The New York Giants will be the first team to test out the new-look Philadelphia Eagles defense when the two teams meet on Christmas Day down in the City of Brotherly Love.
The Eagles made a change in leadership on the defensive side of the ball by demoting coordinator Sean Desai and placing him with Matt Patricia as the defensive playcaller.
Giants offensive coordinator Mike Kafka — whose unit has averaged a paltry 15 points per game in their three meetings with Philly — draws the short straw in Week 16.
Giants head coach Brian Daboll knows Patricia well from their time in New England and Kafka spoke about the internal conversations regarding the Eagles’ switch in defensive play calling.
“I think Dabs touched on it a little bit yesterday but with Patricia now calling it and Sean (Desai) over the first half of the season, there’s some similarities, a lot of similarities,” Kafka said.
“Obviously, the personnel there, it stays consistent. Coach Patricia — I think there was a couple things that might have felt a little bit different, now into the second week, probably could anticipate a little bit more of things kind of being changed up. We’ve got to be ready for everything. Going to prep through — go through our schemes, go through our personnel groupings, and make sure we’re tied up there.”
The Giants are approaching it like they would any other situation they would encounter with any other opponent.
“You try to gather as much data as you can from this last week and see if there’s any tendencies there and then look at kind of the scope of the season and see where things have kind of been played through as well,” Kafka said,
“Again, when you have a new play caller, there’s a little bit of unknown and that’s okay, but we prepare our guys the best we can and get them ready for Monday.”
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