Who’s To Blame

[time2rock]

Who’s To Blame

Posted: January 2nd, 2024 | Author: Tommy Lawlor

Nick Sirianni has talked about what a big sports fan he is over the years. That love of sports caused him to give me a call last summer to talk about Eagles fans and the upcoming season.

Sirianni was concerned that getting to the Super Bowl so quickly would bring on a lot of bandwagon fans. Part of what makes Eagles fans so special is that they are 100 percent dedicated. They follow the team win, lose or draw. Sirianni worried that too many bandwagon fans could make all Eagles fans look soft and ruin the reputation they’ve built for decades. Soft is only good in Philly when we’re talking about pretzels.

So I got a call from Sirianni asking what he could do that would drive away some of the bandwagon fans. I took a sip of my PBR and looked over the schedule, hoping to come up with a good idea for the Eagles coach. The team could start 0-4. That would bring a lot of misery. But it would also suck right from the beginning. Nothing would build.

Then it hit me.

"Nick, you need to get off to a really good start. You could go into the bye week undefeated, but that might be too much. Lose a game to some AFC team nobody cares about. Lose to the Jets.”

"Okay, we can do that. I’ll have Jalen throw some picks and we can write that off as a bad game. What then?”

"This could be amazing. Start 10-1. You’ll have wins over Dallas, KC and Buffalo. It will be hype city. Jalen will be getting MVP talk. The Eagles will be favored to get back to the Super Bowl. Fans will be on cloud nine. Then you drop the hammer. Lose to the Niners and Cowboys. Even better, make those blowouts. Fans will be pissed. But they will rationalize the losses because those teams are so good.”

"I like where your head’s at.”

"Then we’ll really get weird. Blow the game in Seattle at the very end. Fans will start to get really despondent. That will put them on the edge. They’ll rationalize the loss because winning in that crappy stadium is so hard.”

"So that puts us at 10-4. What next?”

"Beat the Giants. We don’t want to start losing to them. That would be a dead giveaway that all of this is scripted. We don’t want that. Make the game closer than it should be to keep fans uncomfortable.”

"We can definitely do that. I’m sensing a fluky pick-six and some other weird plays.”

"Nick, you’re speaking my language. We are on the same page here. Now we come to the Arizona game.”

"Wait, you don’t want me to lose to Gannon do you?”

"I know that is asking a lot, but it would be perfect. Everyone will go nuts if you lose to the Cardinals. They’re going to be one of the worst teams in the league. Make it another late game loss and bandwagon fans will be buying Christian McCaffrey jerseys faster than you can call a wide receiver screen on third-and-long.”

"Damn, Lawlor. That’s asking a lot.”

"I know, but think about it. You’ll go from 10-1 to dropping 4 of 5 and losing late leads to bad teams. This will crush the souls of all Eagles fans. Only the truly fanatic people will stick around. You’ll be scraping barnacles off a sinking ship.”

"This really is some devious stuff.”

"It won’t be easy, Nick. People will be ripping you relentlessly. They’ll want to fire you.”

"If that is what it takes, I’ll do it.”

"You’re going to need to do some weird stuff to really sell this. Demote Sean Desai in the middle of the season. The fans like him. Promote Matt Patricia and that will be another thing that has the fans wondering what’s going on.”

"Sean’s a good dude, but he’s been in Philly. He’ll understand why this has to happen.”

"This is all well and good, but how should we close the season out?”

"I’m glad you asked. Here’s what we’re going to do…”

http://igglesblitz.com/2024/01/whos-to-blame/

[UK_EaglesFan89]

Ultimately everyone is to blame. Nobody should escape blame.

Sirianni has to take responsibility for the way this has fallen apart. But the players are the ones out there making mistakes so it falls on them too.

Sirianni also takes blame for the coaches he picked and for his offense. That’s on him although the coaches haven’t done a good enough job.

And then there’s Howie. He put together a really talented roster but he took risks. Bringing back older guys (again) really hasn’t worked. Neglecting LB and S (continually) hasn’t worked. He’s given Sirianni elite offensive talent and the offensive failings are on Nick, BJ and some are on the players. But that defense has been exposed. The elite DL has been exposed and negated. The secondary is woeful.