Eagles schedule: Ranking expected matchups for James Bradberry

Don’t hit the snooze button on a pesky Lions team that often seems to give the Eagles trouble.

As they did a season ago, the Philadelphia Eagles open the regular season on the road versus a team that they should be better than. This time, their Week 1 opponent is an annoying Detroit Lions squad.

Whenever these two franchises meet, the Birds are always favored, but occasionally things have gone haywire. Philadelphia has lost four of the last six games to these guys. During that time, we’ve seen overtime losses, Carson Wentz throw the first pick of his career (a game-ender to Darius Slay of all people), and a three-game losing streak that included a massacre by Calvin Johnson and the Lions’ offense on Thanksgiving in 2015.

Yep! Thanks Chip Kelly!

That’s all been said to say this. Most of us believe this one should be a tune-up game for offensive coordinator Shane Steichen, Philly’s shiny new full-time play-caller on offense, and Jonthan Gannon’s new-look defense. You can never be too certain though.

This is a week one game. The Birds are on the road, and the Lions have played better under now-second-year head coach Dan Campbell. Expect to see a ton of Darius Slay versus rookie Jameson Williams. That would, more than likely, match Bradberry with Amon-Ra St. Brown on the other side.

As a rookie, he notched 90 receptions. That resulted in 912 tards and five trips to the end zone. With all the talent that the Eagles have, they should still be able to pull this one out and do so relatively easily… we hope.