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When the Philadelphia Eagles collapsed late in 2023, it wasn’t hard to see parallels between the team’s last two regimes — both of which enjoyed unexpectedly sudden surges to Super Bowl contention, only to fall back to Earth just as swiftly. Now, one of the coaches from this ongoing boom-or-bust Eagles era, Super Bowl LII champion Doug Pederson, just might be reliving history of his own with the Jacksonville Jaguars. And it’s not pretty.
Desperate to get their first win of the 2024 season on Monday night, Pederson’s Jaguars instead looked as deflated as they’ve ever been, mercifully yanking starters before the buzzer of a 47-10 blowout loss to the Buffalo Bills. Former No. 1 draft pick Trevor Lawrence, now one of the four highest-paid quarterbacks in the league, flailed around like he’s done for much of the last year. And Pederson had no choice but to leave the door open for wholesale change in his postgame news conference, admitting with gutting resignation, at 0-3, that “this is who we are.”
Yes. It’s also who Pederson’s teams have been. Change the names of the players, the colors of the uniforms, the stadiums in which they’re trotted out, and you’re left with almost a perfect replica of Pederson’s late-stage Eagles. Not the Super Bowl-winning Eagles. The Eagles who crashed, burned and required a lightning-speed rebuild.
Let’s start by acknowledging the good, even if it’s the furthest thing on which Duval County cares to dwell: Pederson is a respected leader of men. It’s why the Eagles tapped him to replace Chip Kelly almost a decade ago, and it made him the perfect figurehead for a squad full of underdogs in that spirited 2017 title run. It’s also why the Jaguars hired him in 2022, to wash away the stink of a failed Urban Meyer marriage, rebuild locker-room morale, and uplift the ailing Lawrence.
On both occasions — in Philly, and then in Jacksonville — Pederson’s everyman presence helped…
Source link : https://www.cbssports.com/nfl/news/trevor-lawrence-cratering-jaguars-are-mirroring-doug-pedersons-sudden-eagles-collapse/
Author : Cody Benjamin
Publish date : 2024-09-24 14:26:50
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