At Eagles minicamp, are early changes in the Nick Sirianni-Kellen Moore offense enough to stick?
There will be tweaks to the Eagles' system. There is expected to be more motion. But minicamp offers merely an early glimpse at how a new offensive coordinator will make changes.
Kellen Moore’s new-look offense is starting to come together.
Just how much the Eagles’ first-year offensive coordinator will change the system Nick Sirianni has run the last few seasons remains to be seen. But the early indication as the team started its three-day mandatory minicamp on Tuesday suggests that some notable differences could be coming.
“There’s times where we’ll have something that’s a new tweak, I’ve said to Kellen probably a handful of times, ‘Man, I really like that, I really like the way that looks,’” Sirianni said. “Kellen has a brilliant offensive mind and a great, unique way of explaining it to the coaches and the players.”
What might those tweaks be?
Moore’s fondness for pre-snap motion at his previous stops seems to have carried over, for starters. Both DeVonta Smith and A.J. Brown have spent time working out of the slot and motioning across the formation before the snap this spring, something the Eagles seldom did last season. The offense has lined up in unbalanced formations and in condensed splits a good amount as well.
When asked about the changes to the offense before Tuesday’s practice, Smith said the receivers have gotten some added autonomy operating out of Moore’s offense this spring.
“I think it’s going to be great to get a new style of offense around,” Smith said. “Get guys — not have more freedom but be able to do things that we weren’t allowed to do. Move guys around, things like that.”
When discussing the advantages of the bunch formations, Smith added, “It gives you more space at times. When you get in bunches and things like that, guys don’t press as much and it kind of confuses the defense. So it just gives you more space and opportunity to do things.”
It’s important to note that both Smith and Brown also worked out of the slot at times in the previous system. According to Pro Football Focus, Smith spent 31% of his snaps on passing downs last season lined up inside and caught 33 passes for 459 yards from that alignment. By comparison, Brown was inside 24% of the time and caught 15 passes for 225 yards.
The biggest change may be with the frequency of pre-snap motion. Last year, the Eagles used motion before or at the snap 10.9% of the time, which ranked 32nd, while Moore called plays for a Los Angeles Chargers offense that ranked eighth with a 25.9% motion rate.
Smith acknowledged that the previous scheme allowed for some positional flexibility for him and Brown but noted that the pre-snap motion will give them more chances to hunt for favorable matchups.
“Everyone has always been playing different positions,” Smith said. “But moving guys around allows guys to go out there and create some one-on-one matchups and win how they want to win.”
» READ MORE: Nick Sirianni or Kellen Moore: Whose scheme will the Eagles offense reflect more of in ‘meshing’ two systems?
The significance of Moore’s imprint on the Eagles offense won’t become truly apparent for months, though. Sirianni said as much Tuesday, noting that the team plans to keep things under wraps through the preseason to preserve some mystery concerning the new scheme until the games count.
Earlier this offseason, Sirianni described Moore’s task as “meshing” the better parts of the previous offensive system with his own. The Eagles finished eighth in total offense last year but struggled during the team’s late-season collapse, which resulted in Moore replacing former offensive coordinator Brian Johnson to address a “stale” offensive approach.
When asked about Smith’s comment on the receivers having more agency at the line of scrimmage, Sirianni said Moore has made several adjustments for the better that the wideout group has taken to.
“Those guys have done a good job,” Sirianni said. “Whether it’s an option route or different types of things with options there — there’s multiple things — but those guys have done a good job learning the system. And Kellen has done a good job teaching the system.”
Moore said last month that the coaching staff has preserved some of the previous terminology installed under Sirianni while other parts of the new jargon originated from his previous stops with the Chargers and Dallas Cowboys.
The new calls have taken some getting used to for Smith, but not the plays themselves.
“At the end of the day, football is football,” Smith said. “Everybody runs the same thing, they just call those things differently. So, just getting used to the terminology.”