Eagles dropped ball by consulting Ron Jaworski about coaching hire

I COME HERE not to bury Ron Jaworski. He is a far more prolific football analyst, golf course developer, and product pitchman than the average man, certainly more so than the threesome who apparently invited him to sit in on their interviews as they searched for the next head coach of the Eagles. Had I been charged with selecting that coach, I'm not sure that I would have had any less confidence in Jaws than I would have had in Jeffrey Lurie or Howie Roseman. In fact, one can argue that he was the most qualified guy in the room.

That being said . . .

You may be aware that the Eagles began their head-coaching search with a bit of a credibility problem. To call them rudderless would be to suggest that they set sail with some charted course. Their owner's most recent news conference sounded like an unsuccessful audition for a TEDx talk. The qualifications he listed for his new head coach read like a Google translation of "Chicken Soup for the Soul." As he outlined his vision for his NFL franchise, he seemed to be channeling some bizarre combination of Jane Seymour and Vanilla Ice. Collaborate, listen, and open your heart.

In hindsight, it should not have come as a surprise that the offensive minds Lurie has long craved were reluctant to open their hearts to him. Over the last five years, his franchise has quietly entered the ranks of the NFL's most dysfunctional, encroaching on territory once firmly controlled by cities like Oakland and Detroit and Miami. Any candidate with other options surely entered his interview with serious questions about the overall direction of the organization. And there to address the questions that Lurie and Roseman could not answer was . . .

Jaws?

Really? Ron Jaworski? A guy who has never stood on the sidelines as an NFL coach? A guy who has never held an official title in an NFL front office? A guy who sends me emails every day about deals on tee times? Even if my friends are correct and it is not actually him at the computer?

Hey, maybe Adam Gase is a big Jaworski fan. Maybe he doesn't miss an episode of "NFL Matchup." Maybe he listened to Jaws declare on the radio in 2014 that Russell Wilson was "not particularly close" to being as good as Nick Foles and he said to himself, "You know, the man's got a point." Maybe Gase agreed with Jaworski's proclamation that Colin Kaepernick might soon establish himself as an all-time great.

But what if he didn't? What if he walked into the interview room and came face-to-face with a guy whom he regarded as just another average NFL quarterback turned talking head? What if, every time Jaworski asked a question, Gase thought to himself, "How in the world is this guy asking me to defend my offensive scheme? Does he really know more than me about what it takes to run an NFL team?" Maybe Gase entered the interview with a profound respect for Jaworski's ability to deliver Philadelphia's only professional football championship since 1960, even though it was with the Soul. Or maybe he spent the whole time thinking about another former quarterback who once hired him in Denver and said to himself, "My man, this ain't the arena league."

Again, the issue isn't Jaworski's football knowledge. He has 20-plus years of experience with the league, some of it firsthand. He has been far more successful at his job than at least one of the three members of the Eagles' official search committee. But that's kind of the point. The Eagles weren't simply deciding if candidates like Gase were right for them; they were trying to show that they had more to offer than teams like the Giants and the Dolphins. They knew that Roseman's reputation and personnel track record raised eyebrows around the league. They knew that their lack of patience with Chip Kelly had the potential to make prospective coaches wonder about what kind of benefit of the doubt they would receive. And bringing in a guy on TV was the best they could do?

Again, think about what a coach like Gase might think if he considered the nature of Jaworski's position as an NFL analyst. The Foles and Kaepernick examples are obvious cherry-picks, but don't you think there's a chance that a head coach might have some trepidation about working in a situation where a guy who offers such opinions has the ear of the owner? If you are an NFL head coach, are you really comfortable knowing that Jaworski's analysis of your performance has the very real potential of impacting your fate?

As far as I can tell, the Dolphins did not include Dan Marino in their interview process and the Giants did not think to ask Phil Simms. Lurie and Roseman scrolled through their lists of contacts and landed on Jaworski. With all due respect to the man, think about what that means.

On Twitter: @ByDavidMurphy

Blog: philly.com/Eaglesblog