PHLY Philadelphia Eagles Podcast - PHLY Eagles Podcast | Howie Roseman and Nick Sirianni answer for Philadelphia Eagles’ end-of-season collapse … finally

Episode Date: January 24, 2024

Oh, did you have something to do? No problem for the Eagles, who get to operate on their own schedule. Eventually, mercifully, Howie Roseman and Nick Sirianni spoke Wednesday, touting their record over the past three seasons and the “aberration” of the 1-6 finish. Such an aberration that they’ve fired both coordinators, of course.Zach Berman and Bo Wulf recap and react to the end-of-season presser and the news that Vic Fangio is now likely to take over as defensive coordinator. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

PHLY Eagles podcast on a Wednesday afternoon. Finally, mercifully, we can talk about the postseason press conference for the Philadelphia Eagles. We have just heard from Howie Roseman and Nick Siriani. I am Bo Wolf. That is Zach Berman. We've got a lot to get to the news that maybe Vic Fangio will finally become the Philadelphia Eagles defensive coordinator. But, Zach, we've got to start. You know, three years ago, the Eagles.

had to clean house, unfortunately because they were the team most affected by COVID. And this year, they have had a delayed press conference to no fault of their own because of the snow. You have to feel bad for them. And, well, in that locker room the other night, they were really devastated, right?

They could see it, so they took a day to regroup, and then those exit meetings, I mean, no other team. Yeah, no other team had, no other team was sad that their season was over. Nor has exit meetings as extensive as the Eagles. Look, that's why they said there was a delay here and then Friday. That's how the press conference began. Howie Roseman was apologetic in trying to explain why it was that, you know, as Danes said,

like the Tampa Bay Bucks beat them in the playoffs and still had their postseason press conference before them, as if there were not, you know, decisions to be made. And by the way, this was just an aberration, this one and six finish, never must. mind don't pay attention to the fact that we have fired both coordinators. You know, we believe in the way that we are pulling that. This is going to be a little bit disjointed because we are still sort of digesting everything we just heard. But it did sort of seem to me like the arc of that press conference was, all right, we're going to come out with our talking points. We are going to own this. You know, this is a season that deserves explanation and change to

help fix some things. And then as it went on, it became a little bit more, you know, chest puffy. like, well, you know, our record was whatever it was. 33 and 11, right? Yeah, and like, you know, we've got the confetti. And I know that we can do it because we've done it before. And so I don't know. I don't really know what my answer is here, but it was just, it kind of flittered away. It was actually kind of like the arc of the eagle season a little bit.

Look, I get it, right? I mean, I would be defensive too, if you will, or I would, you know, it's, you know, it's, old, it's the old lawyer adage, if the facts are on your side, argue the facts, right? And from, you know, so you asked, for instance, about the defensive line and he kind of defended the linebacker situation in there. I asked, I asked the question that I said on yesterday's show, you know, is, how do you explain the underperformance of the defensive line? And has it taught you anything about, or changed your mind about anything from a roster construction standpoint? And instead we got, well, we believe in Nicobie Dean, the player. Well, no, the part of that,

I was going to mention was that Howie conveniently noted that when they made the Super Bowl twice in the past six years, right? And then the same way, like when... The linebackers were good, okay, so then why don't you care about it? But so, look, I'm not going to kill them for that because if you're just going to get up there and say, sure, we went one in six in the last seven games, we went one and six in the last seven games, right? Like, that wouldn't infuse confidence. I think they're trying to infuse confidence, but there is a degree of defensiveness. What you want to find out is what's their plan going forward.

Do they view one and six as an aberration or do they view one and six as an indication? And I frankly think that they're viewing one and six more as an aberration, although... Now, I don't agree with that. Okay, well, no. I think that's their line. Well, from the roster, I think. From the roster. I think the coaching staff clearly,

if they were if they thought this was a complete outlier they would just run it back and they're not running it back right they dismiss both coordinators you only do that if you think changes needed and Nick to his credit he said the offense was stale

at the end and they need to get rid of the staleness of the offense and look that it's what you got to do this is a good test if you've got like a stale like baguette or a piece of bread or something just you put a little bit of water on it, and then you put it in the oven.

And it's sort of like it's brand new. Is that right? Yeah. Okay. They chose not to do that. They chose to get a new baggett. They chose instead to bag it. To baggett. Look at you. That's why you're so clever.

But yeah, there's a lot of places to go with this. there wasn't much of a action plan that was described, nor would we expect there to be an action plan described. We can say that the offense is going to be in the hands of the offensive coordinator. Nick Sirionic kind of made that clear that now we'll see it in practice if that's the case, and a lot of that could depend on who they hire. Brian Johnson, it seems like Brian kind of guy, and Nick even alluded to this, He kind of got scapegoated for, like, they need fresh ideas,

and Nick's not gathering it from himself, so he's going to get rid of the guy, the offensive coordinator. Like, Brian got caught up in that. Yeah, I think we're both rambling a little bit, because there is a lot to unpack. Let's start with, like, the news that came out of this press conference. And that's not even the Schefter report that Vic Fangio is out in Miami and likely to land in Philadelphia.

You had a nice little back and forth with Nick remembering the last time that something like this happened when Kevin Byard, was traded to the Eagles in the middle of his press conference. I think from a what did we learn about what's going to change moving forward standpoint, the most interesting thing, the most tangible thing that we learned was what you just said about Nick's explanation that the offensive coordinator they hire is going to, like they're going to hire in part for a scheme. And it's going to, you know, it's still going to be the Philadelphia Eagles offense, rah, rah, but they are committed to, bringing in somebody who is going to bring a freshness to the scheme.

