It smells like planting season right now in the NFL, as head coaches and assistant coordinators are being mulched and recycled all over the league.
The latest moves: an unusual swap of offensive coordinators— the Atlanta Falcons hired Dirk Koetter from Jacksonville to replace Mike Mularkey only four days after the Jaguars introduced Mularkey as their new head coach.
Mularkey, whose Falcons offense was shut out in a 24-2 playoff loss to the New York Giants last week, was introduced as Jacksonville’s coach on Wednesday. He hired former Falcons quarterbacks coach Bob Bratkowski to be his offensive coordinator.
The Falcons hired Koetter despite the Jaguars ranking last in the league in total offense and yards passing in 2011. Koetter’s offense ranked 29th with its average of 15.2 points per game. Koetter was hired as Jacksonville’s offensive coordinator in 2007. He worked with Falcons coach Mike Smith for one year. Smith was the Jaguars’ defensive coordinator before he became Atlanta’s head coach in 2008.
The Falcons are still looking to replace defensive coordinator Brian VanGorder, who moved back to the college ranks to head Auburn’s defense.
What does all this mean to the Eagles? For one thing, I sure as heck appreciate Marty Mornhinweg a lot more as an offensive coordinator when I look at Dirk Koetter’s body of work… I mean, other than a few good years at Boise State, what experience can Koetter possibly bring to the Falcons that would improve their offense beyond what he produced in Jacksonville? What new ideas can he implement? Run more no-huddle? Throw more to Julio Jones? I just don’t understand the hire…
To the Eagles it also means there’s going to be a lot of potential opportunities for movement among all of their assistant coaches, including guys like Jim Washburn (who may wish to rejoin Jeff Fisher in St. Louis), Marty, and even Juan Castillo (who is reported to be sought after by the Vikings—but not sure whether it’s on the offensive or defensive side)… and it also makes the availability of Spags as a new defensive assistant even that much more of a sweepstakes.
As a footnote to all the movement of coaches around the league, here’s a take on which impending Free Agent Players the Eagles need to decide upon keeping or letting go.
Derek Landri (DT) is a guy I would like to bring back for 2012… but the Eagles may have other plans.
The great hard-working Jason B of Bleeding Green Nation put out the perfunctory list of Eagles Free Agents who are on the line for 2012. Since I can’t improve upon or disagree with the factual nature of this list, here it is in a nutshell:
To start, here is the list of pending free agents: DE Victor Abiamiri, RB Ronnie Brown, DT Antonio Dixon, OT King Dunlap, WR DeSean Jackson, DT Derek Landri, DT Trevor Laws, G Evan Mathis, DE Juqua Parker, FB Owen Schmitt, WR Steve Smith, QB Vince Young.
Jason then breaks the list down into the following categories:
Bring them back:
Evan Mathis – Might be the most important pending free agent. He had a fantastic year and made himself a vital part of the line’s success going forward.
Derek Landri – Made the most out of absolutely every snap he got this season and was one of the most productive DTs in football on a per snap basis. He’s certainly earned another contract.
DeSean Jackson – Money will be the big issue here. If Jackson and Rosenhaus want Larry Fitzgerald money, there’s a decent chance he’s gone. But we don’t know how that will work out yet. At this point all I can say is that I think he does play an important role on this team, his production would not be easily replaced and I’d like to see him back.
Antonio Dixon – His loss was a very underrated part of the reason why the Eagles struggled against the run so often this season. Plus, his play last season had to be part of the impetus for trading Brodrick Bunkley prior to this year. Bunkley went on to have a good season in Denver, but Dixon flat outplayed him in 2010. I’m interested to see what he brings to the DL rotation when he’s healthy next year.
Indifference:
King Dunlap – King has done a really good job when asked to fill in at time over these past two seasons. This is clearly a guy that has put in the work since his rookie season when he looked like he’d be completely useless. Line depth is important so King certainly has value, but a backup is a backup so I can’t call him a “must bring back.”
Owen Schmitt – He’s done a perfectly acceptable job as the Eagles FB over these past couple seasons. If he’s back, fine. If they want to try to upgrade, I’m fine with that too.
Let ‘Em Walk:
Victor Abiamiri, Ronnie Brown, Vince Young – These all need no explanation…
Steve Smith – I would not be at all surprised to see Steve Smith have a resurgence next year. He came off a terrible knee injury suffered late in 2010 and clearly looked like a shell of himself in 2011. Maybe he’ll never get back to his Pro Bowl level, but next year he’ll be two years removed from microfracture knee injury and should be more productive than he was here. All that said… he can do it somewhere else.
Trevor Laws – He’s really shown flashes of being a disruptive player in the middle, but in your fourth year you need to be showing more than flashes. I was really close to putting Laws in the “indifference” category, but looking at the DT position on the team, it’s hard to see where he’d even fit.
Juqua Parker – He’s given 7 years of solid service to the Eagles and I certainly appreciate that. However, he’s going to be 34 this year. He had trouble staying healthy and assuming Brandon Graham comes into next year ready, it’s really hard to see a place for him on the squad.
Looking at this list again, I might want to try to change Jason’s mind about letting Trevor Laws go… That would be my biggest concern about losing a guy who may be ready to reach his peak performance as a defensive lineman. I’ve seen Laws make big plays in isolated moments over the past two years. He certainly would be snapped up by another franchise the moment his name hit the FA wires.
But cases like these are where you have to trust your Personnel and coaching professionals. The Eagles have inside data based on medical reports and game film evaluation which armchairs like me will never get to see. For all of our intuitive feel and understanding of the game, we are lacking in hard data. Admitting that fact, I just go with a feel for the guys I like…and I like the idea of going to war in 2012 with Landri…and Laws…together again at DT, if it is meant to be.
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