of hindsight that he only lasted so long because he was a favorite son of Jerry Jones (Wade Phillips was more successful than Garrett by any measure, but lasted less than four seasons in Dallas). In other words, he was the perfect avatar for the Poser Cowboys. Thankfully, it looks like Dallas replaced Garrett with another coach just like him.
2020 Philadelphia Eagles
Final Record: 4-11-1 (previous year: 9-7, 0-1 in playoffs)
What happened? Literally everything you can imagine. The team got old in a hurry, sustained major injuries for the third straight year and this time couldn't overcome them, Carson Wentz turned into a pumpkin (Wentz had previously enjoyed remarkable luck in avoiding turnovers despite his penchant for putting the ball at risk), there were internal issues between team and coach and management, and all of this ended up not only cratering the season but costing both Wentz and Pederson their jobs.
2021 Washington Football Team
Final Record: 7-10 (previous year: 7-9, 0-1 in playoffs)
What happened? Really nothing; the 2020 WFT was one of the more weak playoff teams in league history. Them losing out of the playoffs only proves the continued inevitability of regression to the mean. Washington went from being below average to... being below average. Nothing of note here.
2022 Dallas Cowboys
Final Record: 12-5, 1-1 in playoffs (previous year: 12-5, 1-1 in playoffs)
What happened? Similar to the 2017 Cowboys, this team was actually pretty good but just not good enough to catch the Super Bowl bound Eagles. A late injury to Jalen Hurts provided Dallas with an opportunity to make the divisional race interesting, but in classic Poser Cowboy fashion, an overtime loss to Jacksonville (on a walkoff pick six, no less) all but slammed the door on any chance of catching the Birds.
2023 Philadelphia Eagles
Final record: 11-6, 0-1 in playoffs (previous year: 14-3, 2-1 in playoffs)
What happened? Arguably the worst Late Season Collapse in NFL history. Philly opened up 10-1 (with six of those wins coming against eventual playoff teams), and were two solid games clear in the race for the NFC's top seed. Philly then played six straight ugly games (losing five), including indefensible losses to bottom feeders (Cardinals and Giants) to close the year (even as the division was still up for grabs). This team had some injuries but not nearly enough to account for this.
All told, sixteen of the nineteen defending champs had a worse record (none improved). The total win-loss record of these teams was 148-162-2 (47.5%), which represents a loss of a little more than three wins per year on average. Only eight finished with a winning record (42.1%), and only four made the playoffs (21.1%). If you were paying attention, you noted that there was not a significant pattern that developed in terms of a predictable cause. It isn't this simple, but I broke down what I felt were the primary causes this way:
Injuries (5 times): 2005 Eagles, 2010 Cowboys, 2013 Redskins, 2015 Cowboys, 2018 Eagles
Actually improved but the division was too tough (3 times): 2007 Eagles, 2016 Redskins, 2022 Cowboys
Team wasn't as good as the year before (2 times): 2006 Giants, 2017 Cowboys
Late season collapse (3 times): 2009 Giants, 2014 Eagles, 2023 Eagles
Internal implosion (2 times): 2011 Eagles, 2020 Eagles
Just posers (2 times): 2008 Cowboys, 2019 Cowboys
Team was no good to begin with (2 times): 2012 Giants, 2021 WFT
As far as these issues go, I don't see the last three (Internal Implosion, Just Posers, Team No Good) as being applicable to Philly; this team is too talented and well managed for that, and is blessed with terrific veteran leadership. The second and third causes (Improved but Division Too Tough, Not As Good) also don't seem to fit for similar reasons. The biggest points of concern based on the history we've looked at would be Injuries and a Late Season Collapse (that second half stretch of six straight games against contenders looms large here). Edit: this happened. Injuries are the most obvious and frequent cause of these regressions. It's worth pointing out that crippling QB injuries were a major driver in four of the five seasons cited, so the Birds obviously need to do what they can to keep Hurts upright. I'd hate to think of what may happen if Lane Johnson were to miss a notable portion of the season too; he's as valuable to this team as anyone (QB included). I've alluded to this earlier, but the Eagles have piled up a 76-45-1 (62.7%) record when Johnson plays more than 50% of the snaps; they are only 16-24 (40%) when he comes up short of that standard. That simple difference counts for three or four wins each year by itself.
It's difficult to know how concerned we should be about the specter of injuries. On one hand, regression to the mean is typically to be expected if a team enjoys unusually good (or bad) health, and Philly seemed to do pretty well on the injury front last year. Some of the advanced statistics back this up; the Eagles were the third-healthiest team in the league last year by FBO's AGL. On the other hand, injuries can't really be predicted or controlled. Philly has done a superb job in recent years in injury prevention improvements, from rebuilding their training staff to their now-famous light practice schedule. Making anything close to a firm prediction is totally impossible, but I believe the #1 protection against the kind of regressions we've been reading about will be reasonable health.
One final note; even if the average bite of regression comes for the Birds, it's hardly the end of the world. The average regression of three wins would “only” drop the Birds to 11-6. That record almost certainly gets Philly into the one-sixth category of defending NFC East champs that return to the playoffs. Edit: this also happened.
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