If Nick Sirianni's Job Is Safe, Then Nobody In America Should Ever Get Fired Again
Mitchell Leff. Getty Images.There's really only one way to secure your job as a head coach in the NFL, and that's to win a Super Bowl. Even then it doesn't guarantee that you'll keep your job for much longer. The Eagles fired Doug Pederson just 3 seasons after winning a Super Bowl. Meanwhile, it looks like Mike Tomlin has a job for life in Pittsburgh. Either way, it's a cut throat business. There are a couple of truly elite coaches in the game, and then there are a bunch of dudes who are all replaceable. It's the same way in any industry, but this just happens to be more publicly consumed than the world of insurance or some shit.
All of this is to say that Nick Sirianni is replaceable. Maybe you can get away with manning the ship behind a historic collapse if you've won a Super Bowl already and given yourself that job security. But Nick Sirianni hasn't, and he hasn't earned that benefit. You have so many people out there who are scared right now for the Eagles to start over with a new coach. They'll bring up the fact that Sirianni has brought the Eagles to the playoffs in 3 straight seasons. That he's taken then to the Super Bowl. That they were 10-1 this season before the aforementioned historically terrible collapse. And what does all of that get you?
This was a show me year for Nick Sirianni. It was his first year without Jonathan Gannon and Shane Steichen. He lost two great coordinators who led the Eagles to have one of the most productive defenses in the league last year, and one of the most explosive offenses. Nick Sirianni gave up play calling, handed everything over to his coordinators, and then lost them both to head coaching jobs. Such is life in the NFL. So this year was time for Nick Sirianni to prove if the Eagles past success was because of him, or if he was just along for the ride.
Do we really need to talk about the past 7 weeks to evaluate how that shit ended up? Don't get me wrong, the 10-1 start was fine. But what exactly did Nick Sirianni do? I guess he instilled a culture of winning and just getting the job done by any means necessary. A culture where you just find ways to win football games. Which was great, until it wasn't.
I think everybody can agree that the 49ers game broke the Eagles. It shattered them physically and emotionally. They were never even close to the same team after that, and the results speak for themselves. But if you want to go back a little further to figure out when this team truly died, you can look to right after the final whistle of the Chiefs game.
I'll admit that when the Eagles were winning, I did every mental gymnastic I could to talk myself into Sirianni's antics being a positive for the Eagles. But this is who he is. He is an unserious man who is unfit to lead a team through adversity. He shit talks incessantly when things are going his way and is then silent the moment shit hits the fan. When you have a quarterback who was literally molded in a Nick Saban factory, obviously there was no way that relationship was ever going to last.
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I'm a massive Jalen guy. I'll die on a hill defending him, and I fully believe he has everything it takes to be a legitimate franchise quarterback for the Eagles for years to come. But I have no problem admitting he was bad this year. Clearly he either didn't feel confident in this offense, or the one's creating the offense (Sirianni and Brian Johnson) weren't confident enough in Hurts to really open it up. Whichever one it is doesn't really matter. Because the thing about Jalen Hurts is that he's making a $255 million. Agree with it or not, the Eagles should probably make the decision based on the guy they're giving a quarter of a billion dollars to right now. And if he doesn't have confidence in Sirianni's offense? If he can't trust that Nick Sirianni will be an actual adult instead of a cheerleader on the sideline? Well then you're just lighting that $255 million on fire because the relationship is broken beyond repair.
You can replace Nick Sirianni within a day. And sure, you could also get another quarterback in here to replace Jalen Hurts, but that $255 million makes that option a little more dicey.
Replaceability is really the main point here. If you took Nick Sirianni away from this Eagles team this year, would they have been any worse? I don't think so. They would have either been just as 'good', or they wouldn't have had a locker room that was fractured into a million pieces with half the players quitting on the team Monday night. He doesn't call plays. His offense gave you absolutely nothing this year. He lost the confidence of his quarterback. His locker room was as divided as ever. He couldn't get guys to play hard. And the team lost 6 out of their last 7 games in one of the worst collapses that Philly sports has ever endured, which is saying a lot.
If you think any of that gets cancelled out just because they barely squeezed into the playoffs 2 years ago, beat Daniel Jones and a 49ers team without a quarterback in the playoffs last year, and then got embarrassed by Baker Mayfield in the wild card this past Monday night? I just don't know what to tell you. Does Nick Sirianni deserve to keep his job? I mean…I don't love seeing people get fired, so I guess I'll say maybe. But did Nick Sirianni earn the ability to keep his job? Not a fucking chance. So if he doesn't get fired, then none of us should ever get fired again.