Philadelphia Eagles: Plants won’t grow in bad soil, Nick Sirianni

The Philadelphia Eagles‘ decision to replace Doug Pederson with Nick Sirianni was an inflection point in team history.

I knew it, you knew it, the team knew it; heck, that’s why they did it in the first place.

For all of the good Pederson brought to the table, his locker room presence, his sunny disposition, and, oh yeah, the fact that he won a freakin’ Super Bowl, his vanilla offense, poor coaching staff decisions, and inability to get along with Howie Roseman created a power vacuum where the two couldn’t coexist.

Would Sirianni be better than Pederson? Yes, no, maybe so, but he was certainly a different person with a different approach and a different mindset. If Jeffrey Lurie wanted to shake things up, this was one of the better ways to get that done.

Thus far, the results have been mixed to poor, to say the least.

The Eagles’ offense is bad, their defense might be even worse, and the NFL’s least experienced coaching staff has largely worn their inexperience on their sleeve by struggling at nearly every facet of the game.

Let’s just say when you need three turnovers to beat a Carolina Panthers squad that benched Sam Darnold a few weeks later, you probably aren’t going to win too many games.

But hey, it’s all good. When asked about the team’s struggles, Sirianni compared his team to a garden, where roots have to grow before the fruits of their labor can come to life.

… except that’s not really how a garden works. All the water in the world won’t help a flower grow if it’s planted in bad soil.

The Philadelphia Eagles can’t grow a contender with bad schemes.

For the sake of argument, let’s say Nick Sirianni is correct. Let’s say the Philadelphia Eagles are building a foundation from which they can build a contender. What, exactly, does that foundation look like?

Well, let’s see.

First, it’d be an offense designed around throwing screens, running RPOs, and then attacking the endzone with deep vertical throws. Sure, the team attacks the sidelines fairly often, largely with out routes and comebacks, but the team runs the sort of short passing attack that has made Tom Brady millions, quick slants, and crossing route drags far less often than you’d expect from a team that now only employs quarterbacks on rookie contracts.

This foundation also features the fewest rushing attempts by running backs of any team in the league, with Miles Sanders only earning double-digit carries in three of the team’s seven games. This lack of a reliable running game had allowed opposing defenders to drop back into coverage or blitz the quarterback without having to read the play first and has fired the offense to become shockingly one dimensional.

And on the defensive side of the ball? What does that foundation look like?

Well, Jonathan Gannon‘s defense runs zone coverage more often than any other team in the NFL. That isn’t necessarily a bad thing, as plenty of good teams run zone, but Gannon compliments it with very few exotic looks and one of the lowest blitz rates in the league. While Gannon has shown a willingness to adapt somewhat, as he has shadowed receivers like D.J. Moore with Darius Slay when his team needed it most, the Eagles’ defense is so easy to direct that opposing quarterbacks are routinely completing 80 percent of their passes against the team in route to season-high passing averages.

Heck, even the Eagles’ special teams unit has just been alright as they’ve had a kick by Jake Elliott blocked and failed to execute an onside kick directly after the half versus the Las Vegas Raiders.

If that is the soil the Eagles are cultivating, does anyone really expect a contender to grow?

At their core, the Philadelphia Eagles are a fundamentally flawed team. Sure their personnel isn’t great, but riddle me this; would adding an elite coverage linebacker like Fred Warner somehow fix the team’s proclivity for predictable zone coverage? Would a do-it-all rush linebacker like Haason Reddick shine in a system where he seldom rushes the passer? Would Derrick Henry excel in an offense where he gets an average of nine carries per game? And what about quarterback? Would plugging Russell Wilson into this offense make the Philadelphia Eagles instant Super Bowl contenders? Unfortunately, the team’s issues run much deeper than simple personnel and on-field effort, and until that is addressed, all the water in the world won’t make this garden grow.