“I got to do a better job of protecting the football. Regardless of whether or not we pick the blitz up, it’s still my responsibility to push up in the pocket, two hands on the ball, drills that we do every day and I didn’t do it.” – Michael Vick

The Eagles had a tough act to follow going into their game Tuesday night against the Minnesota Vikings – themselves.

The Vikings, with nothing to lose, played loose and were able to takes chances; the Eagles never made Minnesota pay for taking those chances, the result was a disappointing 24-14 loss, locking the home team into the No. 3 playoff seed and making the Dallas game this Sunday meaningless.

“They’re not going to the playoffs in two weeks,” center Mike McGlynn said after the game. “They have nothing to lose. A team that comes at you and blitzes you like that, you hit a couple of deep balls on them…hit a couple of plays…they back off. We were unable to do that.”

It was only natural that any team coming off an epic come-from-behind win as the Birds did last week against the New York Giants was going to come out a little flat.

All week though, every Eagles player, coach and official said they would forget about the Giants game and focus on the next task at hand which was to make a go for landing the No. 2 seed in the NFC playoffs and the first-round bye that comes with it.

So why did the Eagles show the DeSean Jackson winning punt return on  its giant video screen after the game against the Vikings had already started?

Clearly the emotions from that game affected the Giants – who were clobbered by Green Bay on Sunday – and the Eagles who may have played their worst game of the season.

It was obvious from the start; the Vikings were not going to play the role of the Washington Generals.

“Going into this game we made no assumptions,” Viking offensive tackle Ryan Cook said at his locker after the game. “We treat each game as a singular game. We approach each game the same way every week. Given the delays we had this week because of the so-called blizzard, it was important for us to keep our focus over the three-day stretch we had to deal with. I think we did a pretty good job of keeping out focus coming in here and showing what we can do.”

One guy who was focused was Vikings rookie quarterback Joe Webb. The sixth-round draft pick out of Alabama-Birmingham was solid in his first pro start. Webb was 17 of 26 for 195 yards, no interceptions and was sacked twice. He also ran six times for a net 31 yards and a touchdown.

Not a bad line for a guy who was banged around the week before in a relief role for Brett Favre by the Chicago Bears in a blowout loss.

“He played a good game today,” Cook said. “I’m sure he had some mistakes here and there, but he’ll back in there tomorrow, watch the tape and get better. But for his first career start, I think he did pretty well for himself.”   

Sensing an Eagles letdown, the Vikings, after winning the coin toss, elected to defer to the Birds.

Bad sign for the home team.

Eagles coach Andy Reid was furious with himself and his team for being so predictably bad.

“It was an absolutely pathetic job on my part of getting my team ready to play,” Reid said. “We didn’t coach well and we didn’t play well. It was a complete tail-whipping right there. Compliments to the Vikings. [Interim head coach] Leslie [Frazier] has done a nice job there.”

Both teams failed to move the ball at all their first two possessions. The Eagles were able to move the ball on their second possession thanks to some big-yardage penalties on the Vikings.

A “Halo” violation against the Vikings when Jeremy Maclin attempted to field a punt put the ball at midfield.

Then a pass interference call against cornerback Asher Allen trying to cover Maclin moved the ball 24 more yards put the ball at the Vikings 26-yard line.

After a five-yard loss Michael Vick hit Maclin for a 28-yard gain setting up a first-and-goal from the Vikings three.

Two plays later Vick hit tight end Clay Harbor for a three-yard touchdown in the back of the end zone.

Eagles back on track, right?

Wrong.

Actually both teams continued to struggle on both sides of the ball. The Vikings blew two easy interceptions and the Eagles defense failed to put much pressure on rookie quarterback Joe Webb.

Vick, named as the NFC starter in the Pro Bowl just prior to the start of the game, was anything but a star in the first half going 13 of 21 for 128 yards, an interception and one TD pass. He was sacked three times.

The last sack resulting in a fumble was caused by Vikings cornerback Antoine Winfield who after registering the 11-yard sack on Vick picked up the ball and raced untouched 45 yards for a touchdown to even the score 7-7 with 44 seconds left in the half.

Vick ended up throwing the ball 43 times – for 263 yards – completing 25.

The running game never got going.

Vick spoke about the fumble before halftime that turned into a Vikings score.

“We set a slot blitz and we didn’t pick it up,” He said. “I got to do a better job of protecting the football. Regardless of whether or not we pick the blitz up, it’s still my responsibility to push up in the pocket, two hands on the ball, drills that we do every day and I didn’t do it. We see the effects and what happened and how that was a huge momentum swing for the Minnesota Vikings.”

Vick then talked about the fumble in the third quarter when the Eagles were driving to take the lead.

“The fumble in the third quarter was just me trying to get extra yards, trying to do more than what I could at the time,” said Vick, who suffered a quad contusion on the first play from scrimmage and will most likely sit out the Dallas game. “That’s just trying to press the issue instead of letting it happen and playing smart. You got to be disciplined in this game. You got to be disciplined for four quarters and you got to be conscious of what is going on around you. I failed to do that and it cost us.”

The Eagles moved the ball enough to let David Akers – also elected to the Pro Bowl – to try a 54-yard field as time expired – the attempt fell short.

Vikings coached Leslie Frazier looked like a genius as his team took the third-quarter kick off and drove to the two-yard line.

The Vikings showed why they will be watching the playoffs on television when they failed to get in the end zone and had to settle for a 30-yard field goal by Ryan Longwell.

Key was Andy Reid’s challenge on a called touchdown and Juqua Parker’s sack of Webb to force the field goal.

But give the Vikings credit. This week they did not fall apart. They kept up the pressure on Vick and ended the game with a whopping six sacks for 39 yards in losses.

Vick turned the ball over three times including the fumble to Winfield.

 “The more we watched tape on Michael Vick, the more he made you kind of shake in your boots a little bit because he’s making so many plays on so many people,” Frazier said. “And we just felt like we needed to attack him and not let him attack us as much as we saw him attack other people. Our guys did a great job of executing all the things we had talked about in practice. The play by [CB] Antoine Winfield was a huge, huge play. And Antoine has made plays like that for us before, but none maybe bigger than this one tonight because of where we are as a team. Our goal was to attack Vick and to make him pause a little bit and we were able to get that done with six sacks and constant pressure.”

To a man, the Eagles want to play against Dallas. All said the same thing: They don’t want to enter the playoffs off a poor performance.

“Without a doubt,” Jackson said. “We have to go into the playoffs on point. Whatever we have to do to get that back and get to our ‘A’ game we just have to do…I am already looking forward to playing Sunday.”