Many Philadelphia Eagles fans were caught off guard by the hiring of offensive coordinator Sean Mannion, since it went against everything they were looking for in a candidate with play-calling experience, but it now appears clear that head coach Nick Sirianni wanted him.
Before everyone arrived at the NFL Combine, Sirianni sat down with the media for the first time during an extended roundtable discussion. He shared that the Eagles interviewed 17 candidates, with seven receiving second-round interviews, but it was Mannion who came out on top.
“Kind of just revealed itself, like, ‘Hey, this is the right guy for this,’” Sirianni said via The Athletic's Zach Berman. “You go in, you have thoughts of what you might be looking for, and different things like that. And there was a lot of different things that I went in looking for, and then it just went to Sean. Some of the things he hit, some of the things maybe that I had thought was important at the beginning didn’t end up being that. … It was very obvious. When you do that, when you cast the wide net, and you go through the process like that, it reveals itself to you who the right one is.”
Nick Sirianni opens up for the first time about hiring Sean Mannion
Mannion was a stunning hire, especially since he had no experience calling plays outside the East-West Shrine game he participated in last month as one of the offensive coordinators. In fact, Mannion barely has any coaching experience to really brag about.
Before Philly, Mannion was an assistant coach for the Green Bay Packers, as he was promoted last offseason to quarterbacks coach. He was successful in his first and only season in the role, as Packers quarterback Jordan Love had arguably the best statistical season of his career, throwing a career-low six interceptions and posting a career-high 66.3% completion percentage while serving as the main starter.
Adding the fact that Mannion is about to bring in a whole new scheme that'll replicate what Sean McVay and Kyle Shanahan do was attractive as well. The Eagles have been a run-heavy offense for a while and needed something new to bring some creativity to an offense that finished in the bottom 15 in total offense, passing, rushing, and scoring.
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Sirianni seems confident that he's got the right coach in place on offense, but the pressure is on: if the Eagles' offense fails with another coach with zero play-calling experience, many jobs will be lost on that coaching staff.