Doug Pederson has won a Super Bowl and just started his coaching tree. Let that sink in for a moment. He’s come a long way since word leaked he was a key target for the Eagles in January of 2016. Exactly zero people were excited when they heard that news.

Doug Pederson?

Here is the first long piece I wrote on him.

This isn’t a resume contest. Pederson wouldn’t stand a chance if that was the case. This is about Jeff Lurie trying to find the right coach for the Eagles. It is possible that Lurie and Roseman will think Pederson is the right guy.

There would be no “wow factor” with this hire. But the Eagles made the wow hire 3 years ago and now they are in the process of looking for a new coach so sometimes the wow factor is completely meaningless.

The best hire Lurie ever made, Andy Reid, was the least celebrated of his coaching hires. Ray Rhodes had just won the Super Bowl with the Niners when he came to Philly. The Eagles were going to become SF East. Didn’t happen. Chip Kelly was supposed to revolutionize the NFL. He certainly had an impact, but the Eagles never came close to being an elite team under him.

Reid was the guy who never called plays or was even a coordinator. He was the consolation prize when Holmgren took the Seattle job. Nobody had Reid as their first choice. He came in with little fanfare, but left as the best coach in franchise history.

If Pederson does get the job, remember that while he could be the next Pat Shurmur, he could also be the next Andy Reid. Lurie has made good hires so far during his time as owner. If there is something about Pederson he likes enough to roll the dice, history says he just might be right.

Rather than say “I love this idea or hate this idea” I wanted to figure out what made him a candidate. If Lurie and Roseman were willing to hire Pederson, there had to be a reason. The more research I did, the more I could see what they might be looking at.

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Here was my reaction to Pederson’s hiring.

Is this a good move?

No one knows the answer to that question. People can talk about their feelings in regard to the move, but only history will really tell us if Jeffrey Lurie, Howie Roseman and Don Smolenski made the right move. Just 3 years ago I thought the Eagles made a great hire when they lured Chip Kelly away from Oregon. Now he’s gone and there isn’t even a playoff win to reminisce about.

Pederson is not a sexy hire. He wasn’t interviewed by any other teams. To some outsiders, it appears the Eagles panicked and settled on a guy that no one else wanted. The problem is that we don’t know how high Pederson was on the list to begin with. He might have been close to the top. There were a few in the media who thought he would be a top target from the beginning.

You can still argue that they made a bad choice, but that’s different from panicking and settling for someone.

I don’t know if Pederson is the right guy. I know he can be. He needs the right people around him and he needs the right people playing for him.

And

Doug Pederson isn’t here to be Andy Reid 2.0, but he is here to move things back in that direction. Pederson played for Reid in Green Bay and Philly. He coached here for 4 seasons and followed Reid to Kansas City. Pederson has seen Reid when things are good and bad. He was part of the 4-12 disaster that led to Reid’s dismissal. He’s also been part of an amazing 11-game winning streak this season.

Critics see this as Lurie hiring a “Yes Man” type of coach who will fit in and not rock the boat. I certainly get that perception, but I think it missing a big part of the equation. Roseman’s future and reputation will be greatly affected by this hire. Lurie’s legacy will be affected. I don’t think the average person understands how much Lurie wants to win. It kills him to be the lone NFC East team with no rings.

Lurie would not make this move if he didn’t believe it could work. He isn’t an owner just out to make some money. Lurie has built the Eagles into a first class organization. He does everything he can to help the team out. He is more interested in winning games than making money. He wouldn’t just choose someone for the hell of it. Lurie believes in Pederson, whether you do or not.

Back in 2013, the Eagles went after the big names. They sold themselves to Chip Kelly, trying to convince him to leave college and come to the NFL. That process set the tone for the relationship. “Come save our team…” Lurie gave Chip every resource he wanted. He eventually gave him all the power. Lurie went all-in with Chip and it just wasn’t working.

This time out, Lurie decided he wanted a coach that would be part of the solution. Doug Pederson is not here to save the Eagles. He is here to be the coach. He’ll work with his staff, the personnel department and ownership to build the Eagles into a championship caliber football team. That’s the goal, anyway. Clearly, as we learned with Chip, there are no guarantees.

Based on Lurie’s history, the sexier the hire, the worse the coach. When Pederson leaves in 27 years, I hope Lurie hires someone we’ve never even heard of.

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Here was my reaction to Pederson’s first PC.

Pederson gave some generic answers. He wants his team to be tough, to work hard every day and to be aggressive. I’ve heard debate team coaches use the same description for their squad.

I hated the answer Pederson gave when he talked about not having specific schemes, but rather shaping things around his players. No, no, no. You absolutely need base schemes that you believe in. You tailor and adjust components of those schemes to fit the current players, but you must have schemes that guide your personnel decisions and are based on your philosophy. Trying to adjust every season to the players you have is not the way to go unless your name is Bill Belichick and you are a coaching freak. Mortal coaches need schemes. I hope Pederson simply meant that he’ll adjust his playbook to the personnel at hand. He better have some core beliefs and plays that he will build around.

I did like Pederson talking about creatively using the players on offense. He talked about lining up guys in different roles and different spots. He talked about not being static, as in RCB vs LCB or Riley Cooper almost always being on the left side and Jordan Matthews mostly being in the slot. Move players around. Mix things up so you don’t become static and predictable. Chip was very disappointing in this aspect.

I liked it when Pederson talked about giving the QB freedom at the line of scrimmage. Pederson is a former NFL QB and I’m sure he would have loved to call his own plays. KC gave Alex Smith a lot of freedom at the line and he helped the team get red hot and make the postseason.

It is really funny that I compared his ideas to Belichick after that PC. I had no idea that Pederson would prove to be such and X’s and O’s guru that he could in fact do things on offense that Belichick does on defense.

Pederson showed an amazing ability this year to adjust the offense. We saw an incredible amount of versatility and creativity.

No one had an idea just how good of a coach the Eagles were getting, the Eagles included.

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I assume you aren’t too tired of Super Bowl talk…here is a good piece from a Patriots site on how the Eagles got the best of the NE defense.

Winning is fun.

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