Tanks for everything: Doug Pederson returns to face an Eagles team to which he gave much

When they love you, they love you, and when they don’t, they let you know.

The latest episode of Welcome to Wrexham, a documentary series that chronicles Rob McElhenny’s co-ownership of the titular Welsh soccer club, featured a conversation with Eagles owner Jeffrey Lurie about, of all things, when to fire a coach.

The scene for the FX show, titled Sack the Gaffer, was shot last season, but that it would air days before Doug Pederson returns to face his former team seems only appropriate — or cruelly ironic.

Before his advice-seeking talk with Lurie, McElhenny, the local product best known for creating It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, met current coach Nick Sirianni at Lincoln Financial Field and offered the above summation about Philly fans.

“It’s crazy that Coach Pederson — I mean, 2017,” McElhenny said as he pointed to the Super Bowl LII banner hung high in the stadium. “I’m like, ‘God, that was like yesterday.’”

» READ MORE: What to know about Doug Pederson’s return to Philly with the first-place Jaguars

When Pederson was fired in January 2021, he became the eighth Super Bowl-winning coach to be sacked, with only Don McCafferty of the 1970 Colts getting let go in a shorter amount of time since lifting the Lombardi Trophy.

The Eagles made the playoffs in the two seasons following the title, but there was regression, and, ultimately, a precipitous fall in 2020 that resulted in Pederson’s departure. He took a year off but returned to coaching this offseason and has the nascent Jaguars 2-1 entering Sunday’s visit to the Linc.

“That was a long time ago, two years ago,” Pederson said Wednesday when asked if he was over how it ended with the Eagles. “I’ve got to get my team prepared. And I’m personally excited coming back to Philly. Obviously have a lot of fond memories there. And what we did in 2017 is something we’ll always remember.”

For that season alone, Eagles fans will always love Pederson. And the ones in attendance Sunday will be sure to let him know with a resounding ovation. The 54-year-old coach’s fingerprints still remain on the team, and even if he wasn’t around when wide receiver DeVonta Smith and defensive tackle Jordan Davis were drafted, it’s unlikely they’re Eagles without him.

Pederson’s final game here was an ignominious end to his tenure. Some players and coaches still express shock with the Eagles’ supposed tanking that day. But most moved on, and many fans welcomed the loss to Washington that moved the team three slots up in the next draft.

General manager Howie Roseman would parlay the No. 6 pick into two first-rounders that, after minor moves up, netted the Eagles Smith in 2021 and Davis in 2022. Pederson’s handling of the tank might have reflected some of the reasons Lurie had moved on, but mostly it was how the owner viewed the direction his team was headed.

“If you reach the conclusion that you think you’re on a downward trajectory and you needed fresh leadership, then you got to make a change,” Lurie said, generally speaking, in the Welcome to Wrexham episode. “Don’t be afraid to make a change.”

» READ MORE: NFC East: Eagles soar as motivator Doug Pederson returns; Cowboys run over Giants, but can either stop the run?

Whether he hooked him too soon or not, Lurie’s decision looks prescient. The Eagles reached the postseason in Sirianni’s first season and currently are 3-0, the only undefeated team in the NFL.

Pederson seemed to agree that change for change’s sake benefitted him as well. He may have worn the pressures of coaching in Philly more than any recent coach. By the end of his five seasons, he looked like U.S. presidents often do after their first terms.

“It just was a really good time for me to step away, refocus, and regroup myself,” Pederson said during a video call with Philly-area reporters. “And come back with a lot of energy and passion and pour everything I learned in five years into this job and make it the best I can be. … Have a little more fun with what we do and don’t be so stressed out all the time.”

Pederson’s initial lightheartedness was refreshing for an organization coming off three drama-filled seasons with Chip Kelly as coach. He was approachable, and players appreciated his openness.

“One of Doug’s biggest strengths was making the players take ownership of this,” center Jason Kelce said. “I really think he did a good job of making players and staff largely feel like they had their hands on making the team.

“First of all, he was a fun guy to be around. He asked for your opinion. He made me feel valued as an employee.”

Jake Elliott recalled their chats before field goal periods when Pederson would focus on their shared passion for golf. He’d like to relate the kicker’s swing to how he booted a football, but he also knew a lot, Elliott said, about the intricacies of the discipline as a former holder.

Pederson, a former reserve quarterback, often relied on his playing career as a means to connect with the locker room. His jocular personality made him relatable. He tried to keep it light, from ice cream treats to kicked trash cans, all the way to an improbable Super Bowl run in only his second season.

But mostly it was his genuineness, even as the Eagles failed to sustain that level of success, that appealed to players.

“If I had bad days, he would tell me the truth. If I had good days, he’d tell me the truth,” tackle Jordan Mailata said. “So he was always honest with me. There weren’t any secrets.”

Some underestimated Pederson’s offensive acumen when he was hired, but his scheme and play calling were among the best in the league during his first two years. A combination of factors — namely, personnel turnover, injuries, and quarterback Carson Wentz’s decline — played a role in the coach’s inability to stay ahead of defensive coordinators.

The Eagles had built-in stability advantages over their NFC East rivals when the pandemic hit, but Pederson contracted COVID-19 in training camp and never seemed to mentally recover from that setback.

