PHILADELPHIA -- It's a remarkable achievement, really. Under Andy Reid, the Eagles have gone 38 straight regular-season games without losing two in a row. It's the longest such streak in the NFL.

Think about it. After their last 11 losses dating back to Week 3 of the 2000 season, the Eagles are 11-0. It's like a baseball team with a stone-cold stopper. If anything in his short tenure in Philly, Reid has taught his team how to recover, how to move on.

But this reclamation project -- recovering from an embarrassing 35-13 loss to the normally pedestrian Indianapolis Colts last Sunday at the Vet -- may be Reid's toughest to pull off.

At the team's NovaCare Complex, the sting of the loss to Indianapolis was still in the air four days later. Both offensive coordinator Brad Childress and defensive coordinator Jim Johnson, perhaps anticipating what was to come, sat down at the press table in the auditorium on Thursday, and said the same two words to the assembled reporters -- "Fire away."

	Donovan McNabb has thrown only two touchdown passes in the last four games.

And they were asked question after question -- not about Sunday's upcoming game against the Arizona Cardinals (4-5) at the Vet -- but about what went wrong against the Colts.

"I cried a lot," said Johnson, whose defense surrendered five touchdowns after giving up just two in the previous three games. "That was a tough one."

Particularly tough for quarterback Donovan McNabb. For the past week, local columnists and radio talk show hosts have debated whether McNabb has been pressing too much since he signed a contract extension worth $115 million -- the NFL's richest deal -- before the Houston game in Week 4.

In B.E. (Before the Extension), McNabb was completing 61.3 percent of his throws and had eight touchdown passes and just two interceptions. In the five games A.E. (After the Extension), he's completed 54 percent of his passes and thrown five TD passes with three interceptions.

Reid has tried desperately to relieve the pressure on his quarterback, saying after the loss to the Colts, "This is my problem."

"We'll be fine," McNabb said. "Everything is all right. I put all the pressure on myself. I don't worry about what people are saying on the outside."

When I asked a senior Eagles player on Thursday to take the team's pulse, he quickly talked about McNabb.

"I don't think Donovan is pressing at all," the player said. "The coaches are pressing a little bit. You can feel that. It's a little tight around here from that standpoint."

And why not? The Eagles (6-3) were not supposed to lose to the Colts. They stood at 6-2, having demoralized the Bucs and Giants, and were in the hunt for home-field advantage, something even Reid has preached. Having been an assistant coach in Green Bay during the playoff runs of the mid-90s, Reid knows the Packers don't lose in the postseason at Lambeau Field.

And, under Reid, the Eagles have been superb in November the last two seasons, going 7-1 -- that only loss coming in a brutally fought game to the Redskins, 13-3. Not a blowout like last week.

That has been the mantra at the NovaCare Complex: losing to the Colts was an aberration, an asterisk, one bad game. Indeed, the conventional wisdom on the Eagles' season is that they lack consistency, that they often sprinkle a bad outing into the middle of a good stretch. Cases in point: the losses to Tennessee and Jacksonville in September and October, respectively.

This time, the conventional wisdom may not apply. This time, there are warning signs of bad trends developing with a defense that may be overly reliant on the blitz, on an offense that can't connect on the big play, and with a quarterback who is -- the numbers show -- playing very average football.

Time to call off the dogs?
Peyton Manning beat the Eagles' fire zone blitzes so often on Sunday, it looked like the Colts had stolen Philadelphia's signals. The Eagles did not register a sack for the first time all season.

"Everything we did was a step slower," Johnson said. "A step slower on our blitzes. I didn't think we disguised as well as we could have. We tipped sometimes. We did tip a couple. But ... we were just a step slower."

Perhaps because they are a touch older. Replacing middle linebacker Jeremiah Trotter, who is 25 and was the consummate blitzer, with Levon Kirkland, 32, who has helped stop the run but cannot rush the passer with the same speed or ferocity, has certainly had an impact. Same with plugging in strong safety Blaine Bishop, 32, to replace the younger Damon Moore, who was injured in last year's NFC Championship game and not brought back.

