The Philadelphia Eagles might still make the playoffs this season, but the overall feeling surrounding the program is that a new direction is needed. Maybe in management and the coaching staff, and almost definitely in regards to the quarterback.
The gamble of going after Sam Bradford hasn’t paid off. Not that Nick Foles was better, but it’s funny thinking how after a couple of good performances in the preseason there were talks of the Eagles missing out on extending Bradford for small money, and are now going to either lose him or pay more than they could have at the end of the season. Turns out not signing him to a long term deal wasn’t such a big mistake, although things can still change.
Sanchez? He is who he always was. In an offense that asks more than the minimum of him, he’s always going to crash and burn. There might actually be teams around the league who’d consider him to be a starter, but none of them would have any expectations going into the season, and it’ll be just him holding on to a role until someone better comes along for a team that’s going to lose a lot of games.
Bradford is the real disappointment in this one, injured right now but will come back to the field after Thanksgiving against the Detroit Lions. This was his chance to show that the Rams knew what they were doing when they took him at number one overall, and it was all bad luck that he hasn’t made more of his NFL career. But through nine starts, Bradford hasn’t shown he’s worth the wait and the confidence of a franchise for the long term.
And yet in the current quarterback market, who knows, he might still stick around if there’s nothing better to be found. The bigger questions in any case have to do with Chip Kelly and his future. He hasn’t been under this much pressure before, and although he holds a very powerful position in the franchise and probably has a vision that extends beyond whatever happens this season, it won’t be surprising to see him out of a job before he fulfills it.