Eagles' McNabb Off the Mark Dispatches

One veteran scout who has watched both of Philadelphia's
regular-season games--losses to the Bucs and the Patriots--had
this to say about struggling quarterback Donovan McNabb, who has
completed 45.1% of his attempts and has a passer rating of 41.4:
"By far his biggest problem is accuracy. He's never been very
accurate, but his passes are so far off now, it's scary. It's
unbelievable to me because he's played so much yet he looks so
uncomfortable in the pocket, as if he has no confidence in
himself or his receivers, who get no separation. You see him on
the TV close-ups, and he looks beyond frustrated, like he's
totally defeated. [Coach] Andy Reid has a huge problem on his
hands." ... At halftime of the Bengals-Raiders game, in which he
caught eight passes for 131 yards, Cincinnati wideout Chad
Johnson walked up to Jerry Rice and asked if the two of them
could get together sometime to talk about the finer points of
receiving. Rice agreed, but after the game he said, "Watching him
today, he doesn't need that much [help]." The brash Johnson, a
second-round draft choice in 2001, is the franchise receiver the
Bengals thought they were getting when they took Peter Warrick
with the fourth pick in the 2000 draft.