Nick Sirianni ‘deserves a ton of credit’ for Jalen Hurts’ development

The Eagles were given a bit of a scare in Houston on Thursday night but ultimately came away with another double-digit victory. The Birds are now 8-0 on the season with four of those wins coming by 10+ points.

Head coach Nick Sirianni is understandably the favorite for the NFL Coach of the Year Award, and perhaps he deserves even more recognition than he’s getting. Philadelphia has the second-best point differential in the league with dominance on both sides of the ball.

Eliot Shorr-Parks of the new Audacy Original Podcast "The Best Football Show" ranked his top five NFL coaches this season and explained why Sirianni is at the top.

"To me, the coach of the year is the coach that has the only undefeated team in the league, and that’s Nick Sirianni,” Shorr-Parks said (11:37 in player above). "Brian Daboll’s doing a great job, but Nick Sirianni is 8-0, he’s beaten the number two and number three teams in the NFC.”

Not only did the Eagles beat the Vikings and the Cowboys, the NFC’s second- and third-best teams, but it wasn’t particularly close. They beat the Vikings 24-7 and the Cooper Rush-led Cowboys 26-17.

Sirianni coaching an undefeated team is impressive, but perhaps even more impressive is what he and the rest of the coaching staff have done with Jalen Hurts.

"Jalen Hurts deserves a ton of credit for what he’s done and the work he’s put in to help develop his game and to go from a player last year that was playing for his job to now being an MVP candidate. But I think sometimes because of Jalen’s hard work ethic and again, rightfully so, he does work really hard, I think sometimes the coaches don’t get credit for that,” Shorr-Parks said.

"To take Jalen Hurts from where he was under Doug Pederson to where he is now, that’s an amazing coaching job. Sirianni deserves credit for that,” along with the rest of the offensive coaching staff.

Hurts started four games in 2020 with a 52% completion rate and a 1-3 record. Last season, he flashed some signs of what was to come in an 8-7 season. Now, he has eight wins through eight games and there’s no signs of slowing down.

"They have taken a quarterback that was in the second round. Again, the first year in the league he was doing Wildcat packages,” Shorr-Parks said. "The Eagles were – wrongfully so – his rookie year basically using him as a running back. And now he’s an MVP of the league. And Sirianni just deserves an absolute ton of credit for that.”

https://www.audacy.com/national/sports/nick-sirianni-deserves-credit-for-jalen-hurts-development

Sirianni is a fantastic young HC. He's got huge upside and could be a great HC.