I just heard the news: Spagnuolo is heading to the Saints. How depressing!
After an extraordinarily long season of sub-par football in the city of Philadelphia, I was hoping the off-season would start on a better note. It’s been two weeks since Jeff Lurie announced that Andy Reid would be returning to coach the Eagles. Two long weeks of wondering what would be decided about the fate of D-coordinator Juan Castillo. Two weeks of hoping that I would read the headline Spags to the Birds.
Instead, it has been two weeks of nothing. Andy Reid hasn’t said a thing!
You know, I would love to like Andy Reid…in the past I have been one of his biggest supporters, but it kills me that he just doesn’t seem to get Philadelphia or its’ fans. I am a dyed in the wool, bleeding midnight green eagles fan. In many ways, I am consumed by this team! I find myself scouring the usual internet pages soaking up any news I can find about my beloved Eagles. Sometime I feel like my brain is going to explode from the constant thinking about the upcoming season (which is a whole eights months away from starting). And it bothers me greatly that Andy doesn’t show the same emotion. I mean, does this guy know that he has the world’s GREATEST job (outside of actually playing for the team)?
Maybe he’s not an emotional guy….maybe he’s burning with the desire to do nothing else but win the Lombardi for the greatest city in the world….maybe he’s sitting in his house thinking of a coordinated nuclear attack on the other 31 teams in the NFL so that we can stand alone at the top (OK, maybe that was going too far!)…I don’t know. What I do know is that I (personally) feel a strong sense of urgency about getting back to the Super Bowl and winning that silver trophy, and so does every other Eagles fan on the planet. I have often said that the day Philly wins the Superbowl, is the day it ceases to exist. There will be a party like the world has never seen before!
But Andy doesn’t get it, and until he does, I fear he will never get a Superbowl.
A couple of weeks ago, I was sitting in my office waiting to hear the Jeff Lurie post-season press conference. Truth be told, I was so hoping to hear Lurie say that he had hired Bill Cowher (current NFL game analyst and former Pittsburgh Steelers Superbowl-winning head coach) to replace Reid as the head coach for the birds, but it wasn’t meant to be. Why Cowher? Because I always got the sense that he was gonna come off the sideline and rip somebody’s head off if his team wasn’t performing. He was always so intense and I always saw that competitive fire in him that I never see from the big guy.
Ultimately, I think that Andy is a good football coach with an amazing head for the game. But Andy doesn’t get it. He lacks the fire that needs to be seen by the team and it’s fans. He doesn’t share the heart of the city, and unfortunately I think his time with the Eagles will end after another disappointing season…
….but here’s to hoping that I’m wrong!