Gannon VS Schwartz, Did the Eagles Make A Mistake At Defensive Coordinator?

[time2rock]

Gannon VS Schwartz, Did the Eagles Make A Mistake At Defensive Coordinator?

I’ll be the first to say, I was never a huge fan of Jim Schwartz defensive scheme over the last 5 years. Sure, watching the Eagles give up big play after big play on 3rd down was abysmal and made me want to rip my eyes out – but that has looked much better than the incompetence that Jonathan Gannon has presented us in 9 weeks of football.
Mostly because it’s the same thing, except this time the Defense looks horrendous on most downs.

A prime example of how the Eagles Defense has completely fallen apart is the lack of production on the Defensive Line. With the loss of Brandon Graham in Week 4 against the 49ers, the Defense was likely to take a hit, but this loss is not excusable to the absence of Kerrigan & Barnett on the stat sheet. Derek Barnett is also heading into a contract year where he’s recorded 1 sack and 4 penalties in 9 games, not a great look for him.

After signing Ryan Kerrigan to a one year $2.5m deal, Kerrigan has 1 Tackle for Loss and 2 QB Hits in 204 snaps in 9 games (33% of defensive snaps). Now sure this could simply be because the Defensive End is nearing the end of his career, but that didn’t stop him from having 17 tackles, 5 for loss and 6 QB hits in 38% of the Washington Football Teams’ snaps in the previous season.

However, the bleeding doesn’t stop there on the Line. All-Pro Defensive Tackle Fletcher Cox has also seen a lot less production compared to recent years. Being limited to only 15 tackles and the fumble recovery that resulted in a touchdown against the Cowboys in Week 3, Cox has been awful quiet for playing 69% of the Eagles defensive snaps in nine weeks, projecting Cox to be about 33% less productive than he was in the 2020 season with 41 tackles and 6.5 sacks in 15 games on 72% of total defensive snaps.

Now sure, Schwartz put up good and bad numbers, some that lost the birds several games in the prior seasons, but we’re mostly comparing Gannon’s season to 2020 as the personnel have been relatively the same and the Eagles are on pace to put up a similar record to last year’s 4-11-1 record. The 2020 Eagles had an average of 26.13 points against compared to the 24.56 that they’re averaging this year in the first 9 weeks. Sure, that number looks lower, but in 2020 Carson Wentz threw 15 INTs and had 6 lost fumbles. Teams were being gifted points left right and center getting field position that almost granted them a guaranteed Field Goal after these turnovers.

The worst part about all this is Gannon’s complacency with the way the Defense has been performing, and that’s not good. Gannon’s Defense is allowing historically atrocious numbers over the air, here’s what QB’s have looked like against the Eagles this year:

Matt Ryan: 21/35, 164Yds, 0TD, 0INT
Jimmy Garoppolo: 22/30, 189Yds, 1TD, 0 INT
Dak Prescott: 25/39, 326Yds, 2TD, 2INT
Patrick Mahomes: 24/30, 278Yds, 5TD, 1INT
Sam Darnold: 21/37, 177Yds, 1TD, 3INT
Tom Brady: 34/42, 297Yds, 2TD, 1INT
Derek Carr: 31/34, 323Yds, 2TD, 1INT
Jared Goff: 25/34 222Yds, 0TD, 0INT
Justin Herbert: 32/38, 356Yds, 2TD, 0INT

Now when looking at the passing defense in 2020 this is what Schwartz injury plagued (3rd year running since the Super Bowl) looked like compared to Gannon’s 9 week of Defense.

2020 Eagles (16 Games): 364/530 (68.6%) 3798Yds, 27TDs, 8INTs
2021 Eagles (9 Games): 231/306 (75.5%) 2121Yds, 16TDs, 6INTs

Now Schwartz was also playing with a much worse LB core led by Nate Gerry and resorted to playing CBs like Michael Jacquet who had a not so tremendous game against the Cowboys in 2020 where he gave up 7 catches on 9 targets for 182 yards and 2 touchdowns. While Gannon’s defense has been able to stay relatively healthy for most of the games.

If I were the Eagles, Gannon is not a long-term solution, Sirianni has shown competence and areas of improvement by bringing in the run game while Gannon shows premise of being able to call a good game, and then completely forgets about it the following week and resorts to intangible excuses during post-game press conferences that doesn’t add to the confidence fans should have in him.

https://www.phlsportsnation.com/2021/11/10/gannon-vs-schwartz-did-the-eagles-make-a-mistake-at-defensive-coordinator/

[PoconoDon]

Unacceptably soft and ineffective to even softer and more ineffective. Neither choice is good. Schwartz's defense was bad, and that can't be lost or forgotten, simply because Gannon's is worse. It's like choosing a broken leg over two broken legs and forgetting that a broken leg is bad. 

