The Philadelphia Eagles made a pretty major change this season when they replaced defensive coordinator Sean Desai with senior assistant Matt Patricia midway through the season. And while it was a necessary change based on the way the defense was playing, that doesn’t mean it’s been easy on the players.
This week, Philadelphia Eagles edge rusher Haason Reddick opened up about how difficult it has been moving from Desai to Patricia in the middle of the season, but acknowledged that the team simply has to be better.
“It’s a hard thing to do,” Reddick said according to Olivia Reiner of the Philadelphia Inquirer. “It’s our job at the end of the day, so it’s not complaints about it. But yes, that was definitely a hard thing, right? You spent so much time with one DC, and learning a new DC at that, at the beginning of the year and trying to learn everything he wants us to do. His terminology. The way that he calls things. And then, you know, toward the end of the season, we switch. But like I said, at the end of the day, it must get done. That’s what the higher-ups here felt was needed to get done in order to try to make a change and get some things corrected. As players, we’ve got to go out there and do our best to perform.”
The Eagles struggled mightily on the defensive side of the ball this past weekend against the Arizona Cardinals in a game where they allowed more yards and points than Arizona has put up all season. We’ll have to see how the team bounces back from that this week and into the playoffs.