Indeed, the Eagles have only four sacks their last three games. More important, Philly has just one interception in the last five games. And, if anything, the reason the Eagles gamble on defense under Johnson is to force turnovers.

The Indianapolis game was the confluence of all these trends -- no sacks, no interceptions, and a defense that looked old and slow up the middle, surrendering big plays to rookie running back James Mungro and Pro Bowl receiver Marvin Harrison.

Johnson said he will begin using rookie strong safety Michael Lewis more. But with strong side linebacker Carlos Emmons still suffering from a torn hamstring, Johnson's options at linebacker are limited.

Nevertheless, Johnson promised the blitzing will continue -- despite the lack of effectiveness. He said he admonished his secondary for coverage that was "too soft," and acknowledged that perhaps his team "showed some of the blitzes too much, especially on third down."

Keep this in mind: The Eagles' blitz packages worked least effectively against the three best quarterbacks they faced this year -- Manning, Mark Brunell and Steve McNair. Next up is Jake Plummer, who will do anything to avoid taking a sack. And Jeff Garcia and Kurt Warner (or Marc Bulger) are looming over the horizon in Weeks 11 and 12.

Red zone blues
This is how offensive coordinator Brad Childress described the Eagles problems in the red zone: "But for a couple of slips, a couple of drops, you are just where you want to be in the red zone," he said. "We feel like we have a pretty good plan down there."

Here are the facts: The Eagles have made 38 trips into the red zone this season, second most in the NFL, yet their touchdown conversion rate of 39.5 percent is the third-worst in the league. Of the last 17 trips into the red zone, the Eagles have scored three touchdowns. And, in the last four games, McNabb has thrown one touchdown pass in the red zone, a 2-yarder in the fourth quarter against Indy when the game was far out of reach.

In fact, former Pro Bowl tight end Chad Lewis, usually McNabb's go-to guy in the red zone, has one red zone TD catch this season -- a 4-yarder against Jacksonville, Lewis' only touchdown reception.

McNabb did not try to sugarcoat it -- he knows the team has a problem in the red zone and it must be fixed. They cannot rely solely on David Akers' leg to get them to the Super Bowl.

"Whether it's a miscommunication, whatever it may be, it's something that we are aware of," he said.

Measuring McNabb
Overall, the passing game has ground to a halt. When Antonio Freeman arrived at the beginning of the year, he occupied the slot and pulled the double team off of wide receivers James Thrash and Todd Pinkston. But defenses have caught up to that. And Thrash's productivity has dropped off dramatically.

For example, against Indianapolis, the Eagles ran 72 offensive plays from scrimmage and Thrash had just one catch. That's unheard of in the West Coast offense, which is built around the No. 1 receiver pulling in a lot of balls and piling up yards after the catch.

But Thrash's drop-off has been evident for a while. He has not caught a touchdown pass in the last five games. And Pinkston has just one in his last six games. Reid insisted there will be no major changes on offense -- that Freeman is not going to take over the No. 1 spot from Thrash -- although we may see more Dorsey Levens in tandem with Duce Staley in the backfield.

That's just tinkering. McNabb, the NFL highest paid player this season at $15.389 million, knows that despite Reid's insistence on taking the blame and responsibility, it all comes back to the quarterback. And the numbers don't lie: McNabb's 56 percent completion rate is ranked 25th in the league. His 81.4 quarterback rating ranks him 21st.

The issue of McNabb's accuracy was raised in the preseason by Fox analyst Troy Aikman. It was shot down by an aggressive p.r. campaign and some early success. Now, it's re-surfaced and the only one who can make it go away is wearing No. 5.

McNabb said it helps that this team has shown the moxie and wherewithal to bounce back before.

"It provides a little more confidence going into the situation," he said. "Having the experience of being in the situation last year and the year before puts a big perspective on things. Now, you watch the film and you know what happened and you erase what happened and refocus and get ready to change our season."

There is a giant new Nike billboard overlooking I-95 near the exit that takes you to Veterans Stadium. It features McNabb with a simple message: "Love is proving your doubters wrong."

Sal Paolantonio covers the NFL for ESPN.