And it seemed to me the way he was describing things, like the way that we've talked about Vic Fangio or Ron Rivera as a head coach of the defense, that they are maybe trying to bring in someone who can be the head coach of the offense, which is not Gerard Johnson, who they interviewed today. I don't know that that is necessarily the case because Nick was joking about, you know,

maybe I can pop in some defensive meetings or whatever. But it certainly sounds like the biggest, change is that they are transitioning, whether this is of Nick's volition or this is Jeffrey's direction, that they're transitioning Nick to become more of the CEO type and a little bit less in the weeds on the offensive side of the ball. Yeah, it sounds that way. Now, we need to see it in practice, but I think you hit on something interesting there that that might have come from Jeffrey, that they need fresh ideas on offense. Perhaps Nick had that self-awareness to acknowledge that,

but yeah, it's pretty clear that there was change expected on the offensive side for him to specifically use the term stale because that's not how they were describing the offense in season. And I get it. You're not going to bear your soul during the season. But that struck me for him to use the term stale as he's been adamant, that's his offense. And again, the way he described Brian Johnson leaving

was that Brian Johnson kind of got caught up in this in this thing that they needed fresh ideas, that they need to bring in someone from the outside. He said, I can't say enough good things about Brian. Now, I will point out. He pulled a little ZB. He worked blue there. It dropped an S-bomb.

Is shitty an S-bomb? What would the other S-bomb be? No, my point is, is shit he's not a horrible world. You're allowed to say that on radio, I believe, aren't you? No, and not that I know of. I know that. Howard Stern, is that one of the words against...

Howard Stern is not on, like, terrestrial radio. No, yeah. Have you seen the private parts movie? There's like seven... Yeah, and I'm sure one of your favorites. Po. There's seven words you can't say or something like that. I don't think shit is one of them, but...

Yeah, it absolutely is. And you have just said it like eight times in the past... Joy's going to look it up here. 20 seconds. Is it one of the words you can't say on... So in any event, besides the point. So I, I, I, what do you read there, these seven words that you can't say on television? Oh, okay, it's one of the words.

Okay, my fault. So I'm actually on Nick's side here. You want to say that C word? Oh. Come on. So I'm on Nick's side in the sense that, you know, Tim McMahon. It was a fair question if you're hiring a head coach of the offense and you're hiring a head coach of the defense, like what's your role?

And he says, the head coach of the team. Well, that's what John Harbaugh's role is too, right? Like, there's, I think we do get caught up in the notion. I don't think that there's anything wrong with that. Sure. If that's the decision that they have made. Yeah. So I'm not, like, I don't think Nick is, is, it's like, what are he doing here?

Because that's his job is, is the culture is. game management is over is being the head coach of the entire team. That's what, by definition, that's what the head coach is. But that is part of it is that the culture seemed to be rotten at the end of the season. And the game management has not been good. Sure. He needs to improve that. I did think it was a little bit funny that, you know, Nick was asked about, like,

what is his job? And he starts talking about it. We're still going to have our core values. but we might like move them around a little bit. Like maybe we're going to order them differently. Like we'll put football IQ to the top of this time and that'll be the secret sauce that against us back to the Super Bowl. Yeah, connection goes to the four compete.

Well, actually like the connection thing to me, Zach, tell me what you think about this. And maybe I'm thinking about it too much. When you have to fire like these guys who have been with you every day for three years, as he talked about, like he's been with Brian Johnson more than he's been with his loved ones. Sure. Right? And that's when he dropped the,

the S-bomb about how bad this process is. I think it is a little bit hard to continue to preach that message when you know that you've had to like stab your people in the back. And I think there's a chance that it sort of falls on deaf ears. This is the job. This is what they sign up for.

Yeah, exactly. All that stuff. But like, you know, is Brian Johnson really fired because Brian Johnson was a bad offensive coordinator? or is Brian Johnson fired because he's taking the fall for Nick Siriani? I think the latter, but also if their offense was better this year, Brian Johnson would probably, he'd probably be a head coach this upcoming year. But no, I agree with what you're saying.

I think it's the nature of the business, though. And, yeah, it's the Bum Phillips quote. There's two types of coaches, the coaches who have been fired and coaches who will be fired, right? And we all get that? Yeah. that's all true, but it makes the connection stuff sound a little false and ring a little bit hollow to me. And I could see, like, if you are, you know, I don't know, Jamal Singleton or whoever, like, a guy who has also been here all three years and sees what was what just happened.

And like, here we go again. Like, we have to stay connected guys. We've got to be pulling in the same direction. We're like, okay, well, we tried that and then you just fired my buddy. Like, I don't know. Yeah, I disagree with you there. I think it's a little idealistic to view it that way. You know, Brian Johnson left Dan Mullen at Florida.

Like, he bettered his career at one point. Nick Siriani's let, you know, he's bettered his career. I agree with what Nick said that it is crappy because I can't say. Good for you. Nice job. It is crappy. Like, I don't envy him. I've never had to fire somebody before.

I imagine that's difficult to do, especially when, like, Like you said, everyone kind of knows that Brian Johnson's taking the fall for something that Nick is on the record saying he's responsible for, the offense, right? And they're bringing in fresh ideas. They're not firing Nick, but they have these fresh ideas. It needs to be the offensive coordinator. That's a crappy part of this. And like I said to, you know, as crappy as Nick feels, the person getting fired feels worse. We always talk about that on Cutdown Day when they're like, well, this is the hardest day of the year for us.

it's much harder for the guy who's actually losing his job than the person who's who's firing you essentially. And I'm sure that there's a little bit of, you know, Survivor's guilt up there for Nick. Like he's up there. He's still here. He's had to fire these people who are answering for some of things that maybe he failed at. But I do think coaches recognize this is part of the job. Like every, it's the nature. It's the business they've chosen.

If we text Coach Flynn right now, he would probably tell us the same thing. Like, it's the business they've chosen. Yes. But then don't pretend that it's all kumbaya. That's all I'm saying is if you're, if you're, if you're, if you're, you're going to pretend that like our secret sauce is connection and that's what's going to pull us through in the end. It's hard to, it's hard to play both sides of that. I don't know. Yeah.

