Eagles Went Deep Into Rolodex With Recent Coaching Hire

PHILADELPHIA - Bobby King is expected to be the new Philadelphia Eagles linebackers coach after a search that featured some bigger and more accomplished names, including former defensive coordinators Joe Barry and Mike Caldwell.

The prevailing thought was that new Eagles defensive coordinator Vic Fangio would be able to put together a more accomplished staff due to his reputation as the Godfather of modern NFL defense.

That sentiment held with hires like Clint Hurtt, who will be handling the defensive line after finishing up a run as Seattle’s DC, and Christian Parker, a 32-year-old future coaching star who will help in the secondary and got interviews for DC jobs with Green Bay and New England during this hiring cycle.

It’s conceivable that King, who spent the past two seasons mentoring inside linebackers in Tennessee, was Fangio’s first choice all along but unlikely.

Barry, the ex-DC in Green Bay, took the job of linebackers/run game coordinator in Miami under Dolphins rookie coordinator Anthony Weaver, who took over for Fangio down in South Florida while Caldwell, a former Eagles’ LB and assistant before peaking as Doug Pederson’s defensive coordinator in Jacksonville, got the same title as Barry with young Las Vegas coach Antonio Pierce.

Another potential candidate, Anthony Campanile – Fangio’s LBs coach in Miami last season – got that same gig with the Packers.

King, meanwhile, doesn’t even have a history with Fangio and his only obvious connection with the Eagles is being a colleague with head coach Nick Sirianni in San Diego back in 2014-2016.

In many ways, the hiring of assistant coaches in the NFL is the most uncharted aspect of the on-field product, the equivalent of the ocean around us. Despite all of our technological advances, National Geographic estimated that a staggering number of “more than 80 percent of the ocean has never been mapped, explored, or even seen by humans.”

The hiring of assistants is done behind closed doors and spun from there. Sirianni and Fangio will ultimately talk up King when the time is right much like the head coach did with one-and-done LB coach D.J. Eliot in the spring of 2023.

Eliot was ditched despite GM Howie Roseman doubling down on Nakobe Dean's long-term potential and expressing how well late-addition Zach Cunningham played during his end-of-season press conference.

You can do the math on your own as far as the direction the Eagles wanted to go with the coaching position.

The question is why did accomplished coaches, some with a history with Fangio, choose situations under bosses with far less cachet?

The answer should be obvious in that the Eagles return little talent at the position with now injury-prone Dean and 2023 undrafted rookie Ben VanSumeren, along with unproven futures deal hopeful Brandon Smith under contract.

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But that’s only part of this equation because Roseman’s devaluation of the position isn’t a secret only known to locals and any LB coach coming to Philadelphia is probably going to be asked to put together a group greater than the sum of its parts.

Sirianni has often said, “Show me a good coach and I’ll show you a bunch of good players.”

The odds of getting good players at LB in Philadelphia are lesser than in many other cities because of the team's roster-building philosophy and that’s why the Eagles have to go deeper in the Rolodex at that position when it comes to the coaching staff.