So maybe Donovan McNabb should make some controversial statements about race every week.

Or maybe we simply should resign ourselves to the idea of the team wearing those garish blue and yellow throwback jerseys. Hell, they didn’t even look good on the cheerleaders.

Or maybe the Lions just flat-out stink.

Whatever it was, we should bottle it.

After stinking up the place for two consecutive weeks to open the season a bumbling 0-2, the Eagles showed up at Lincoln Financial Field yesterday with all the "urgency" they lacked the first two weeks and simply dismantled a 2-0 Detroit Lions team.

McNabb spent much of the week talking about his comments on an HBO show that black quarterbacks have "to do a little more" and are still unfairly criticized. It sparked still another week of hand-wringing about the role of the person who plays quarterback for the Eagles and all that comes with it.

No one is criticizing McNabb’s performance this morning.
Very simply, McNabb was at the peak of his game yesterday, very likely his best performance as the Eagles signal-caller.

All McNabb did was lead the Eagles to three consecutive touchdowns to start the game, torching the Lions with a variety of throws to new star wide receiver Kevin Curtis and all-everything running back Brian Westbrook.

McNabb ended the day 21-of-26 for 381 yards and 4 TDs.

Along the way he may have shed the persistent snickers that he was on the downside of his career, that the injuries that have cost him big chunks of the last two seasons had finally caught up with him. That the future had arrived along with top draft choice Kevin Kolb and that McNabb soon would be shown the door.

It was not just all those images McNabb shed yesterday. He shed something else, which may have been the key to his eye-popping performance.

He shed the knee brace he has been wearing during his recovery from the shattered tendon that ended his year last season.

Yesterday, for one brief shining moment, McNabb was everything any Eagles fan could have hoped for. He was accurate, scuttling the long lament that he does not possess the accuracy to run this offense. He was mobile, using his legs to get out of trouble. And he was the leader of an offensive juggernaut that torched a befuddled Lions defense.

Maybe this week Donovan should talk about his feelings about the Jena 6.

Or maybe he should petition the league to allow the team to keep wearing those blue and yellow jerseys.

Yesterday, McNabb was a throwback, a throwback to everything we thought we were getting back when Andy Reid first drafted him. You might remember that day was when a group intent on pressuring the Eagles to draft running back Ricky Williams booed the McNabb selection at draft HQ in New York.

McNabb has had a chip on his shoulder about it ever since.
Maybe yesterday he finally shed that chip, along with that knee brace. And he did it while dressed up electric blue and yellow duds.

Maybe the Phillies should break out some throwback jerseys for this week.