Nick Sirianni joined Eagles Insider Dave Spadaro for his first interview as the team's head coach. This discussion covered several topics including his blueprint for building the foundation of the team.
Here are six other takeaways from the Q&A:
• On the first week of the job: "What a phenomenal organization," Sirianni said. "I just felt that from Day 1 of the interview process. Great people that just care about the Philadelphia Eagles, care about winning, and care about people. It's just a special place. I can feel that. The coaches that we have here can feel that. It's just been a great couple first days."
• The initial priority is to build a coaching staff: "My biggest job is to bring together a staff that I know are good people, good teachers, good coaches. Putting together a staff is by far the main thing right now."
• One of those coaches will be Defensive Coordinator Jonathan Gannon, who was the defensive backs coach with the Indianapolis Colts: "You got a really high-energy coordinator in Jonathan Gannon and his excitement and his energy and his juice level and his passion for the game, it's contagious," Sirianni said. "So I think that's going to rub off on everybody. If you get a defense playing, the way I know that I've seen guys play for Jonathan Gannon in the last three years, you better be on it offensively or you're going to get exposed, because they're going to be so juiced up, that you better be juiced up. That will not only make the defense better, but also the offense as a counterpoint as well, just a ton of respect for him as a coach, coaching the fundamentals, and then his ability to scheme. I think you're just getting a good leader. You're getting a good coach of fundamentals, and you're getting a guy that knows how to scheme. I believe that our players will be in really good position to make plays."
• Sirianni feels "great" about the quarterback position in Philadelphia with Carson Wentz and Jalen Hurts: "You look at a lot of rosters and they don't have any quarterbacks, right, that they feel really good about. We have two. That's unbelievable to have two quarterbacks who have played and that have played well," he said. "I couldn't have watched more tape on Carson Wentz in 2018. When Frank and I got back together, when we were installing our offense with the Indianapolis Colts, we watched a lot of Chargers tape, and we watched a lot of Philadelphia Eagles tape from 2017. Man, what an impressive player. He's got so much talent, and from what I've heard from everybody, great person. Good talent, good person, it takes your game to really high levels. So excited. Jalen got his snaps last year and was able to play last year and he played good football in meaningful games. Not a lot of people have that luxury of having two quarterbacks that have experience, so super excited to be able to work with them because, obviously, we all know how important that position is to a football team."
• Sirianni confirms that he will call plays on offense. What will be the scheme? "It's all about who the player is and what they do well," he said. "What we ran in Indianapolis with Andrew Luck and Jacoby Brissett and Philip Rivers, it was different. What do they do best? That's what you want to do. What do your receivers do best? That's what you want to do. What does your offensive line do best with your back? That's what you want to do, so the book's not written there yet. We have some core things in place that we want to be able to do both offensively and defensively. But this next week, we're evaluating our team and figuring out who they are. That's where we can kind of identity who we are even a little bit more."
• On collaborating with Howie Roseman: "Howie and his staff have done a great job of organizing this team. It's a good, talented team, so how do those pieces fit in the things that we want to do? Then we need to adapt to the players that we have. ... I think when there's that communication between the coaching staff and the scouting department of what we are looking for in players, and also take that a step further, how we would use that skill set that pulls everybody on the same page? I can't wait to start doing that and can't wait to start working with Howie and his staff to bring in really good players that love football to Philadelphia."
Get an up-close look at new Eagles Head Coach, Nick Sirianni.