Yeah. I disagree with it. It feels a little bit. Because like, for instance, you know, T.J. Edwards could have felt really connected to the team last year, but he had an opportunity to better himself. Like Shane Steichen felt connection. He had an opportunity to better himself, right? It works. it works both ways. If you're going to leave, then you can also, you know, get canned, if you will.

So, yeah, that, I kind of disagree with you on that. I understood Nick's sentiment about Brian Johnson, but again, like, I mean, there is a bottom line portion to this that the offense wasn't good enough. He said it got stale. They needed to make changes. And Brian Johnson is the odd man out, and it's it's not fair to Brian Johnson per se. But like I said, if the offense was better, Brian Johnson would probably, he'd probably be a head coach next year. Let me ask you this, because these press conferences are kind of a, an S show, as you might say, by nature, where, you know, there's more media than usual

and everybody's trying to get a question in. Sure. And people are just sort of trying to make sure that their voice gets heard, even if a question has already been asked before. Yeah. which is annoying, but one thing that we didn't get sort of clarification on, there was some focus on, you know, the nature of the meetings,

and you asked a good question about that, but we didn't really get like what was Jeffrey Lurie's perspective here, and, you know, they may have danced around that, as I'm sure they would have, but given the way that Nick was talking about needing freshness on offense and the way that he was talking about, I can't say enough good things about Brian Johnson. Do you think that finding a new offensive coordinator was a Jeffrey Lurie edict?

Just purely speculation. Yeah, I think. And by that I mean, and not Nick's idea. I mean, perhaps it was mutual. Like perhaps they both came to the conclusion that the offense was stale. Now, the route to get there, it might have been up for conversation. But knowing what we know about Jeffrey Lurie, seeing an office. offense scored nine points in the season finale.

I'm sorry, in the playoffs have zero points at halftime, right, of the final regular season game. Clearly, the offense needed to improve. I mean, Jeffrey Lurie has put his foot down about the offense when it's been better, you know, in certain situations. So it's sounded that way. Now, let's kind of paint this here a bit. I asked Jeffrey, I'm sorry, I asked Nick specifically, how would you characterize?

those meetings and did you feel you had to sell yourself in the vision to Jeffrey to keep your job? And he said it was normal end of season meetings like he's had the past few years. So he didn't necessarily feel like he had to. But he said he was an unproven coach when they hired him. He's felt the past two years, three years that he's had to prove himself. And he feels now like he has to prove himself again. And he has to prove them right again. So he says that's the way he's going into it. Clearly, as you said at the top of the show, as how he said at the top of the press conference,

this was an atypical end of the year, right? It's the snowstorm, the exit meetings, all of that. They can say all that. It doesn't take a week plus for your head coach and or your GM to speak after the game. Sean McDermott lost a tough game. He spoke right the day after the, you know, every team finds a way.

They all have exit meetings. That's not, by the way, much easier if you do it then. Sure. Like, they could have just done it then. Yeah. So clearly, there will, I mean, they said that they had to take that time. You know, I think Nick made the reference today so we can answer your questions, right? I mean, it's not as if they answered our questions much different today than they would have a week ago.

But clearly there were conversations that needed to be had with Jeffrey Lurie. And, you know, after that. We knew the defensive coordinator change was going to happen. The offensive coordinator change happens. So, yeah, I think whether this was Jeffrey's idea or whether it was Jeffrey's demand or whether it was something Nick brought to the table, I don't think Nick went into that meeting and Jeffrey was ready to talk him into keeping the same offense, right? So I guess that's the best way I can answer that question.

I wonder if it was, you know, this is. this is pure speculation, but it read to me like it was the kind of thing where it was like, you can go together or you can be the one to fire him. Yeah. That's good. It's, look, it's a fair, I don't know. And I don't know if I'm going to read that, but clearly, in order to have a fresh perspective and a new person calling the offense, you need to change the offensive coordinator.

And that stinks for Brian Johnson. That's the reality for the Eagles. All right, Zach, why don't you tell us a little bit about our dear friends and wheelhouse? Because cards and community, that's what you're all about, baby? Yeah, I do like community. And then my son loves cards. And when I was that age, I loved cards as well. That's how I, when I play Immaculate Grid, especially the baseball version, really, like, the only thing I'm doing is what pops into my mind is a picture of a baseball card.

And so I got very upset the other day. It was the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. Rays. Well, not necessarily. Not when you do it, when you go back. And it was a player born outside the U.S. or D.C. And just what pops into my mind for whatever reason is a baseball card of D.V. Cruz, Davey Cruz, the shortstop. But he never played a game for the double raise.

I didn't know that. I just had the image in my mind. Okay. Cost me a nine for nine. Sorry to hear that. That's a good segue, though, for this, because you can get that. that Devee Cruz card and other cards. Yeah, those are, I don't know if you're going to have enough money to get that card.

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subscriptions by going to rocketmoney.com slash P.H. That's rocketmoney.com slash p hl why rocketmoney.com slash p hl y. Julia, do you mind pulling up the superchats? Let's knock those out. Real time says which DC can best scheme ill-fated penetration is I think what he was going for there. Zach and then MBD, BD, BD, BD, BD, F, B BD BD BD B FBBD BD BD says, can you imagine Sean McVe or Mike McDaniel or Kyle Shanahanahanan or Matt LaFleur?

bringing in an offensive coordinator to run the offense with new ideas. What chops does Siriani have to be CEO? What are we doing? Yeah, so I'll disagree with that because, I mean... I think he is not that type of coach anyway. Exactly. Exactly. John Harbaugh brought in Todd Monkin this year.

He had Greg Roman before that. He had Jim Caldwell before that. He had Cam Cameron before that. I'm trying to go through all my Ravens OCs. Yeah, but he was, I mean, to be fair, not an offensive coach. Sure. I mean, Tomlin has brought in different people. Belichick's brought in different people, right?

