ANYONE who thinks the 2018 Eagles Offense will be similar to the 2017 edition, is woefully misreading the situation. While Head Coach Doug Pederson was the guy who called plays for the Offense, play design had a ton to do with whether or not a called play would succeed.
Any former NFL coach will tell you there’s as much art as science, in designing and maintaining a system. As no two artists paint, write, or draw exactly alike, so to are NFL coaches. For example, we all know about Jon Gruden’s version of the West Coast Offense, but who runs it like Jon does? Nobody. Who ran the 46 like Buddy Ryan? Nobody. Who runs Zone Blitz like Dick LeBeau? Nobody. Sean McDermott studied under Jim Johnson, and when Johnson passed, McDermott was overwhelmed by all of the on-the-fly adjustments, required to make Johnson’s system work.
Coaches are artists. Never loose sight of that fact.
That’s partly why our Head Coach is in no rush to replace Frank Reich, “I’m not going to rush into it, I’m going to make sure it’s the right person, the right fit for what we’re doing. I think that’s important too, that that person fits the culture and his way of thinking has to coincide with the way we’re thinking…”
The artist (Reich) that Doug spent the last two years crafting our offense with, has moved on. At some point either one guy (or two), will replace him. That means we’ll get a different personality (or two), a different source of experience (or two), and a different perspective (holding mic out to the crowd) helping design plays. From that mix we will get different art.
Understand, who we pick will affect who we draft, who we sign, and who we re-sign. At times during weekly prep, they may oversee or manage something that Doug cannot, because his attention has to be elsewhere. This will impact the win/loss column. It will affect playoff seeding. This isn’t some minor thing.
If you didn’t know how much this mattered before, you certainly do now. And you will likely never underestimate it’s importance ever again.
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