Philadelphia Eagles head coach Doug Pederson explains not hiring an OC

During the NFL Combine, Philadelphia Eagles head coach Doug Pederson spoke with the media to discuss, among other things, his decision not to hire an offensive coordinator.

Recently, Philadelphia Eagles head coach Doug Pederson has been seen by some of the media and the fan base as someone who had finally gone off of the deep end, similar to Jack Nicholson’s character in The Shining.

In that one, Nicholson plays Jack Torrance a writer who takes a job as a caretaker at the isolated Overlook Hotel and brings his wife and son with him. He does so in an attempt to cure his writer’s block, but when that plan goes nowhere, his son Danny, who has been having these psychic premonitions, sees his gift intensify.

Jack discovers that the hotel has a few dark secrets and goes off of the deep end as he unravels and begins to terrify his own family.

Well, on second thought, maybe Doug hasn’t lost it to that level, but after seeing Philly’s offense struggle in the two seasons that followed a Super Bowl win (and his offensive coordinator Frank Reich‘s departure), some have wondered if the mad scientist on offense had gone, well, mad.

Pederson’s taken heat for both his game management and his playcalling and after ridding the team of its offensive coordinator of the past two seasons, Mike Groh (who has since realigned himself with Frank Reich and the Indianapolis Colts), hope had intensified that Coach Pederson would do right by the fans and the franchise and hire a capable and gifted offensive coordinator.

The team announced their coaching staff changes a little over a week before Valentine’s Day, and no OC had been hired. In the minds of some, Pederson had gone off of the deep end. Either this was an innovation at its finest or another demonstration of Pederson’s stubbornness. If you take a poll, most will say it’s the latter.

The coach explained the decision as 32 NFL teams and 335 NFL hopefuls prepare for pro football’s biggest job fair. Here’s a quote.

"It’s a great question because it’s a question I have really pondered about for quite some time, really for many years. You look around the league and there are teams who don’t have coordinators. There are teams that have coordinators. I’ve had a coordinator by title. I look at the structure of what we’re doing offensively and how collaborative we put our game plans together. It’s like players. it’s not about one guy. (It’s the) same way on the coaching staff. It’s not about one coach who has to do everything. It’s a collaborative effort."

Okay Coach, but umm why isn’t there an offensive coordinator? Pederson also spoke on what, from the outside looking in, appears to be a fractured relationship between Eagles star signal-caller Carson Wentz and wide receiver Alshon Jeffery.

"Yeah, you know, I don’t see that. I think one of the things where Carson really took a big step was in that leadership approach this past year, getting everybody on the same page and on board. It’s just unfortunate because we had a lot of high expectations as an offense going into the season. When pieces started to drop out, it’s just unfortunate that way, but there were no issues between those two."

Well, look at it this way. Obviously, he knows more about his team than any of us but doesn’t it feel like all of that is a tad off base? Keep an eye on both of these situations going forward. One thing is certain. We’re not done talking about either one of them.

Let’s just hope Coach doesn’t come out of the Novacare Complex with a bunch of letters that read ‘All work and no play makes Doug a dull boy’. If he does, run for the hills.