None of them offensive guys. Okay. I'm just saying if you're saying what qualities does Nick Siriani have to be the CEO coach, it will be the leadership ability, it will be the organization ability. That would be, if they felt that he was deficient at that, then he shouldn't have the job because, look, if he's not calling the offense, he needs to be exceptional in these other areas. And only Jeffrey can ascertain that.

Now, or not only Jeffrey, but Jeffrey is responsible for ascertaining that. Howie Roseman kind of gave his defense for why Nick Siriani is still the head coach and mentioned Siriani's record before the 1 and 6 end to the season, talked about three consecutive postseason appearances. I don't know how many teams there are that have been in the playoffs three straight years. Like the reality of it is, I mean, not to pat ourselves on the back, but it was kind of like the pitch that I gave in the meeting last week, right? He was a little bit more composed.

What's that? It was a little bit more composed. Wow. Jesus. I mean, there's a reason you got fired in that meeting. I got fired because it was your decision. That's why. I was just channeling Jeffrey Lurier.

That had nothing to do with me. Oh, goodness. you know, I got a message from someone recently saying, what if you turn the tables on, on Bo and started ripping on him? And I was like, I know how that would turn out within the first 30 seconds of it. Yeah, he was touting his resume there, right?

And so whether you think that is merit for staying the head coach, that's the way Hallie Roseman's framing it. And it is accurate, right? Three consecutive postseason appearances now. the thing is you can't say this is what his record was before he finished one in six this year because he finished one in six this year and there's no denying that and that that stain is going to be there throughout the off season it's going to be there going in the next season and it's going to be there going into uh you know the 20 24 December and January so he needs to he yeah

it's is it's until Nick Siriani wins in the postseason and goes into the postseason, this is as much a part of his resume as those things that Halley mentioned. Very, just very quickly looking. I could be wrong about this. I counted, I think, seven teams that have gone to the playoffs three straight years.

That's almost a quarter of the league. That's not a crazy. Yeah, and two of those years were a first round exit. One of those years was the Super Bowl. Yeah. But it's as we discussed in the past week, I don't know if you're going to get a more credentialed, well, I shouldn't say that, you can probably get Bill Belichick, but there aren't as many credentialed coaches

available right now as Nick Siriani. Now, you have to have confidence in his fitness as a head coach, and we'll see that this year, right? Like, this is a big year for Nick, and that's kind of, that's the part of this that looms over, is, you know, I remember going. into the 2012 season how Jeffrey Lorry said like eight and eight's unacceptable right and that kind of set the set the standard for that year it's fairly clear that if there's a first round exit next year or if if if there's inconsistency next year you can't just keep running it back right

you know there there there needs to be improvement next year all right I think we should save the Fangio stuff here let's let's make tomorrow's episode which will be at noon we'll be back at our normal noontime. Let's make that like the Fangio episode. Let's really get into that. Yeah, we'll do some work on it tonight. Let's keep getting into some of the things we heard today. One of the things he said that was interesting was like about the rest of the staff.

That, you know, it's not ideal that there are all these position coaches and quality control coaches who are sort of twisting in the wind right now because whoever they hire, those coordinators might want to bring position coaches with them, which makes sense. Absolutely. And you want to evaluate the staffs. on their own merit. It was interesting, he kept bringing up Kevin Petulow, so it sounds like Kevin Petulow is safe,

which is good to know. That's a piece of news. Yeah, I think to use the reference that you used about Jeffrey Lurie, like, you know, it's out of both of you or if that was framed with Kevin Petulow, they both might have been going down with the ship. Okay. Let's see what else here I have in my notes. How about your question?

Because you referenced it before when the linebackers, how he brought that up, prompted and he said that they had a lot of confidence in the Kobe Dean this year basically suggesting and he said Zach Cunningham had a had a good season but but basically that everything and it's it's what we talked about I think the first week of the show actually when when Nacobi got hurt all their plans of linebacker this year were what they were built around Nicopi Dean and they let T.J. Edwards and Kaiser White leave with the expectation the confidence that Nicopa Dean will be the top guy and that did not come to fruition so that he, you know, That was his kind of rationale for why the linebackers underperformed this year.

Yeah, you know, I am not, I'm not here to bury Nikobe Dean. I think there's a chance that Nicopi Dean is going to be a good player for the next two years. I think the failure was, in part, a lack of self-scouting from his rookie year. You know, they chose to not get him on the field at all and better evaluate him. And then, number two, making that like the plan on defense, yet, like, Listen, if they're going to invest that high of a third round pick on a linebacker, they're going, like, he's going to be the main guy on defense in the middle of the field. But, you know, part of the reason that he fell was because there were injury concerns.

And he got injured twice this year in his first year as a presumed full-time starter. That was always going to be on the table for that position. And they didn't have good enough backup plans. And when they had an all-pro caliber guy sitting on the bench and then released him and he got to go to New England, guess what? The season went down the drain. Yeah, I'm surprised that question didn't come up. You know, I tried to get it.

You tried to get it. So, give kind of an overview of what Howie said about the roster. First, he said that he thinks back to the Tuesday after the Super Bowl last year. And Nick Siriani walks in his office and says to him, you know, how are you doing, Howie? And Howie was most upset about letting good guy that he knew good players where we're going to have to go. he knew their schedule was going to be more difficult. He didn't mean just players, though. He was talking about coaches.

He said, good people. Good people. Because I think that's a big part of it for them. Okay, okay. You thought coaches too, he was referring to. That's how I read that, yeah. Okay, I thought he meant like, you know. Because in that time you're losing both coordinators.

I thought he meant like it's a good player, it's a better person type thing, you know? Like. I didn't think, I meant, I think he meant everybody in the infrastructure. So, yeah. And then he referenced how the schedule was going to be more difficult. And he said that they knew they had. some young pieces. He thought that the offense would be ahead of the defense. They don't want to be middle of the pack in like both of those. And so the offense would would be ahead.

