Shuey's Firing Completes Defensive Shakeup

After 10 years with the Eagles, linebacker coach Bill Shuey was let go by the team yesterday, completing a drastic and unprecedented coaching shakeup on the defense.

Shuey is the fourth member of the defensive coaching staff who won’t be back with the team next year. Defensive coordinator Sean McDermott was fired and landed the same job with Carolina. Defensive backs coach Dick Jauron took the coordinator job in Cleveland. Jim Washburn, formerly of the Tennessee Titans, replaced defensive line coach Rory Segrest. And now Shuey.

Shuey started as a lowly intern on the staff in 1999 and was promoted to assistant to the head coach, offensive assistant/quality control coach, defensive quality control coach, and finally linebackers coach in 2008. His departure means that only assistant linebackers coach Mike Caldwell and defensive quality control coach Mike Zordich remain from the 2010 staff.

Never before has Andy Reid so thorougly gutted such a large part of his coaching staff. All of the top four jobs on that side of the football have been vacated. Perhaps the soon-to-be-hired new defensive coordinator will want the openings to bring in some of his own, but the moves still raise questions.

First, how much does Reid blame the coaching staff for the defense’s struggles last season? The talent level was never particularly high, and the unit lost multiple starters to injury as the season went on. Yet it appears Reid thinks coaching was a bigger problem than the players. You don’t see the team anxious to get rid of a lot of the on-the-field talent.

And, second, with the NFL lockout looming, how are the Eagles going to institute new tactics and techniques before the season begins? Rules prohibiting player-coach contact will go into effect soon, and it’s possible they won’t be released until close to the start of the 2011 season. It’ll be tough to roll right in if players have to adapt to an entirely new system in a short window.

Originally published at NBC Philadelphia.

Jim Washburn, Eagles Coaches, and Beyond

There’s plenty to like about the Eagles new defensive line coach, Jim Washburn.

Formerly of the Tennessee Titans, Washburn has been praised as one of the best in the business. Various NFL reporters have called the move “a game-changer” and a “great hire”. SI’s Peter King told a cool story about Washburn’s work style.

Statistically, Washburn’s defensive fronts have been very productive. The Titans defense had the seventh-most sacks in the league since he arrived in 1999 — and they weren’t known for an aggressive blitzing philosophy. More impressive is that Washburn has gotten good results with players of low expectation like Kyle Vandenbosch and Jason Babin. And when he worked with first rounders, both became Pro Bowlers: Jevon Kearse and Albert Haynesworth (neither of whom had as much success after leaving Tennessee).

This great track record should sound familiar to Eagles fans. It’s everything we heard about special teams coordinator Bobby April when he joined the team last offseason — best in the league, great upgrade, fabulous hire.

The quick lesson is that no one should expect immediate results on the defensive line. A year ago everyone was hopeful that April would engineer a quick turnaround, but Football Outsiders ranks the 2010 group behind Ted Daisher’s 2009 squad.

But the more interesting note, to me anyway, is to look at the evolution of the coaching staff. Simply put, we’re seeing a new trend emerge: bringing coaches in from the outside. This is both natural and necessary.

As the Andy Reid era extends into its second decade, we’ve seen almost a complete bleed of coaching talent from the team as Reid’s coaching tree expands. Former assistants Brad Childress, John Harbaugh, Leslie Frazier, Ron Rivera, Steve Spagnuolo, Pat Shurmur have all become head coaches. Pete Jenkins, among others, retired. Jim Johnson, of course, passed away.

All of this assistant turnover is normal for a head coach tenured for so long. Take a gander at Bill Belichick’s staff in New England. There are only three or four guys who’ve been with the team even as recently as the Patriots 2007 Super Bowl appearance.

Ultimately, the question is, can Reid cope with this talent brain drain? Apparently the first strategy was to continue to promote from the bottom of the internal barrel, as Reid did with Sean McDermott and Rory Segrest. Clearly that wasn’t the right philosophy.

So Reid appears to be moving on in a positive direction, combing the NFL for highly-regarded coaches to add to his staff. Finding talent is a different skill than developing it, but with April, Washburn, and whomever Reid picks for the defensive coordinator spot, it certainly appears that he’s trying.

Originally published at NBC Philadelphia. Image from Getty.

Will the Real Eagles Please Stand Up?

Can anyone say with any certainty that they know how the Eagles will play on Sunday against the Packers? I’m not talking about the outcome of the game, but rather how the team will perform, relative to their talent and their recent games.

We know the 2010-11 Eagles can be a dominant bunch. They didn’t win six of seven games during the stretch run from Halloween to Christmas for nothing. Football Outsiders ranks the Eagles number five overall in the league, with the third best offense — one that is capable of scoring 28 points in just under eight minutes against the Giants a few weeks back.

But this team can also look woeful. The first three quarters were ugly in that Miracle in the New Meadowlands game as the Giants mounted a three touchdown lead. And the Joe Webb-led Vikings took down the Birds in a sloppy team effort with a first round bye on the line. You don’t see football played much worse than that…

Eagles Lack Fundamental Hunger to Win

Two supposedly elite NFL teams played games this week against opponents that were widely considered inferior. Each had already clinched its division and was looking to secure better playoff positioning. But while one team, the Patriots, took care of business to the tune of a 34-3 beatdown at the lowly Bills, the other, our hometown Eagles, got whupped by the Vikings 24-14.

What’s the difference between these two teams? It surely isn’t talent. Both the Patriots and Eagles have legitimate Most Valuable Player candidates under center — Tom Brady and Michael Vick — and a good supporting cast. Is it coaching? Perhaps Bill Belichick is the best coach in the NFL, but despite his many detractors, Andy Reid isn’t far behind.

So what really separates these two clubs, both of whom came into their Week 16 games as overwhelming favorites? A hunger to win…

Vick-Jackson Connection Broken in 1st Half

The first half of the Eagles-Vikings Tuesday Night Football showdown was exceedingly sloppy in all areas, but that theme was especially evident in the most explosive connection on the field: Michael Vick to DeSean Jackson.

Up to this point in the season, the Vick-Jackson link has been perhaps the best thing the Eagles have had going for them. Jackson has six receiving touchdowns and has averaged over 22 yards per catch this year, a career high, even for the most explosive wide receiver in the NFL. The long-ball heroics just earned dynamic duo starting nods for the NFC in the Pro Bowl.

But Tuesday night? DeSean was targeted nine times — more than any other Eagles player. But instead of exciting, the results were disastrous in the first half…

Celek's Disappearance Exposes Flaw in Vick's Game

What you have to understand first is where Celek runs most of his routes and catches most of his passes. Last year, when he caught 76 passes, over two thirds of them came in the middle of the field, between 0 and 19 yards downfield. Of those, 31 were passes under ten yards.

That worked great for Donovan McNabb and Kevin Kolb. In 2009 and 2010, both quarterbacks passed into that short middle area more than 30 percent of the time, by far their busiest target on the field. And it was also one of their most effective. McNabb completed more than 68 percent of his passes into that area (with a 93.0 QB passer rating), while Kolb hit a cool 75 percent (with a 103.4 rating). That is the West Coast Offense, in action.

Vick sees the field differently. He favors the sidelines and the deep ball over short or intermediate middle passes. Under 23 percent of his passes go over the middle and less than 10 yards downfield. That accounts for some of Celek’s drop in production — he has less opportunities to catch the ball.

But what is more interesting is that Vick is also significantly less effective throwing into that space…