Philadelphia Eagles: It’s adapt or die time for Doug Pederson

If the Philadelphia Eagles retain Doug Pederson, there need to be some changes.

Doug Pederson is a demonstrably good head football coach.

Since taking over for Chip Kelly – well, technically Pat Schumer – as the Philadelphia Eagles‘ head coach in 2016, Pederson has a winning percentage of 53.8, a 4-2 record in the playoffs, and is one of only 32 men in the history of the NFL to lead a team to a Super Bowl victory. By all accounts, (most) players seem to like to play for him, he never pulls a Beleckeck with the media, and he even wrote a book that is only mildly cringy in the contest of how things have turned out post-Super Bowl.

And for what it’s worth, Pederson hasn’t exactly been handed the easiest hand when it comes to the beginning of their head coaching career.

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Over his four-year tenure with the team, the Eagles haven’t drafted a single Pro Bowler save Carson Wentz, have been embroiled in a near-constant quarterback controversy, and have steadily shed talent with each passing year. Pederson has been tasked with coaching an increasingly barren cupboard strapped by the consequences of Howie Roseman’s team-building philosophy and has had to remain competitive without a single ‘marquee’ free agent addition save trades for Michael Bennett and Darius Slay.

Objectively speaking, even the best head coaches would struggle to succeed under the Eagles’ current situation, and for a guy like Pederson, who comes off as a serious people pleaser, this situation must be a real shock to his Super Bowl-winning system.

But make no mistake about it, Doug Pederson is not blameless in the Philadelphia Eagles’ current struggles – far from it.

No, regardless of the hand Pederson has been dealt, he’s still a stubborn, inflexible play-caller who just can’t seem to get out of his own way. To make matters worse, the Eagles have actively enabled Pederson’s ways by failing to replace Frank Reich with a legitimate offensive coordinator who will force run-pass parody on the former quarterback.

Should the Eagles fire Pederson at the culmination of the 2020 NFL season? I would say no. For all of his flaws, Pederson is still the first person to bring the Lombardi Trophy back to the City of Brotherly Love, and that holds considerable weight both historically and in the context of the league’s current landscape. With that being said, things can’t remain copacetic if Pederson wants to still be holding an Eagles clipboard in 2022.

Week 17 is the first step in that revolution.

With the Eagles now officially eliminated from playoff consideration, there’s very little reason for the Birds to be throwing the ball 30-plus times in the second half against Ron Rivera and company. If that happens, it’s a dead giveaway that the team is in trouble moving forward.

No, if Pederson wants to make a good impression and prove to Jeffrey Lurie that he’s not an inflexible pass junkie, he’ll finally commit to running the ball and do everything in his power to make sure Miles Sanders becomes the Eagles’ first 1,000-yard rusher since LeSean McCoy. He’ll also need to make sure to put Jalen Hurts in the best position to succeed and play to the 22-year-old’s strengths as an incredibly accurate game manager with exceptional escapability.

Sanders is not only one of the best young running backs in the NFL, but also one of the Eagles’ best players, period. There’s no reason he should ever get single-digit carries in a game.

If Pederson can further adjust his game plan to take advantage of Hurts’ talents – maybe going so far as to crack open the old 2019 Oklahoma tapes to see how Lincoln Riley turned the Alabama transfer into a Heisman Trophy Finalist – it’ll say a lot about the newly humbled head coach’s ability to put his personal offensive preferences aside to put his team in the best position to succeed.

If that happens, the next decision the Eagles need to make is who will serve under Pederson in 2021 and how much say he’ll have over the offensive play design.

Whether it’s Matt Rhule and Joe Brady, Jon Harbaugh and Greg Roman, Sean McDermott and Brian Daboll, or even Bill Belichick and Philadelphia’s public enemy number one Josh McDaniels (more on him here), the NFL has a slew of fantastic head coaching-offensive coordinator relationships that have only served to make each other better in an iron-sharpens-iron sort of way. For all of the love Pederson gets for his offensive ingenuity, adding a fresh, empowered voice willing to stick to a gameplan has to be a better option than relying on a half dozen ‘senior offensive assistants’ with no true hierarchy of command.

If nothing else, having a dedicated offensive coordinator should at least limit the number of plays the Eagles start with less than two seconds left on the play clock.

Had the Philadelphia Eagles been able to steal Graham Harrell away from USC, maybe things would be different. Maybe Carson Wentz and/or Jalen Hurts would be flourishing in a modified air raid offense tailor-made to their skillset by a 35-year-old upstart with a bright future, and the Eagles would already have the NFC East in their back pocket. But because the team went the opposite route, fully placing the offense into Doug Pederson’s hands to either swink or swim based on his choices alone, we collectively learned just how challenging that can be. No, if Pederson is going to not only return in 2021, but thrive, he needs to adapt his personal philosophies to what best suits a successful team – even if it means compromising his personal philosophies as a result. If not, I hear Jacksonville is nice this time of year.