The Philadelphia Eagles haven’t finished putting together their staff yet. In fact, the Eagles won’t even officially announce who they have hired until the entire staff is finished. But Philadelphia took another step towards finishing it by hiring a new quarterbacks coach, according to ESPN on Jan. 29.
The Eagles have gone right back to hiring college coaches, as they reportedly picked up Virginia Cavaliers offensive coordinator Bill Lazor to manage their quarterbacks. But unlike new Philadelphia head coach Chip Kelly, Lazor had NFL experience before going to college.
In fact, he was the quarterbacks coach of the Washington Redskins and Seattle Seahawks from 2006 to 2009 -- before they got game-changers like Robert Griffin III and Russell Wilson. Lazor then spent three years running Virginia’s offense, which was enough to bring him back to the pro level.
However, Lazor can only excel if he has the right personnel, and no one knows who that might be yet. Whether Lazor will work with Michael Vick, Nick Foles, both of them or someone new has not been determined, and might not be for several weeks. As such, picking a coach was really the easy part for the Eagles.
But before they can make their final decisions on players, the Eagles have to finish crafting their coaching staff. It seems to be mostly set, with Pat Shurmur likely to be confirmed as offensive coordinator once everyone else is hired.
The biggest puzzle piece left for Philadelphia is at defensive coordinator, with candidates like Ed Donatell, Ted Marachino and Billy Davis in the running. Yet with Donatell and Marachino on the staffs of the San Francisco 49ers and Baltimore Ravens, the Eagles likely won’t make a choice until after the Super Bowl.
Even if Philadelphia isn’t ready to fill that big piece yet, it still had smaller ones to take care of in the meantime. Now that Lazor seems to have filled this void, the Eagles have much bigger ones to fill in order to make his new job easier.
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