I don't know if you want to commit long-term money to aging players in the secondary, if that's the case, if you're willing to accept a back turn on defense. Sure. And so that was that was kind of how he explained it. He said he's a part of this. He He looks at when they've made the Super Bowl. He's done a really good job in those years. And so he has to look at his part. Of course. And then, you know, he said that they're always kind of studying the league trends and that,

but they need to anticipate what the trend is going to be, which I agree with him there. Totally. What I wanted to know, he didn't answer this question, is how he feels their roster stacks up against the team still playing. And I wanted, I would try to get that on the record because basically does, does he view it like they had a Super Bowl caliber roster that underachieved? Or does he feel like the roster played to its potential this year? And I didn't really get an answer on that. But I am curious from an organizational perspective, clearly they think coaching was an issue here. That's why they, that's why they fire coordinators on both sides of the ball.

it will be and there are considerations like contracts and you know dead money that could restrain you in certain areas but we'll see based on their moves how much they view the roster as an issue here and whether they they make material changes or whether like philosophically it's the same thing and it's just new coaches trying to extract more out of the talent what did you make of Howie's answer I think it was Jeff McLean who asked him his role and his view of the Matt Patricia situation, the sequence of events there. He said that Nick came to his office. Nick came to him.

Nick came to him at the play calling with Shane Stuyken a few years ago. Which was curious because I thought that that was Jonathan Gannon, but. Well, Jonathan Gannon came to Nick with it and then Nick went to Halley with it. That's the chain of events here, yes. but I think look I I got to imagine that that there's more to that story right

yeah this is like a good you know let's keep in mind reporters out there that like they are not under oath up there yes you cannot say that like so like a story is confirmed like that's just what he said yeah also I I want to clear this up you know there's there tends to be like fan sentiment when they're upset that reporters

but we really need to pin them. Like, it's not like you say false, that's false. Like, you ask them the question. They give their version of it. You try to do more reporting on whether it. I mean, it's a whole song and dance. Yes. Okay.

The truth is there are no repercussions for them just lying to our faces. They're not like, there's no, there's no perjury at a press conference. Which like, we look, and as I've said, Nick is a nice guy. Okay. I will say that. Nick is a nice guy. If you think I'm being a Nick, a sympathist here or whatever,

then I will wear that. But Nick blatantly lied to all of our faces and your face is the fans when he said this year, you know, he said week 13, they're not making any changes. Right. And then all along they were making this change.

And then he said after the game, the reason I didn't say anything was for competitive advantage. As if like that, you know, throwing Sean Desai up there to do a press conference mattered more than, you know, the dignity of, like the lack of dignity in the, in the, in the, in competitive advantage Trump. Lack of connection. So, yeah, so I.

Howie said, quote, I trust him with the coaching staff and he had made up his mind. Yeah. Look, I think there's probably always more of the story, but it is. Nick's perspective there was, you know, if I do something and it doesn't work out, you can second guess it, you know, basically saying he did what he thought was right at the time. Really no acknowledgement. I didn't like that answer from Nick. I didn't like that answer at all, frankly.

I think what you don't see. Yeah, clearly. I think you can say like, like I did what I thought was best at the time. And it didn't work. And he, you know, to your decide point, like, I don't know what the relationship dynamics are between Nick and Desai,

but it is a little bit bothersome to me from the outside that, you know, Brian Johnson, I couldn't say enough good things about Brian Johnson. Matt Patricia, well, me and I really put him in a tough spot and there's no such cover for for decide it's like they're they're just throwing him under the bus yeah uh it was a good question from uh jimmy kemsky like wouldn't you know would you have have done that again or do you i guess regret that decision and he was asked that a few times and his point about you can always second guess it well no that's literally what we're doing here

is you have the benefit of hindsight now do you regret it um and he says it's a decision that that we understand you agreed with that decision at the time What I wanted to see there was a little bit of acknowledgement that this did not work, that it was a mistake, it was an error in judgment, it was an error in execution, and that this is something that needs to be re-evaluated with everything else. You can't just, like, if I make a bad decision, I can't just say, well, I thought it was the right decision in the time. No, how are you learning from that decision? Like, I will be quick to admit if I make a decision, I will say, you know what, this is why. I made it, but I was wrong. Okay?

And when I go forward, this is how I'll do that decision better in the future. So I did not like that answer from Nick. And if Nick asked me that, I would tell him that. This was not really what he meant, but it sort of made me laugh as I was thinking about it on the drive from Novićer to here. Basically, the idea that if you had the ultimate gift and you granted Howie Rosemey, a time machine and he could go anywhere and make any effect on the arc of the history of the world. You know, he's not, he's not going back to kill Hitler. You know, he's not, he's not going to cancel the apprentice early. He's going to go back like two months to the game after the

bill's game and just soak up how good it felt to be 10 and 1. I think context is relevant there. I mean, there's probably other things he would do. Of course, that was not the question. That's why I was just laughing about it. Like, man, if only I had a time machine, I could go back to that bills game. Yeah, I mean, my guess is... You know, the time you met your wife for the first time or something like that. You'd probably go back to January 2013, honestly.

I thought you were going to say January 6th. I just thought that's what you were going to say when you said January. That's where your mind goes when I said January. As if, like, okay, well, you need to work on that. Like, that's... You don't think he would go to January 2013? You don't think he'd go...

How about to the parade? Oh, true. Well, I mean, if there's anything he could redo, it's probably hiring chip. Although he probably feels that. But then it led to the Super Bowl. Okay. Yeah.

I think he might, I mean, why not go back, well, actually, like, two weeks after that and just keep Christian Ellis. I mean, wave Albert O. Yeah. What did that turn out to be? Yeah. You know what? We should have asked why was Rashad Penny on the roster.

