Eagles Hiring of Nick Sirianni Shouldn’t be a Surprise

While the news is shocking, it was a mild surprise.

On Thursday the Eagles made the decision to hire Indianapolis offensive coordinator, Nick Sirianni to be their 24th head coach.

After talking to 10 different candidates to lead the team, they replaced the only coach to ever win a Super Bowl in Philadelphia, Doug Pederson, with a virtual unknown.

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The 39-year old spent the past three season as Frank Reich's offensive coordinator, though he did not call plays. During his time with the Colts, the Indy offense ranked eighth in overall, scoring 25.9 points per game.

Sirianni has been around the league, spending time as an assistant with the Kansas City Chiefs, Chargers and Colts.  He has served in a number of NFL roles including quarterbacks coach, wide receivers coach, offensive coordinator and now head coach.

Sirianni worked with former Eagles offensive coordinator Frank Reich in San Diego, and the duo paired back up in Indianapolis when Reich got the Colts head coaching job in 2018.

While its a surprising decision, he was not a hot name on the coaching circuit this season among the seven teams that needed a head coach, he does fit the mold of hires by Lurie during his tenure as team owner.

This fits the mold of hiring Andy Reid, who at the time was a young, unknown quarterbacks coach, who turned the Eagles into a consistent winner. After Reid, the team went for a innovative coach with no NFL experience, Chip Kelly. Kelly was highly sought after for his offensive-mind at the college level, but fizzled out after three seasons.  After Kelly the team went back down the Reid road, hiring his top assistant, Pederson.

Now, they went back down a similar road, plucking the first name off the Reich tree, getting a young up-and-coming coach, who they hope can emulate the success that Reid and Pederson were able to bring the franchise.

The team brought in Reid and paired him with Donovan McNabb.  They hired Pederson and drafted Carson Wentz.  And now they need someone to help restore Wentz to the player he once was for Pederson - enter Sirianni.

So was Sirianni hired simply to fix Wentz?

While its not the only reason, it could be the key reason.  The Eagles are tied to Wentz after handing him a massive contract that his him virtually locked here in Philly.

Sirianni has worked with plenty of quarterbacks, including Andrew Luck and Philip Rivers and now will try to work with Wentz, in hopes he can help find the 2017 version of him and if he can, he may just be the right choice.

While the teams search was an extensive one, talking to both offensive coordinators and defensive coordinators, they went with what felt most comfortable, emulating their past.