Matt Burke Likes his Depth at Defensive End

It was 2004 when Jim Schwartz, working in Tennessee as the Titans’ defensive coordinator at the time, called a relatively unknown college assistant, Matt Burke, then a 26-year-old recent Dartmouth graduate, and asked him to fly to Nashville to interview for an opening as a quality control coach.

Burke, who was on the staff at Harvard when his phone rang, knew that opportunity was knocking. He planned on answering the door then slamming it shut, so after he got the job, he slept in his office for a couple of months until he found an apartment. Even after he did find a place to live, Burke still slept in his office several times a week, grinding away, working, by his estimation, 100 hours a week for two years.

“My whole philosophy was this is my opportunity, I’m not letting it go,” said Burke, who joined the Eagles last year as a defensive special assistant after being let go as the defensive coordinator of the Miami Dolphins. “This was pure luck that Jim tracked me down, somehow, and made that phone call initially. The sell job for me was I’m going to make sure once I’m in, I’m not letting anybody takes this away from me.

“I got the opportunity, for whatever reason that was, and I wasn’t going to let that go.”

Burke, who was elevated to defensive line coach this season, was brought in, he said, as a “new set of eyes” for Schwartz.

The two have a long history.

When Schwartz left Tennessee to become the head coach for the Detroit Lions in 2009, he took Burke with him to be the linebacker coach. After five seasons there, Burke went to the Bengals as an LB coach for two seasons before heading to Miami, first as an LB coach then the DC in 2017 and 2018.

He took his opportunity and ran with it, which is a message his new charges inside the DL meeting room are likely to hear, if they haven’t already, players still trying to carve a name for themselves in the NFL, such as Shareef Miller, Joe Ostman, Genard Avery, Casey Toohill, Anthony Rush, and Raequan Williams.

They are the ones with opportunity now.

It’s a crowded roster on the defensive line, so some of those aforementioned players are really going have to throw their weight into that door to nudge it open. Waiting on the other side will be a spot on the 53-man roster.

There are even 16 practice squad spots available, though how many of those will go to a D-lineman is too early to say.

Burke is an enviable spot, with a talented and versatile group of defensive linemen.

It starts at tackle with Fletcher Cox, Malik Jackson, Javon Hargrave, and Hassan Ridgeway. Sprinkle in ends Brandon Graham and Derek Barnett, and that’s a good start for a new position coach.

“The closest gap to the quarterback is the A gap, it’s the most direct, you can get into your pressure with those guys that tends to affect the quarterbacks a lot, so to have three-plus accomplished guys having shown they can win those interiors rushes is going to be huge,” said Burke.

Burke said the flexibility they have will allow him to move them around week-to-week to create favorable matchups, even within a game, they can adjust.

The personnel gets a bit more unproven on the outside after Graham and Barnett but adding Vinny Curry recently to the mix will add more experience. Still, there is opportunity for some.

There’s a lot of depth there and I think it’s going to be, hey, we’re all going to get opportunity,” said Burke of his exterior players. “We’re looking for guys who can be three-down players. We’re looking for guys to come out and be able to play hard, set edges in the run game and be able to rush the passer.

“That’s the foundation of what we do at defensive end here, so that’s going to be the starting point for everything we’re asking those guys to do.”

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