That was the first question. That would be a good icebreaker. Yeah. Howie, the reference to the time machine is. for, so there's sickos for the show. I'm sickos for Howie press conferences, right? Howie made a reference in 2016 when he got the job back. If he could get in a DeLorean, am I pronouncing it correctly?

No, DeLorean. Isn't that what I said, DeLorean? Well, you asked, I wasn't going to say anything, but you asked if you could not pronounce it correctly. What did I say? You said, DeLorean. And it's DeLorean. So I said D and it's D. Yeah.

Okay, I spelled it quite a bit because I've used that quote. It's D.E. Smelled it kind of. Okay. That's good. It means you learn from reading. Yeah. So if he can go back in the, so he said then, if he can go back, he said it wasn't too long ago when we led the league in explosive plays.

And there, I wish I can go in a DeLorean and go back in time and have those players. He was referring, of course, to the Sean Jackson and LeShall McCoy, but I can't do that. So that was the time machine reference. So when he said he made a point where I've talked about the time machine in the past, that was what he was referring to. Now, it was an auditorium of about 30 reporters. I think you're the only one. I think you're the only one. Yeah.

Who immediately knew that he was referencing 2016. Yes. Yeah. That's, I knew exactly what he was referring to there. But that was. So he said then if he can go into the time machine and go. go back to the end of the Bills game, he would, being 10 and 1 at that point. I just think, so Nick Siriani had a quote earlier this year.

I think after the week 18 game or the week 17 game, I think it was the week 18 game. You know, the last six games don't invalidate, you know, the first 11 or something of that nature. And I don't know what the Eagles are saying internally, but if they're looking at it, at it like, well, we were a 10-1 team and not we were a 1-6 team. I think that's problematic. Now, both of those are true. But if you cling to this notion that you were a 10-1 team, then you're, the way you approach the off-season, in my opinion, is going to be ineffective because you're going

to be blinded by what happened then, and they don't want to over-reacted. away the one and six, but the one and six is there. That's how they ended the season. They have a team that finished among the worst in the NFL in those last seven games, and they can't deny it. They can't explain it away, and they need to go about fixing it. I agree with you. Like, generally speaking, I am of the opinion. Like, you take the full sample size into account. That matters more. You don't want to overvalue the end of the season and, you know, circumference. to recency bias. I think in this situation, the context

matters a lot, and they didn't just go from, you know, losing some coin flip games to losing some coin flip games. Like, they became one of the worst teams in the league over the past seven weeks of the season. And there were, like, personality dynamics that were obviously affected. And, like, it was not just the case of, we were really good and then we got

unlucky. And that's why they fired both coordinators. Like, that's, I think they know that. They're just, they're just sort of saying that to move on. What more did you want to hear from them? In a reasonable way. It's a good question. You know, I think I think Howie could have been a little more reflective about the roster. That's what I tried asking him in terms of the roster composition.

That's not his nature. And I think, I think what he said about, like you want to stay ahead of the curve is true. And that is what matters. Now, we can talk about tomorrow, like, whether, whether, you know, like, chasing the ghost of Vic Fangio is following that, or if you're just, you know, going back to what was Evan Sart four years ago. I disagree with some thoughts that some people have on that, but go on. From Nick, you know what, really honestly, the only thing that that I would have liked to hear was a little bit more, like, honest reflection on the Patricia decision and, you know, how things went wrong. Now, one thing that was interesting, well, first of all, you answer that question. What else would you have like to hear?

And this probably leads into what you might have been talking about is I want to hear a little bit more about Jalen. I keep, I think that, and perhaps I'm colored by the covering of Carson Wens and kind of the downfall of Carson Wens and by no means of my comparing Jalen Hertz to Carson Wens. but I do recall when they traded Carson one of the things I asked is like when you're in that position again when you have a franchise quarterback what will you do differently? And Janelan's personality is different

than Carson's personality so it's not apples for apples but there was a lot of enabling of Carson during the 18, 19, 20 seasons and there was a lot of excuse making for Carson in the 18, 19, 20 seasons and there was a lot of rationalization and a lot of keeping their blinders on until maybe,

I mean, you can argue that perhaps they didn't have those blinders on when they took Jalen Hertz. But point being, there is, you have to be careful not to, you want to empower Jalen Hertz because of his importance in the organization, but you don't want to enable him, right? You want to make him feel as valuable as he is and as important as he is because he is. but you don't want to obscure things that he can work on

or not hold him accountable for certain things. He regressed this year. There are areas where J-Len needs to be better, and that's something that I don't hear a lot of from them publicly. One would think that perhaps it's happened privately. Yeah, I think there, I think two lines here. One is you talk about not repeating the same mistakes with Carson Wentz. I mean, it took one mediocre, like, just half-step back of a season for Jalen Hertz for there to be all of this talk about his leadership coming from the locker room.

And, like, you know, is he doing a good enough job as a leader of the team? Like, all of that stuff to be sourced out from the Novicar Complex. Like, that seems like it's repeating that mistake. The second thing is you talk about not enabling him. And I think that is an important way to frame moving on from Brian Johnson. And I think as you have said before, we have probably, or at least like the Eagles bubble has overstated to some degree, like the closeness between Jalen Hertz and Brian Johnson. But I thought the question was, the answer was very funny today because Howie Roseman made a point to go back to it.

And he like, he didn't think this was fair. The question to Nick about whether you talk to Jalen about moving. on from Brian Johnson. And how he went back and was like, now I gotta say like that's unfair. Like, he's only, he's a 25 year old. Like, he's a 25 years old. What happened to a year ago talking about this is the most mature?

