All is well in the City of Brotherly Love – for now anyway. And, speaking of brotherly love, Donovan McNabb apparently had a large part in convincing Andy Reid and the Eagles management to sign Vick. This sounds eerily familiar. Do you remember when McNabb last pleaded with the Eagles to bring in a superstar with questionable character? Do you remember how that worked out? The last thing Eagles fans need is for Michael Vick to be the second coming of Terrell Owens. But Vick inherits an entirely different situation in Philadelphia. For one thing, Vick has a lot to prove to the Lincoln Financial faithful. While T.O. came in as a potential savior of the franchise, thus far Eagles fans have largely shown displeasure toward their newest acquisition. Second, Vick appears ready to reconstruct his image both on and off the field and perhaps most importantly has lacked the demonstrative on-field outbursts that made Owens so unpopular.

All logistical concerns aside, what did the Eagles receive when they signed Michael Vick? Assuming that Vick can get himself into football shape, the Eagles just added another weapon to an offense already loaded with talent. If, and this is a big if, Vick comes back and shows some of the electric talent that made him one of the best players in the NFL early in his career, the Eagles offense will be a nightmare for opposing defenses. While Vick will probably see no more than about five to ten touches a game, his value will be felt long before he steps on the playing field. Team defenses prepping for the Eagles will spend hours each week planning for Vick alone. So what is it that makes Vick so dangerous? He and the Eagles can thank the Miami Dolphins for that. The wildcat formation may have just provided Vick a job in the NFL this year. Even in a copycat league, no other team ran the wildcat at the same rate as the Miami Dolphins (9.4% of all plays from scrimmage).

With Michael Vick at the helm, however, the Eagles can add an entirely new element to the formation. As both LeSean McCoy and DeSean Jackson are versed in the formation and the Eagles have other burners like Jeremy Maclin and Brian Westbrook, Eagles fans may be treated to the spread offense and not the wildcat. This past season the Dolphins ran 91 plays out of the wildcat, 85 of which were designed running plays. In the spread offense, if Michael Vick is able to find his feet (and his arm) the Eagles will effectively have two completely different offensive playbooks for defenses to prepare for. Because unlike the Dolphins run-oriented wildcat offense, Vick’s ability to make plays with both his arm and his feet will keep defenses on their heels. If the Eagles are able to utilize Vick’s arsenal of weapons effectively, they will pass at a much higher rate than the 08-09 Dolphins and the wildcat will have given birth to the spread offense in the NFL.

Without a doubt Michael Vick has a long road ahead of him before he can begin to make a difference for this football team on the field. Questions about his character remain and there are a lot of unhappy people in Philadelphia. But if the Eagles can put the pieces of the puzzle together they have the potential to make the wildcat formation look pedestrian in comparison. One thing is for certain: for Eagles fans, week six has never been so important.

The Eagles made a smart play here. They upped the amount they will pay McNabb over the next two years by about $7 million, but in doing so they accomplished a lot. Firstly, the priority had to be keeping McNabb in Philadelphia. Early in the off-season there was talk of an unhappy McNabb maybe leaving the city of Brotherly Love, but in keeping him around the Eagles went with the sure-fire quarterback who has succeeded in Philly for some time now. Particularly since the Eagles have drafted offensive tools McCoy and Maclin as well as a few via free agency, the worst thing they could do would be to start over with another quarterback. They needed to keep McNabb, and finally allow him to work with an offense that is truly capable of scoring touchdowns, something that has not been there in the past

Secondly, the Eagles were able to hang on to a happy McNabb without making further committments to the 32-year old QB, which is important because there is no way of knowing where McNabb’s body will be in two years, and that’s not a risk the Eagles want to take a risk on. They were able to build a solid team now without compromising the future. Look for the Eagles to be heavy contenders in the NFL’s best division.