If you were Nick Sirianni, how far would you go to preserve your self-respect?
Amid the Jalen Hurts blood-clot fallout, the coach took all the bullets for Jeffrey Lurie and Howie Roseman. He might end up losing his job. There's a way for him to retain his pride.
You’re Nick Sirianni. You’ve had a rough month, as bad as any during your five-plus seasons as the Eagles’ head coach. Your team has lost four straight games. Your star running back, Saquon Barkley, missed two of those games and most of a third and only now is poised to return to the lineup. Your Hall of Fame-caliber right tackle, Lane Johnson, retired. Another starting offensive lineman, Cam Jurgens, was traded. Your best wide receiver, DeVonta Smith, missed some time, too, as did your second-string and third-string running backs. Your new play-caller, Sean Mannion, doesn’t seem capable of fixing the myriad problems with the team’s offense. Your defense hasn’t been nearly as dynamic or impregnable as it was supposed to be.
You’re Nick Sirianni, and none of that is the worst of it. No, the worst of it is that your starting quarterback, Jalen Hurts, likely won’t play again this season because of blood clots in his lungs — and there’s a scandal surrounding his absence. There are questions about how the Eagles treated Hurts’ condition, whether they put him at needless risk, and how they have handled the fallout.
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Their strategy has been to leak information to NFL insiders and to put you on a Zoom call Monday afternoon to field all the necessary and pointed questions — you, not chairman Jeffrey Lurie, not general manager/vice president Howie Roseman, not any member of the franchise’s medical team, not anyone who would have had the say-so and direct involvement to make the final call about Hurts’ status and health.
You’re Nick Sirianni, and during that press conference, you might as well have been Sonny Corleone on the Causeway, taking so many bullets for so many people that it was a wonder you didn’t keel over on everyone’s computer screen. The best that anyone could say about you in the aftermath was that the Eagles never should have put you in that position, that they shouldn’t have had you playing Drew Rosenhaus to Lurie and Roseman’s Terrell Owens. You don’t wield power within the organization the way Andy Reid does with the Kansas City Chiefs or John Harbaugh now does with the New York Giants. In fact, since you don’t call plays and didn’t design this offense, a lot of people wonder what you bring to the table as a head coach.
You’re Nick Sirianni, and a lot of people also think that, once this season ends, you could lose your job. So you might take over play-calling duties or demote an assistant sometime over the next 12 weeks because you’re so desperate to avoid being fired.
You’re Nick Sirianni, but if I were you, I might be inclined to look at this four-week fiasco from a different perspective.
If I were you, I might remember that, during my first five full seasons with the Eagles, I compiled the fifth-highest winning percentage in NFL coaching history. My teams never missed the playoffs, winning three division championships, two conference championships, and a Super Bowl. I might believe that, no matter how great a roster-builder Roseman has been, I’m a pretty damn good coach.
» READ MORE: Nick Sirianni declines to say whether he supports an NFLPA investigation into the Jalen Hurts matter
If I were you, I might ponder what would happen if the Eagles were to fire me. Given my resumé, I might interview for at least one NFL head coaching job, and I might get that job or another. Or, I might find that my personality and style are better suited to coach in college, at a program that hasn’t been as successful lately as it could or should be, a program where the boosters and fans would be happy to have me, where the pressure wouldn’t match what I experience every day in Philadelphia. If I were you, I might see myself as another Pete Carroll, who left the NFL, turned USC into a juggernaut, and returned to the league a better, sharper coach. After all, I’m just 45. I have a long way to go in my career.
If I were you, I’d re-listen to what you said Thursday, when you were asked, amid all this recent turmoil, whether you still loved coaching.
“Hell, yeah, I enjoy it,” you said. “I hate losing. I hate it. … But I love everything about this game. I love coaching young men to be the best football players they can be, to understand football better, to help them become better men. There are things you can control, and there are sometimes things you can’t control. I know I can also control my attitude, my effort, my energy. To me, that’s mental toughness. …
» READ MORE: A rough timeline of the Jalen Hurts blood clot event: Everything we know
“But you have that grace time when you have some time to watch the game, really think about the game. You’re going to feel upset about the game. But then it’s got to be about getting better from that tape, and I think what happens with me is I have those moments after tough times — we’re human — when you’re down, once you get back into the process of this thing, something for me is snapped and, boom, I’m back in this process of doing what I love to do. You get lost in that process.”
If I were you, I might notice that none of what you said had anything to do with the fame of coaching in the NFL, the prestige of coaching in the NFL, or the money that comes with coaching in the NFL. If your answer Thursday was sincere, and I think it was, you would derive similar satisfaction and pleasure from coaching anywhere. You’d be in alignment with what Ethan Hawke once said about acting: If teaching drama at a Seattle high school when you’re 62 doesn’t sound great, then get out, because you’re in the profession for the wrong reasons.
You’re Nick Sirianni, and your reported annual salary, $17 million, might be enough to dissuade you or someone else from voluntarily leaving a job that pays so handsomely. But if I were you, I might ask myself, What’s the cost of the opportunity to stand on my own two feet as a head coach? How much would I pay to have people no longer perceive me as a puppet? How many more times do I have to be the public fall guy for decisions that, when push comes to shove, I’m not making?
If I were you, and this season turns out to be a disaster, there would be a course of action that would ensure I retained my dignity and self-respect. I could walk into Lurie’s office — maybe before the regular season’s final game, maybe just after it — and tell him that I’m walking away. For my family. For my peace of mind. For me.
If I were you, I might think about it.
Even with all the injuries and ineffectiveness through six games, Sean Mannion is still a believer in the Eagles’ offense, saying the problems are “totally fixable.” The Inquirer’s Jeff McLane and Marcus Hayes have some thoughts on the state of Mannion’s group, as well as a defensive unit that’s also been underwhelming this season. Listen here.
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