Mirror Image: Eagles and Cowboys Are One and the Same This Year

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In the past, Philly fans and Dallas fans have had a lot of fun mocking each other through the years. The Cowboys haven't fielded many serious contenders since the mid-90's, but they always have those five Super Bowls to fall back on. So far this season however, there hasn't been much back and forth between the two camps.

Instead, their fans are actually commiserating together.

The 2012 iterations of these storied franchises are like a mirror image. Both teams are 3-5. Both offenses are potent, but have trouble putting points the board. Both are led by turnover-prone quarterbacks who haven't won many big games. Both offensive lines stink. Both locker rooms have players with huge egos or bad attitudes. Both trainers' rooms are beginning to overflow with key injuries. And both head coaches are under siege, at risk of losing their jobs before the year is out.

And so this Sunday, instead of a classic NFC East showdown with playoff implications for one or both clubs, Philly and Dallas will be squaring off to decide which squad is less terrible than the other, and whose season is one step closer to officially being finished. Yet if you polled each fan base on who was going to win the game, you would probably get the same majority on both sides of the aisle: the Cowboys.

That's how pathetic the Eagles have been lately. Their losing streak has reached four, and they were blown out of the water in their last two tilts. The offensive line is disintegrating, and the defense looks like they've quit. Few folks around town are still clinging to their faith, and a sizable portion might even prefer the Birds lose.

I polled one Cowboys fan myself though, somebody who has been down on his team since before the season even began, and he was taking Dallas to win, too. It wasn't a pick made out of confidence in his own team. It wasn't to dig at a Birds writer. It wasn't trash talk or a pissing contest at all, because frankly the Cowboys aren't going anywhere, either.

For the first time I could remember, Philly fans and Dallas fans had something in common: both of them are rooting for inept losers that are heading nowhere fast toward uncertain futures. There was no fun to be had for anybody, and the conversation quickly changed.

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