They did right by Doug Pederson on Sunday — the Eagles, their fans, the players here who knew him best. The Jacksonville Jaguars came jogging out of a tunnel at Lincoln Financial Field, and cameras found Pederson to flash his image on the giant video screens behind the end zones. Then those screens cut to a shot of the Eagles' only Super Bowl banner, the one that Pederson helped them hang as their head coach, and everyone in the bleachers gave Pederson the standing ovation that anyone who knows anything about Philadelphia sports fans knew he would receive.
"It was great. Was great," Pederson said. "Great crowd, great welcome. It was good."
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And then it was finished, and the Eagles got on with continuing what is shaping up to be their best season since that enchanted 2017-18 run under Pederson. The substance of Sunday was their 29-21 victory over the Jaguars, the five Trevor Lawrence turnovers they forced, the 210 rushing yards they racked up through a driving rain, the resilience they showed after falling behind by 14 points. But the style of the win and their 4-0 start made for a stronger connective thread to their former coach, because it's becoming easier to pick up on the similarities between that team and his one, between the man who coached them then and the man who is coaching them now.
The circumstances and coincidences are crazy to consider. A head coach who had never been a head coach before the Eagles hired him. A head coach in his second season, with a quarterback in his second full season as a starter, with an offense versatile and deep enough to play however it has to. A guy with a personality that cuts against all the everlasting stereotypes of someone charged with running an NFL team: a guy who's affable, who's often unguarded, who's open, a players' coach. That was Pederson. That is Nick Sirianni. That team won a championship. This team is the last one without a loss in the league.
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For the justifiable reasons to criticize Jeffrey Lurie and Howie Roseman that have come up over the years — their contributions to the dissolution of the Carson Wentz-Pederson pairing, for instance — say this for them: They sure seem to know how to spot the right kind of coach for the modern NFL. It's not just that Sirianni keeps validating his hire with each game, with his smart offensive mind and ability to reach his players in the right ways. It's that Pederson, after a year away from coaching, keeps proving that his success with the Eagles should never for an instant have been regarded as a fluke.
The Jaguars are 2-2, which for that sad-sack franchise might be enough to command a celebratory parade along the city's Southbank Riverwalk, and through all of Lawrence's errors Sunday, they kept coming after the Eagles. They play for Pederson, just like his previous team did.
"I have so much respect for Coach Pederson," Sirianni said. "First and foremost, I've heard that he's one of the best people in this game, from multiple outlets: people in this building, people who have played for him, people I know who have coached with him. He's a top-notch person, and obviously, you see what he's doing with his football team. That's a tough team. That's a good football team. And he's got them confident and believing.
"The best compliment I can give is, 'Hey, your team is really well-coached.' So I like to pay that compliment to guys I feel that about and there's no doubt in my mind that the Jacksonville Jaguars are in really good hands with Coach Pederson."
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The residue of Pederson's five years with the Eagles was obvious in the loyalty and respect his former players paid him. "I told him, 'I thank you because you're the reason I'm here,'" Jalen Hurts said, referring to Pederson's encouraging the Eagles to pick Hurts in the second round of the 2020 draft. After the game, Pederson lingered on the field with Jason Kelce and Lane Johnson, the latter remembering the support that Pederson lent him when Johnson was at his lowest point, struggling with depression and other mental-health issues.
"Little bit emotional, man," Johnson said. "Spent a lot of my good years with Doug. I felt like he was a guy who was really instrumental in bringing me back from the abyss, so to speak. Any time I was down and needed an encouraging word, he was there. I felt like he might have seen himself a little bit in me, kind of being from the same region, similar mannerisms. You miss him. Anybody who comes in and wins a championship and lays his heart on the line for the team, you have a tremendous amount of respect for him.
"Me and Kelce got a little teary-eyed. It was the first time I've seen him since everything took place. You just wish him the best. Hell of a coach, and a hell of a person."
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Two NFC East titles, three playoff appearances, four playoff victories, a night in Minneapolis in February 2018 that no one here will forget: In his return to Philadelphia, Doug Pederson got the reception and recognition he deserved, only to have his old team take its latest and most impressive step toward matching what he achieved. Hell of a run then. Hell of a shot now.