Jeffrey Lloyd-old we've ever seen in our lives. He gave him $250 million. Like, oh, don't put that on the 25-year-old. My poor baby. Yeah. So my interpretation of that was actually Howie being rabid-eared, if you will, or sensitive to the suggestion. that they were kind of taking whatever Carson said and doing like doing whatever Carson wanted

toward the end because he said they talked to all their players but the players aren't there to make decisions like it's on the coach they call Carson the day they're going to draft Jalen yeah yeah no or or even like those you know some of those drafts there they drafted a bunch of people from Carson's agency and there was a thought that internally when Malcolm Jenkins left like we're going to give Carson once the locker room and that that there was a lot there. They did things behind the scenes and actually Jeff McLean did a good job. He had a podcast during the summer with like some of the things they did behind the scenes for Carson. He mentioned like a police escort to all the games, right? That like other people didn't

have. So yeah, so I think that was his way of saying like J. Owen Hertz isn't making these decisions. This isn't Magic Johnson. That's good. You know, this isn't Magic Johnson saying fire Paul Wested or I'm trading, right? But I do think that the, I think Jailen Hurts respects Brian Johnson. They have a long relationship. I think one thing that's kind of like missing here in this convenient narrative that, you know, Brian Johnson played for Jayhoun Hertz's father and they're from the same hometown and they're close.

Jowen Hertz had the chance to twice play for Brian Johnson in college. Yeah. Right? Brian Johnson recruited him to Mississippi State. Or tried, yeah. And then, yeah. Like try getting him to come to Mississippi State and then try to getting him to come to Florida. Okay. And J. Owen Hertz chose Alabama and then shows Oklahoma. Yeah. Right. J. Allen Hertz is going to do what's best for J.1. Hurtz's career. He's shown that.

He's not like he's he's not in the business of, I mean, he doesn't, he's not Brian Johnson's agent here, right? And Brian would tell you the same thing. Brian would have been an offensive coordinator last year for, I don't want to say a number of teams. There were a few teams that wanted to hire him a year ago. And J.O. and Hurt's. wasn't their quarterback. So it wasn't because of J. Allen Hertz there. So these are two separate things here. Now, I do think that if you're firing Brian Johnson, you need to talk to Jailen Hertz. He's that important to... Oh, you're going to keep him in the loop. Yeah. Exactly. There's nothing wrong with that. But I don't think you make a decision to placate Jailen Hertz. I think you make a decision because you need Jalen Hertz to be at his best self. So whatever is going to make Jailen Hertz is going to make Jailen Hertz. look like he did two years ago or of that level you do it yeah i just it's just something for you to keep in mind though like you can criticize howie you can criticize nick but the names of

everybody on the roster under 26 years old keep him at your mouth please yeah there are there there are only 25 right uh yeah i mean come on i that's that's ridiculous these are yeah these are these are men um there with that in mind i thought it was interesting there was another sort of like, I don't know if it was a slip of the tongue or just something Nick was saying about how the new offensive coordinator is going to bring a scheme and also like coach the quarterback and be important to coaching the quarterback. And so I think that is something to think about as we canvass the landscape for offensive coordinator candidates, which you can read on all P-H-L-Y. Yeah, great job. If you are a diehard. 31 candidates, 3,000 words just, you know, up until 3 in the morning.

I think it was 30 candidates, though, because there was one candidate. candidate there that I didn't know who was. No, I didn't count that one. Oh, you didn't count that. That was 32. Yeah, okay, because I, I was like, Barton Fink doesn't count. I was like, Barton Fink doesn't count. I was like, Barton Fink football, and I'm trying to figure this out. And then I realized that as a culture reference. I didn't understand. That's okay. Yeah. What is that like a movie from the early 1990s? Yes, it's a Cohen brother's movie. You see this. It was, it was. Liam Cohen. It was left over from the Liam Cohen section. Yeah. That one went way over my head. That's okay. That's okay. But I I think, uh, maybe, maybe, he's reference today. Probably went over your head. But see, I don't think that he was like implicitly referencing his previous time machine thing. Oh, I think he was. If you go back, if you go back and listen, he was referencing that specific quote. He was referencing the time he referenced the, he was referencing the time he mentioned the time machine in the past.

It was a little Easter egg for those who pay attention. What would you use your, uh, let's, let's say that like the really, really important world historic things had been done on the time machine already. and you got just a chance to do a time machine. What would you do? Well, I'd like to think that you learn from every decision that you make. You know, so there are things that, there are decisions that I made that I probably would have done, like differently if I had to do over,

but you try to, like, learn and maximize whatever those decisions are. This isn't a job interview. No, I'm telling you. So it would probably be, honestly, it would probably be something I, well, I mean, like the obvious thing. answer if I'm being honest is like I I would have invested in in Google's IPO or something like that right like that would have been but like that's the I thought I did not think that that was the obvious answer that's not an obvious answer if you can go over and do anything again you

wouldn't invest in Google's IPO I mean come on I think we have different uh sentimental tendencies well obviously there are family things like I could but there's some things you can't control right That's what a time machine is for. No, but I'm talking about something I can't control like, I mean, not to get deep. I can't control like the health of somebody or something like that, right? Yeah, but you could go back, that's what the time machine's for. You can go back and spend some good time one more time. Okay, so then I would spend some time with loved ones, okay, who I've lost.

I would do that. But like of something that I had control over, yeah, I'd probably invest in Google's IPO. Okay, I don't think that's a bad. That is so funny. I don't know. Just not the way my brain works. Good for you. What's your answer besides like the...

I don't know. The first thing I think of it is I would go, yeah, I would go spend time with loved ones. Yes, okay, yeah. I would do that. I'd spend time with loved ones. You don't know to take my answer. Outside, no, I said that. That's not what occurs to you.

I said outside of that. Okay. Outside of that, what would you do? Is there like, would you have thrown a different pitch in a game? Would you have... No, I always threw a perfect pitch. Okay. I'm not surprised you think that.

