Luck is Not a Popular Word in the NFL but Nick Sirianni Embraced it This Week

Luck is literally a four-letter word.

In the NFL, it’s also figuratively one, essentially a synonym for the not-safe-for-work four-letter ones.

The Eagles work tirelessly to gain even the smallest advantage in a league where winning outside the margins can be the difference between winning and losing each and every week.

At 16-3 (16-1 with Jalen Hurts at quarterback) Philadelphia has done that better than anyone with Super Bowl LVII against the Kansas City Chiefs the final test on Sunday.

Typically, when the word luck is thrown around, like earlier this season when a market correction seemed inevitable for the Eagles when they hit their high-water mark with a plus-15 turnover ratio, it gets balked at.

“I think sometimes there's a tendency for people to think, ‘Oh, they're getting lucky in the turnover category.’ To me, luck has nothing to do with it,” Eagles coach Nick Sirianni said back in November. “We talk about it more than anybody. We live it. We preach it. We rep it. There are fundamentals to it. Our coaches are all over it. Our players are all over it. It's constantly on our mind.

“Nobody thinks about turning the ball over or protecting the football more than we do.”

In that instance, maybe a word like randomness would have gone over a little better but the sentiment behind the thesis turned out to be 100% accurate when that plus-15 was nearly cut in half by the end of the regular season and the Eagles finished plus-8, still good for third best in the NFL.

The team was still living its turnover mantra, preaching it and repping it but the worm turned a bit because statistically it almost had to regress to the mean.

Maybe Sirianni got worn down by the slog of Super Bowl week and getting asked the same questions again and again but the Eagles coach actually referenced “luck” on Wednesday in Arizona when it came to his team’s health entering the big game.

All 53 available Eagles have practiced in some form this week and it even looks like things are trending toward getting punter Arryn Siposs back from a torn deltoid ligament in his ankle for the Super Bowl.

The coach went through his typical explanation of the organization’s year-long plan to feature more mental work with high-speed walkthroughs and liberal maintenance days for veteran players and even younger ones, who have had a troublesome injury history.

“We spend a lot of time thinking about the players’ health and what we can do to keep them healthy, while also getting them ready to play football games,” Sirianni explained. “We have a lot of different people that get me information — our strength coaches, our trainers, our doctors give me information.

“At the end of the day, I have to do what’s best, what I feel is best for the team as far as practice, getting them ready for practice, and everything like that. But, I’m not an expert in those things, so I use the experts’ advice. I got a lot of good people that are giving me information.”

Then it came.

“There’s a little bit of luck to it, also,” the coach admitted before quickly getting back on point.

“But, we work really hard at the nutrition, at the sports science, everything that goes into it to keep the guys healthy because we have a lot of talented players on our roster, but if they’re not available, then their talents can’t be seen.”

It’s no crime to acknowledge that winning a Super Bowl takes a little luck.

The real sentiment when it comes to good fortune was perhaps best expressed by the country's third president Thomas Jefferson.

“I am a great believer in luck,” Jefferson once said, “and I find the harder I work the more I have of it.”

-John McMullen contributes Eagles coverage for SI.com's Eagles Today and is the NFL Insider for JAKIB Media. You can listen to John, alongside legendary sports-talk host Jody McDonald every morning from 8-10 on ‘Birds 365,” streaming live on YouTube. John is also the host of his own show "Football 24/7 and a daily contributor to ESPN South Jersey. You can reach him at jmcmullen44@gmail.com or on Twitter @JFMcMullen