Week Nine at Washington

Right around the time the mighty Denver Broncos were putting the finishing touches on yet another overmatched foe, my cell phone beeped with a text message from a co-worker. It read, "So now that the Eagles are losing all the time, do we need to reframe How They'll Lose or change the tone?"

The timing was perfect as, at that very moment, I was mulling the very same question. So, I got to thinking and here's what I came up with:

The 2005-06 Birds are in big, big trouble. Make that big, big, big trouble. But, as the 12-year-old kid in the Scream mask who threw a bag of potato chips at my Elway jersey during the third quarter so eloquently proved, now is not the time to bail. That'd be the easy way out. And being a Birds fan isn't supposed to be easy.

As bad as they've looked, they're still sitting at 4-3, in striking distance of a playoff spot. If you're going to turn your nose up at being a wild-card team, you need to smack yourself in the face, look in the mirror and say, "The Broncos took that longer playoff route to win their first Super Bowl."

Their roster is still packed with the cream of the NFC East crop, even if Donovan's hernia keeps on herniating him to horrific first-quarter performances.

And so what if the rest of the NFL has finally figured the Birds out; there's still some life down at NovaCare, considering the cakewalk known as the rest of their schedule.

I might be required to say the Skins are going to beat the Birds 20-17 so as not to mess with karma and all -- I mean it, football gods, with all my heart and soul -- but I got a feeling they'll build on their almost Mile High comeback and make a second-half-of-the-season run for the ages.

So it's time to get back on that rickety bandwagon, folks, because if the Birds fall to .500 on Sunday night, there might be some reframin' and tone changin' around here. And if it comes to that, well, you might as well start thinking about draft position.