Yes, Jeff Lurie says, the Eagles’ coaching search was exhaustive.
So exhaustive that it began … before Chip Kelly was even fired.
Lurie said Tuesday that he actually began preparing to find Kelly’s successor before he fired Kelly on Dec. 29 with one game left in the regular season.
This is part of what Lurie said at his press conference when asked about the search process.
“In this process, we started with about 25 candidates that we completely researched, analyzed, vetted, however you want to describe it,” he said.
“And that research started during the season — at some point late in the season — and it gave us some time to — if we needed to go this direction — be fully prepared for the search process.”
If we needed to go in this direction?
In other words … Lurie began looking for a new head coach while he still had a head coach.
This is astonishing for a few reasons, mostly because anybody who has worked in an office knows that word travels quickly from one desk to another.
If Lurie was already in the process of seeking replacements, there’s a chance Kelly knew that.
Plus, word also travels quickly around the NFL. If Lurie or someone else on the search committee were making calls around the league to inquire about various potential candidates, it’s hard to imagine word wouldn’t ultimately get back to Kelly regarding what was up.
What kind of atmosphere is that for a coach to succeed?
Lurie was asked near the end of his presser to clarify his comments and was asked if he were genuinely looking for a new head coach before pulling the plug on Kelly.
He said no. But then he seemed to indicate otherwise.
“The research started,” he said. “I've always been one to feel you have to have research started long before you ever make a final decision, because that research is the key.
“You've got to do the legwork or you're going to be making it off of names.You've got to have, you know, so much detail of information, conversations planned, who you're going to talk to about candidate No. 14. Who are the connections that really know how that coach was when he was a coach or an assistant coach or whatever it was? Who are the players that played for him? Who are the general managers that he worked with? Waybe potentially owners.”
Lurie fired Kelly with the Eagles sitting at 6-9. They beat the Giants the last day of the season under interim coach Pat Shurmur.
The Eagles hired Pederson last week and introduced him in a press conference on Tuesday (see story).
Lurie said the research he did while Kelly was still in his role as head coach helped the search committee of Lurie, executive vice president of football operations Howie Roseman and team president Don Smolenski once Kelly actually was fired.
“You've got to have it all planned out,” Lurie said. “We were ready to roll by the time a final decision was made on Chip and that gave us … an advantage in terms of research.”