[UK_EaglesFan89]

9 hours ago, time2rock said:

With the loss of Brandon Graham in Week 4 against the 49ers

Week 2... Not week 4.

But yes we do look back now and think in fact we had it good with Schwartz! But at the same time it was time for him to go. The time had come for this team to move on from Schwartz. Its just it doesn't look like going for Gannon was the right move. 

[ManchesterEagle]

2 hours ago, UK_EaglesFan89 said:

Week 2... Not week 4.

But yes we do look back now and think in fact we had it good with Schwartz! But at the same time it was time for him to go. The time had come for this team to move on from Schwartz. Its just it doesn't look like going for Gannon was the right move. 

You know I was always a Schwartz fan. His contribution to the Super Bowl team is massively underrated because the D was so bad in the Super Bowl itself. But we don't get there without the strong play of the D in the regular season and the playoffs. 

After that the talent level declined and he did what he could and did a pretty good job with what he had in 2018/19 and the first half of 2020. It annoyed me that people were trashing him and expecting him to produce top 5 aggressive Ds with the trash he had to work with. (which is on Howie). 

It was definitely time for him to go though. He looked tired and out of ideas towards the end of last year. He's doing a good job with the Titans.

I have a degree of sympathy with Gannon. He has no BG and trash at Linebacker. But although he has changed it up a bit in recent weeks, his soft coverages have been embarrassing to watch.

[time2rock]

It’s so hard to compare a guy who has been running defenses for so many years to a guy who is just starting to cut his teeth doing so.  It took Sirianni 7 weeks to figure out he needed a running game.  It should be expected Gannon should be given at least this season in full to see if he can figure things out (nothing to lose this season anyway). 

[UK_EaglesFan89]

1 hour ago, time2rock said:

It’s so hard to compare a guy who has been running defenses for so many years to a guy who is just starting to cut his teeth doing so.  It took Sirianni 7 weeks to figure out he needed a running game.  It should be expected Gannon should be given at least this season in full to see if he can figure things out (nothing to lose this season anyway). 

I agree that he should be given the full year to figure things out. I wouldn't be disappointed if they fired him tomorrow but yes ultimately he should get the full year. 

[time2rock]

6 hours ago, UK_EaglesFan89 said:

I agree that he should be given the full year to figure things out. I wouldn't be disappointed if they fired him tomorrow but yes ultimately he should get the full year. 

If a directive comes from above that Gannon needs to be fired, then we are back in that same stupid boat we were in with Doug being told which coaches needed to go.  So IF he is fired, I sure hope it is Sirianni's decision to do so ... I said at the time we went through this with Doug the HC should be allowed to sink or swim with his coach hiring decisions.  

[UK_EaglesFan89]

7 hours ago, time2rock said:

If a directive comes from above that Gannon needs to be fired, then we are back in that same stupid boat we were in with Doug being told which coaches needed to go.  So IF he is fired, I sure hope it is Sirianni's decision to do so ... I said at the time we went through this with Doug the HC should be allowed to sink or swim with his coach hiring decisions.  

Mind you... Doug apparently (and we don't know if this is true or not but it's been well reported) wanted to run it back with the same coaching staff before he was fired. So yes I agree the decision needs to be with the HC but that's not always a good thing either. 

[NCTANK]

F no, and i’ll add that i’m not a fan of either one 

[Cochis_Calhoun]

On 11/13/2021 at 12:28 PM, time2rock said:

Gannon VS Schwartz, Did the Eagles Make A Mistake At Defensive Coordinator?

Now Schwartz was also playing with a much worse LB core led by Nate Gerry and resorted to playing CBs like Michael Jacquet who had a not so tremendous game against the Cowboys in 2020 where he gave up 7 catches on 9 targets for 182 yards and 2 touchdowns. While Gannon’s defense has been able to stay relatively healthy for most of the games.

If I were the Eagles, Gannon is not a long-term solution, Sirianni has shown competence and areas of improvement by bringing in the run game while Gannon shows premise of being able to call a good game, and then completely forgets about it the following week and resorts to intangible excuses during post-game press conferences that doesn’t add to the confidence fans should have in him.

https://www.phlsportsnation.com/2021/11/10/gannon-vs-schwartz-did-the-eagles-make-a-mistake-at-defensive-coordinator/

I really need the writer to elaborate on how Schwartz linebackers were 'much worse' because for me the very idea of much worse than our current linebackers is inconceivable, our linebackers are the event horizon of bad linebacker play.

I hated Nate Gerry until I watched Alex Singleton tackle an opposing player his teammate had already stopped over the line to gain for the 10th time.  Last night he went through untouched on plodding Teddy Bridgewater and managed to miss the sack.