Pederson running out of time for turnaround
The last time the Eagles struggled like this, they fired their head coach.
And not in 2015, when Chip Kelly was shown the door. His worst start was better than the 3-6-1 record the Eagles towed out of Cleveland Sunday.
Eight years ago, the end of the Andy Reid era began with a 3-9 mark and morphed into 4-12 along with a one-way ticket out of town.
Bill Belichick couldn’t have won with that team, for it lacked a reliable quarterback, was full of overpaid old guys and mismatched pieces and had coaches that even Big Red didn’t like. Kind of like the 2020 Eagles.
Pederson might want to get his resume ready after the 2217 loss Sunday to the Cleveland Browns. With Seattle, Green Bay, New Orleans and Arizona on the radar, it’s not going to get much better.
The way the Eagles failed is disturbing. It’s a snapshot of the wretched season and a flashback to the days when the only anticipation of Eagles fans was how their team would disappoint them on game days.
Stop me if you’ve heard this but when the Eagles weren’t beating themselves Sunday with five pre-snap penalties, they were giving the ball away and standing around waiting for somebody to make a play.
There were three Eagles turnovers, including a pair of inter
ceptions by Carson Wentz, the first a pick-six by linebacker Sione Takitaki that gave the Browns a 7-0 lead to take into the intermission.
There was a fumble inside the five-yard line by Miles Sanders, a sack of Wentz for a safety and blocked field goal by Derek Barnett that went for naught.
For all practical purposes, it was over at the half. You know you’re bad when a one-TD lead at the break is a death sentence.
“We are where we are because of the mistakes we’ve been making, coaches and players together,” Doug Pederson said. “But this will be a great test for our football team. This will be a great sign to see really who’s in and who’s out. That’s the challenge to everybody. That’s just where we are. It’s a matter of really challenging the leadership of the football team, challenging the coaches, challenging the guys to keep this thing together.”
While Pederson was peppered with questions about Wentz, and whether he was the starter next week (yes), he also realized the same cross examination applied to him.
Pederson has lost convincingly to rookie head coaches in back to back games, the Birds following the 27-17 loss to LC grad Joe Judge and the New York Giants, who played well, to this defeat at the hands of Drexel Hill native Kevin Stefanski, whose team didn’t play particularly well but was never threatened.
Stefanski was cool, calm, collected and rewarded for sticking with his strength, the ground game. It gained just 18 yards on 11 carries in the first half but eventually wore the Eagles out in the second half. Nick Chubb rushed for 114 yards and Kareem Hunt high-hurdled the Eagles for the Browns’ only offensive touchdown on a very rainy day.
“Offensively, hard yards,” Stefanski said. “That’s what it called for today and I thought the guys by and large were pretty good. It wasn’t clean. It wasn’t going to be. The bottom line is the guys did a great job. There’s no such thing as an ugly win. That was a beautiful win.”
There was a time when Pederson won games just like Stefanski and the Browns (7-3) did. Now, almost everything Pederson tries turns ugly.
Case in point, the Eagles got off to a brilliant start as they forced a three-andout with a well-conceived defense featuring four linebackers, the extra one rookie third-round pick Davion Taylor. That bottled up the Browns run game.
The Eagles ran the ball on nine of their first 10 plays to reach the red zone in a steady drizzle at slippery when wet FirstEnergy Field. Pederson running the ball is nothing short of brilliant.
However, Sanders fumbled the ball away on the 10th play and Pederson along with his run game, pass game, quarterbacks and whatever coaches decided it was best to abandon the run in the second half.
Even when Wentz threw a touchdown pass to Richard Rodgers after Fletcher
Cox’s strip sack of Baker Mayfield in the third quarter, the Browns answered with a field goal and a safety.
When Jake Elliott kicked a 43-yard field to get the Eagles within 12-10 in the fourth quarter, the Browns marched 79 yards in four plays for Hunt’s winner. The last 61 yards were on the ground, including a 54yard jaunt by Chubb.
Wentz was sacked five times operating behind an offensive line that except for center Jason Kelce and guard Issac Seumalo, was totally different from the unit that started the game due to injuries.
Wentz made so many questionable decisions when he wasn’t under pressure he looked as overwhelmed as Donovan McNabb in the first half of the Eagles’ 2008 loss to the Baltimore Ravens. Kevin Kolb replaced McNabb at that intermission.
Jalen Hurts is in the wings for the Eagles. Pederson is running out of time.
Right now it doesn’t sound like Pederson has had that conversation with Wentz, Hurts or management.
“I think if you get to that spot where you don’t start him I think you’re sending the wrong message to your football team that the season is over,” Pederson said. “And that’s a bad message. We have to work through this. When the times get tough, sometimes that might be the easy thing to do. This business is about work, about detailing, having ownership. That’s coaches and players. This sport’s bigger than one guy. And we all have a hand in it and we all have to fix it.”