“I didn’t really get with Doug a lot because that was COVID year and they had us separate and he was on the offensive side,” said cornerback Darius Slay, who had arrived that offseason. “He was real big on his offense, so he didn’t really come too much on the defensive side.

“He trusted [defensive coordinator Jim] Schwartz a lot.”

The roster also had a lot of new and young faces as Roseman set about a slow rebuild. The abbreviated offseason made assimilating tough, but Pederson perhaps was too loyal to veterans like wide receiver Alshon Jeffery and overlooked the readiness of rookies like Quez Watkins.

“There was a lot going on that year,” Watkins said, “but toward the end of the year, he showed that he had faith in me.”

» READ MORE: Avonte Maddox and Boston Scott ruled out for Jaguars game; A.J. Brown returns

Benching Wentz would have far more repercussions, so Pederson held off for as long as he could. He would later tell a few colleagues that he had wished, in retrospect, that he went to then-backup Jalen Hurts sooner.

Pederson showed that he could script an offense to accentuate the rookie’s skills in his first start, a win over the Saints, but he reverted back to his pass-heavy offense and the Eagles lost the next two weeks.

By the time the finale arrived, most just wanted the season over. It was decided that Wentz wouldn’t dress, Hurts would start, and that third-stringer Nate Sudfeld would play at some point. Most of the offense found out about the quarterback plan, but Pederson never formally told Hurts or the team.

The Eagles, already decimated, sat any starter who was remotely injured. They were without both starting tackles and were facing a motivated Washington team that would clinch a wild-card spot with a victory.

“I’m assuming that Doug thought we were going to get killed,” a team source said, “and then Nate would just finish it up.”

Schwartz, who reportedly was prepared to step down after the season, had other plans. His defense kept the Eagles in the game, and with Washington ahead only 17-14 early in the fourth quarter, Hurts was removed for Sudfeld.

“Schwartz was mad because, well, a lot did know, but I didn’t know that for Schwartz it was going to be his last year,” Slay said. “So he probably wanted to win out as an Eagle. But I didn’t know nothing about that. We were like, ‘Oh, snap, what are they doing?’

“But I was like, ‘I best not let these guys score,’ because we could only control what we could control.”

Broadcast cameras caught Hurts on the bench apparently saying, “That ain’t right.” A few defensive players had to be stopped from approaching Pederson. Kelce, who had just a few weeks earlier gave a passionate plea against tanking, and guard Isaac Seumalo ultimately went over to confirm the switch.

“A lot of the staff and the players were shocked,” a former assistant said. “It wasn’t a mistake or something crazy happened. This was a conscious thing that we did and it was embarrassing.”

While some had known that Sudfeld was a possibility, what irked some was its timing. Some others, like defensive end Brandon Graham, have since said they weren’t bothered by the way it was handled.

Nevertheless, Sudfeld turned the ball over on his first two possessions and was unable to engineer a successful drive, and the Eagles lost.

“That game was, honestly, it was a shocker to me,” Watkins said. “I didn’t know that type of stuff happened in the league and when it happened, I was confused. But I was just trying to play ball and worry about what I had to do.”

Some staffers had wondered after the season how Pederson’s awkward substitution could affect his relationship with Hurts, and perhaps his future with the team. Wentz already was expressing to those close to him that he wanted to be traded.

But, in the end, it would be the Eagles’ downward trajectory and Pederson’s initial suggestions for replacing Schwartz and finding an offensive coordinator that made Lurie decide to pull the cord.

“I don’t know what played a role in the final note, but I don’t think that last game played any part,” Kelce said. “I’ve heard all the rumors and I don’t know if any of them are true, but usually where there is smoke, there is fire.

“The organization wanted to go in another direction. And that was the end of it.”

Maybe Pederson, after having to endure Lurie’s increasing involvement, wanted to go his separate way, as well. The owner felt compelled to step in on matters pertaining to coaching hires, the use of analytics, and, occasionally, draft picks. It also stands to reason that the tanking was not solely Pederson’s doing.

In March at the NFL owners’ meetings, Lurie downplayed the notion that he was a meddling owner and defended his influence on staff decisions.

“I will never tell a coach who to hire, but I will evaluate a coach on exactly how good their staff is, how good their opposite side coordinator is,” he said then. “All that stuff goes into play.”

» READ MORE: Our beat writers make their picks for Week 4 vs. Doug Pederson

While most of the players interviewed for this story said they hadn’t talked to Pederson since he left, each expressed affection for their former coach. Pederson said early during the owners’ meetings that he hadn’t spoken to Lurie or Roseman since he was fired, but that evening he and his wife, Jeannie, gathered with the Eagles contingent at a party.

Just as they did upon Andy Reid’s return with the Chiefs in 2013, the Eagles are certain to pay tribute to their only Super Bowl-winning coach on Sunday. There’s already a statue of Pederson with Nick Foles outside the Linc that he said he’s never seen in person.

No matter what the future holds, though, there’s no erasing history.

“Sports — the reason it’s popular is because it’s unpredictable,” Lurie said in Welcome to Wrexham. “And the moment you think you got a really good team, you’ll probably have some bad games, and it’ll kill you.”

Whatever influence Lurie’s advice may have had for McElhenny, Wrexham ultimately decided not to fire its manager.