Philadelphia Eagles: Nick Sirianni is all-in on connecting with his players

Nick Sirianni isn’t just an NFL head coach, he’s a cool NFL head coach. He’s technically a millennial – born on June 15, 1981 – grew up in the internet era, and is only 18 years older than his youngest player, Marlon Tuipulotu.

While Sirianni isn’t the youngest head coach in the NFL, as Sean McVay just turned 35 back in January, he certainly brings a different dynamic to the locker room than his two predecessors, who were hired at 48, and 50 respectably.

Fun fact: Did you know Andy Reid was 41 years old when he coached his first game with the Philadelphia Eagles? Crazy.

And though the sample size is rather small, as we’ve only seen the Birds take the field a handful of times this spring, it would appear Sirianni is already trying to connect with his team in a slightly different way. Need proof? Look no further than the shirt on Sirianni’s back.

Nick Sirianni wants to establish a new culture with the Philadelphia Eagles.

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The NFL sells a lot of merchandise.

They sell shirts, jerseys, hats, dog clothes, sneakers, toasters, and even lawn gnomes that look eerily like a former Philadelphia Eagles quarterback we won’t speak about.

Nick Sirianni, apparently, is a big-time supporter of NFLPA merchandise, especially from players he’s been tasked with coaching.

From rocking an officially licensed Brandon Graham shirt earlier this month to taking the field in a “No one likes us, we don’t care” shirt featuring an artist’s rendering of Jason Kelce in his iconic Super Bowl parade Mummers garb, Sirianni has made it a point to show love to the pillars of his team while taking a hands-on approach to getting the young guys acclimated at both ends of the field.

When you’re a team looking to establish a new culture following an ugly slide from Super Bowl darlings to down-and-out fourth-place finishers engulfed in their fair share of internal drama, any sort of morale-building activities has to be looked at as a positive, even if it just comes down to wearing a pair of $30 t-shirts.

With only 10 players on their roster on the wrong side of 30, a sharp decline from the 2019-20 season, the Eagles are not what you would call a veteran team. They’re expected to only start 11 players with 30 or more starts to their name – four offensive linemen, four defensive linemen, two safeties, and Darius Slay – and could have as many as four rookies earn opening day starts depending on how things shake out with DeVonta Smith, Landon Dickerson, Zech McPhearson, and punter Arryn Siposs, who spent the 2020 season on and off the Detroit Lions’ practice squad and thus is technically still a rookie.

If there was ever a group of Eagles from which to build a culture around, this is the group.

While the Eagles aren’t without holdovers from previous administrations, as Howie Roseman is still picking the players and coaches like Aaron Moorehead and Jeff Stoutland are still in the fray, this year’s squad is going to look a little different than in years past. They’re going to utilize some different personnel groupings, deploy players in different ways, and potentially even not call “sticks” defense on every third and long. Getting players young and old to buy into that new philosophy, both schematically and from a leadership standpoint, is going to be the key to hitting the ground running and shocking the world as a plucky contender for the NFC East’s crown.

Considering the current state of the NFC East, anything is possible.

Who knows, maybe I’m reading a bit too much into Nick Sirianni’s outfit choices. Maybe he spilled a La Colombe draft latte on his way to work on two separate occasions and needed to borrow replacement shirts from his players, or simply found them laying around in the locker room and decided to go with it. Or maybe, just maybe, Sirianni thinks the best way to get his players to buy into the Philadelphia Eagles’ culture is to embrace it himself. Either way, I’d really like to see Sirianni rock one of those DeVonta Smith-Jalen Hurts NBA Jam-style shirts, for they are legit.