When the Philadelphia Eagles worked out a deal to trade running back LeSean McCoy to the Bills for linebacker Kiko Alonso on March 9th of this year, the two teams apparently decided not to inform either of the players involved until the trade was approved by the league, which it was the following day. According to Eagles coach Chip Kelly, who tried to set the record straight on this last week, the problem with the plan was that word of the trade was leaked before league approval was obtained and McCoy learned of it through his agent (who had heard through his own sources) and not through anyone in the Eagles organization. This upset him and understandably so. Kelly expressed regret that he did not handle the situation differently by informing McCoy himself as he says is his usual practice in these situations. After all, McCoy had established himself as one of the premier running backs in the NFL over the course of six seasons with the Eagles who drafted him 53rd overall in the second round of the 2009 draft from the Pittsburgh Panthers. The explanation of a leak between the time that the deal was made and league approval was given - as the reason why McCoy wasn't informed of the trade by the team - does seem plausible but perhaps should have been provided more publicly at the time and not nine months later. Kelly also explained last week that the trade was made for financial and salary cap reasons as McCoy was to have represented more than an $11 million cap hit for the Eagles in 2015 while Alonzo's cap hit was only $700,000. Kelly is also very familiar with Kiko Alonso, having coached him for four seasons at Oregon. After describing his perspective on the trade last week, Kelly also said that he would like to try to repair the relationship and offered to shake McCoy's hand before the game.
McCoy's explanation of the reason why he was traded by the Eagles, which he offered immediately after the trade was made, was considerably different that Kelly's. McCoy explained that Kelly didn't respect the league's star players and that he had at least some racial motivation in trading him for a white linebacker. This I find to be a much less plausible story than Kelly's. As the "revenge" game approached, McCoy was asked about Kelly's comments but declined to change his story and stated that would not shake Kelly's hand on Sunday and wanted nothing to do with him. This story became the main backdrop for yesterday's game. While I can certainly understand McCoy's bitterness not only at being traded but also (and likely more so) by the way he learned of it, his suggestion that any NFL coach in 2015 makes player personnel decisions based on whether players are white or black simply isn't credible. But, he was clearly motivated to play well yesterday for a variety of reasons.
McCoy was clearly hoping to have a big game against his former team and what he had was a decent game with 74 yards rushing on 20 carries and another 35 receiving yards on 4 catches, but the main story from yesterday's game was the 15 penalties called against the Bills, most of them on offensive and defensive linemen. The Eagles defensive line had a strong game - too strong for the Bills offensive line who took several holding penalties to protect their quarterback. On the other side of the ball, the defensive line jumped offside repeatedly on Eagles quarterback Sam Bradford's hard counts. Now at 6-7, while not mathematically eliminated, the Bills find themselves out of the playoff picture this morning. This will be the 16th consecutive season with no playoffs, the longest current stretch in the league.
Donald Trump continued to make news last week as he called for a moratorium on Muslim immigration to the US. Finally, the leadership of the GOP responded with a rebuke of this idea and Trump then hinted that he could still consider a presidential run as an independent candidate next year if he is not successful in securing the nomination. This would surely bode well for the Clinton campaign and be disastrous for the Republican Party. It would also serve to clearly quantify just how popular Trump's ideology is, mostly among uneducated white males. However it plays out, political culture in the US will become even more divided than it already is.
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