Doug Pederson Returns to Team, Looks Ahead
Ten days after Doug Pederson told his team that he had tested positive for the coronavirus, he returned to practice on Wednesday.
The Eagles coach was on hand as the training camp shifted from phase one to phase two, with players now allowed to wear helmets and shells. Phase one was just conditioning and brief walkthroughs, often with the offense and defensive units separate from each other.
“I obviously didn’t want to miss any time if I didn’t have to, but I stayed engaged virtually with the team,” said Pederson during a videoconference call on Wednesday afternoon when asked how he spent his self-quarantine. “I was able to watch the practices and stay up on everything that we did and still run the team from my home.
“I think that’s something the offseason taught us, taught me, how to do that virtually. But at the same time, I was chomping, I was ready to get back here and be on the grass with the players.”
As Pederson ran team virtually, assistant head coach/running backs coach Duce Staley ran the day-to-day activities.
Pederson was just the second NFL coach to test positive. New Orleans Saints coach Sean Payton tested positive in the spring but has also since returned to work.
The Eagles were supposed to play their first preseason game on Thursday, but that, nor the other three exhibition contests will happen, due to COVID-19.
Pederson said the eagles would have been ready to play at the Indianapolis Colts on Thursday if there wasn’t a pandemic.
“We’ve put in our entire offense and defense,” said the coach. “It’s already installed. We’re working through situational football now. We’re working through all the different scenarios even though we’re doing walkthroughs and we’re doing classroom.
“We’ve had time with these players even on the grass, we’ve had time with our rookies this past week. So, we’re not really playing catch up. The only thing we missed really is probably just the live practices that we would have had under a normal situation.
“We’re not really playing catch up, we’re just enhancing what we have moving forward.”
That may be an advantage for the Eagles since this is Pederson’s fifth season, whereas in Washington, Dallas, and New York, new coaches may not be as up to quite up to speed as they would be without the pandemic.
Phase three of the training camp begins Monday, and that is when players will put on pads for the first time.
Pederson said he isn’t planning too much different. He will still do two periods of live situational football once the pads come on, however, he will need to find out quickly about some of the newcomers to the team.
“Obviously, the guys we have in the starter roles, the starting positions, making sure they’re in the right frame of mind, their bodies are conditioned,” said Pederson. “They are the things we have to know in the next few weeks leading up to the first game.
"The second thing we need to know, is the new additions to the team, the free agents, the draft picks, the undrafted guys, those are the guys we have to have our answers on as coaches, so as we continue throughout the process and we begin to put pads on those are some of the answers that we’re going to get leading up to that first regular-season week.”
Translation: Things will begin moving fast and furiously, with the regular-season beginning in one month against the Washington Football Team, and Pederson will be there for all of the preparations, provided another positive test for COVID-19 does not emerge.
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