Outside of that? I don't know. I would go, I would go. go back to a fun experience. I would re-experience a good experience. That's what the time machine is for in my mind. I mean, part of what makes it a great experience is that it's fine. So you make billions of dollars off of it? Yeah, I'm not going to get mocked for that answer. I think that's a really, I think that's a really like, all right, let's play this forward. Let's play this forward then. You have become a multi-billionaire.

What are you using your money for? well compound interest right but um but uh no i would i mean there's then there's different investments you can make thereafter you're just to invest more that's all you want is more more more this is this is like what a capitalist it's like all you want is more money you're so greedy you just have billions of dollars give it you know give it to people who need it or i don't know buy a team for yourself that would i would i i just want more investments no no Oh, you could. I mean, there's so many, if I had a billion dollars, there's so much more I could invest in.

Infrastructure in Africa? Like, there's a lot you could do. Yeah. So there's an answer? There's a lot you could do, yeah. So. Okay. But I'm saying that, I mean, there's certainly options in that case.

And so all of this is to say that my understanding is that the offensive coordinator is going to have some kind of quarterback experience, which makes Gerard Johnson, who they talk to today, an interesting candidate. it. Yeah, Gerard Johnson's a very interesting candidate, and that was Adam Schaefter who reported that, right? Gerard Johnson is, like you said yesterday, he worked with Nick Siriani. Right. Okay. He's been exposed to this Kyle Shanahan tree, obviously in Houston, in Minnesota, and he was in San Francisco for a bit, was he bounced around the NFL. for a while. He was with the Eagles.

I remember that. Yeah, yeah. He wore number one, just like Giannihurt. What did you think of that? What did I think of that? No, that's summer when you watched him. I wasn't there. He had a weird release angle. That's what I remember about him. He sort of threw from the side.

Six five. That's where, yeah, he wasn't taking advantage of the height. He had sort of an awkward throwing angle. That's what I remember about Gerard Johnson. Yeah, I remember him when he was at Texas A&M. Yeah. Okay. Okay.

So you threw me off there with a, It's just so funny because the whole point of investing in Google is you, like, you get to make the money that you never have to worry about money again. And then the step two is so that I can make even more money. All right. Let's change the stuff. You've just elucidated the entire problem with the country. Well, we don't need to go there. That's not.

All right. Any other takeaways? When is it going to be enough for you? Any other takeaways? From your perspective? I'm trying to think. That's everything I had written down in my notebook, but I could have forgotten a few things.

What about you? Yeah, I mean, well, we should set the stage for tomorrow's conversation that they were asked about Vic Fangio that came up. Yeah, it happened in the middle of the press conference. Yes. And Nick said that there's a lot of good candidates that they are speaking to. So that was the, I like this.

A very funny idea in the chat. What if, what if Fangio brings in Desai? Yeah. I mean, look, he's going to be able to bring his own staff, right? So, um, so that, that would be, uh, I mean, it's obviously not going to be Desai. But we'll get into all the, all the Fangio stuff tomorrow. Um, I, I thought that overall, in, in terms of what more I, I wanted to see, they weren't going to give you an action plan going forward.

I did want to see a little bit, though, in terms of, like, you know, where Howie's saying, this is what needs to be done better with the roster, with Nick saying, this is what needs to be done better with the offense. It's not just new ideas, but, like, we need to incorporate creativity or, I don't know, there's different things you can do in that regard. I'm going to guess that Rinaldo Hill is going to come with him to be the Eagles defensive backs coach. That's a prediction I'll make based on his background. with them together. Just looking at it. Okay. Tough news for D.K. McDonald.

D.K. McDonald, who was a groomsman in Nixiriani's wedding, so we'll see if he, maybe he goes back to assistant defensive backs coach. That would be tough. Tough pill to swallow. But, okay. All right. Anything else from, what last thing, Zach, because I know that people were upset about this. What did you make of the half-hour delay on the press conference?

Yeah, I got to tell you. I'm used to it, right? I think I've made, I might have made this reference last week. I know I made it to you off air. I don't know if I made it on air that, like, my next book, it could be titled Waiting for J. Owen, right? There's so much of my time that I'm waiting for the Eagles. So, yeah, I am used to it.

I got a message from somebody that it's kind of rude to be late to a meeting you schedule. Look, that's them kind of... But it's unsurprising. Yeah, we're not there. It's not a big deal. Yeah, we're not their priority. Right.

We've waited a week. They're figuring they can wait 30 more minutes, and that's what happened. And I just felt for Julia because she was waiting for us to do the show, and we're able to do the show now, and hopefully it was a good one. I like Z. Bezos from Josh in the chat.

I mean, that's a compliment. Jeff Bezos is an impressive person, so. Bad news for Emily? No, no, not at all. If you're going to be following the Bezos playoff. Well, not everything. I mean, not everything. Can we spend some time at the very close here to congratulate Emily on her new venture?

Yeah, Emily's very exciting. Emily's going into real estate. So I appreciate you bringing that up. She'll appreciate you bring that up. Anyone who's Can you give the sicko some deets If they're looking for Looking for some real estate help

I will have it on my Twitter page Okay Coming up And I'll share the information But Emily Berman will She can help you with If you're buying If you're selling

Yeah she She will help you out That's great because you love to buy and sell No I like the holes You know that That's true Yes I like the holes

She knows that too So yes Well congratulations Congratulations to Emily. Very cool. Very cool change and exciting. So check that out on Zach's Twitter. He'll put out a tweet.

So look out for that. For Julia and Mr. Bezos to my left, we appreciate you. And thank you for listening and watching. We are back tomorrow at noon and Friday at noon as well. Tomorrow we're talking Vic Fangio. We may have some more news about offensive coordinator interviews before then. On Friday, we're going to have the professor, Dainiz, back. in studio to talk about his thoughts.

Maybe he's got some more pointed thoughts on the press conference that we heard today. But lots more to come on all-P-H-L-Y.com and on the P-H-L-Y Eagles podcast. So thank you for listening. We will talk to you tomorrow. And as always, we love you.