Weekend Reading: Ertz On Chip, Harbaugh

With the Eagles off today, here are some links to keep you occupied.

Eagles tight end Zach Ertz was a guest on Daniel Jeremiah’s NFL.com podcast this week. Ertz touched on a variety of topics, including the differences in offensive philosophy between Jim Harbaugh and Chip Kelly.

“It is a lot different to be honest,” Ertz said. “I mean, they are very different where at Stanford we had three play calls and we would dissect it, we would use all of the play clock, it’d be five seconds or less every time we snapped the ball. Whereas Chip is almost the complete opposite. We call the play no matter what the defense is in, and we run it with as much time on the play clock as possible. And we’re gonna go fast every play and we’re gonna make the defense react to us. The offense is gonna set the tempo and not let the defense dictate what we’re gonna do. So I think it is very different.”

Ertz also discussed the experience of playing alongside Nick Foles.

“I think he really never wants to let his teammates down, and I think there’s not really an example that personifies it more than when we were playing the Redskins and he got cheap-shotted by that D-lineman,” said Ertz. “I thought he was gonna be done for the game or maybe a couple games and when he was down on the ground, I thought he got a concussion just looking at him. And then the whole fight or whatever you wanna call it breaks out and then Nick doesn’t even miss a play and he rallies the troops and says, ‘Make ‘em pay for it.’ And we were able to run out the rest of the game and just get that win.”

Click here to listen to the complete podcast.

***

A lengthier clip of Kelly and Foles being mic’d up against the Giants is now available on NFL.com.

***

The Eagles got a fourth-round pick for Bryce Brown in the offseason, but the Bills have had no use for the talented running back up to this point. From Josh Alper of Pro Football Talk:

When the Bills traded for running back Bryce Brown in the offseason, it was easy to assume that they had a role for him in mind.

After all, why give up a fourth-round pick for a player who was going to wind up fourth on the depth chart and inactive every week? That’s just what’s happened in Buffalo, though, and Brown has been left surprised to see that the Bills haven’t found a use for him through the first six weeks of the season.

“I expected to play and I expected to play right away. I still expected to play right away after preseason. Me not playing and inactive was a surprise,” Brown said, via the Buffalo News. “It’s been very tough for me to sit on the sideline, watching my teammates going out, and not being able to contribute on game day. At the end of the day, I can only control what I can control. They made a decision and went with who they went with. So that’s what I’ve got to live with. I really try not to worry about it too much.”

One other Bills note: C.J. Spiller is fielding plenty of questions about his future with the team. There were reports during the offseason that the Eagles had explored a potential trade for Spiller before they pulled the trigger on the Darren Sproles deal. From The Buffalo News:

“I block it out, man. I honestly do,” he said Wednesday. “I just focus on trying to get better at my craft. All that other stuff, if it happens, it happens. It’s not like I’m begging for it to happen. That’s something I can’t control.”

Spiller, though, is in the final season of his contract. He recognizes the Bills have a responsibility to explore all their options – including a trade.

“This organization is going to do what’s best for the organization to be in position to win ball games and win championships,” he said. “I want to be involved in that, be a part of that here at Buffalo, but if this organization decides to go in a different direction, I won’t have any bad feelings at all. That’s part of the business. I want to be a Bill.”

Matt Cassidy and Sheil Kapadia contributed to this roundup.