When I opened up this column last week to Birds' fans hoping to help the team win, I figured I'd get some interesting responses. And that I did.

Art DiFuria, responding to my inability to write this week on account of my Broncos' fandom, asked: "If Andy Reid inherited John Elway, won two bowls, followed this up by missing the playoffs, turning in two one-and-done playoff performances (in one of which his team actually QUIT in the middle of a play), and wasting a third round pick on Maurice Clarett, would you be calling the Eagles the 'gold standard franchise of all sports?'"

Then, there was a chap who goes by J.D. who wrote, during Sunday's game, strangely enough, "So whats up now with the eagles? Shuuuuuuttt uppp u dont know football, the dallas game was a fluke u shouldnt be allowed to talk."

The first? A good point, but I wouldn't have called them the gold standard before they won those two bowls.

The second? A cry for grammar help.

But for both inking an entertaining column in the spirit of this thing, and following the rules — he even used "John Elway is a god among men" in the e-mail subject line — this week's How They'll Lose will be brought to you by Glenside's Tom Durso, who blogs at www.shallowcenter.com.

So, please direct all the regular complaints to Tom this time; I need the week off.

(hickey@citypaper.net)

The reason the Broncos will send the Eagles home from Denver gasping for breath and licking their wounds won't be the ones you think.

It won't be the thin air. The Birds' training staff is keeping Donovan McNabb on the field even though his stomach looks like something out of Alien. I think they can handle oxygen tanks.

It won't be Jake Plummer. The Eagles eat gutless hippies like him for lunch.

And it won't be their own hapless attempts to run the ball; the football gods proved last Sunday that they don't get all that worked up over such nonsense.

No, the reason the Eagles will lose is Broncos coach Mike Shanahan. Specifically, Shanahan's stare. It is a satanic face mask of undisguised fury. Skin pulled tight over his face, lips pursed in feral, barely contained rage, he fixes that look on an opponent, an official, his own quarterback, and the result is utter devastation. It wasn't maturity or a better running game or a beefier line that turned John Elway into a champion. It was Shanahan's sadistic ferocity of purpose, embodied in that seething glare.

There's nothing in Philadelphia to match it.

Andy Reid? The guy won't even concede that Terrell Owens is a minor annoyance.

Charlie Manuel? Uncle Cholly? Next.

Ken Hitchcock? Dude takes his team rowing — I don't think so.

Mo Cheeks? He helps little girls sing the national anthem, for Christ's sake.

And don't even try throwing Larry Bowa at me. I know, I know — he was "fiery" and "intense," which is sportswriter-ese for "an asshole," but it was all bluster. Beneath the bulging eyes, the throbbing veins and the flying spittle was the same undersized kid who was always picked last in gym class and had to compensate by screaming louder than everyone else.

The Eagles will go down this Sunday because Shanahan is prepping to shoot that laser stare on McNabb and T.O. and Brian Westbrook and Brian Dawkins, and when he does, they'll look over to their own sideline and see Reid peering over his reading glasses, covering his mouth with that damned laminated playlist, and working on his "I've gotta put my guys in a better position to win" routine for the Monday press conference. It's no contest: Denver 24, Eagles 14.

-- Tom Durso