Ready or Not, Expect Chauncey Gardner-Johnson vs. Lions

PHILADELPHIA - The regular season is here and if you needed evidence of that Coordinator Day at the NovaCare Complex provided all the proof you could ever need.

Jonathan Gannon, Michel Clay, and Shane Steichen each had their weekly briefing in advance of Sunday’s season opener in Detroit and each was minding his Ps and Qs when it came to the idea of competitive advantage, something head coach Nick Sirianni stresses.

In Gannon’s case, the defensive coordinator was playing it coy when it came to recent acquisition Chauncey Gardner-Johnson, who is expected to start at safety opposite Marcus Epps against the Lions on the back end of the Philadelphia defense.

“Everybody is a little bit different with that,” Gannon said when asked how you set a player ready to go on short notice. "D.K. [Assistant Defensive Backs Coach D.K. McDonald] and D-Will [Defensive Passing Game Coordinator/Defensive Backs Dennard Wilson] are obviously spending a little more time with him to try to get him caught up.

“But [Gardner-Johnson is] very smart. He's intelligent. His skill set fits to what we want to do, and when he's ready to play, he'll play.”

Part of the urgency to get Garner-Johnson up to speed as quickly as possible is because the Eagles don't have any proven commodities behind him.

The most likely placeholder is K’Von Wallace, a player some thought would be released at the cut to 53. After him, it’s undrafted rookie Reed Blankenship and nickel corner turned safety Josiah Scott, who has missed recent practices with a hamstring injury.

Previous starter Anthony Harris, who was released when the Eagles acquired Gardner-Johnson, initially agreed to join the Eagles practice squad before doing a 180 and asking out. He would have been a likely elevation against the Lions as an insurance policy but that option is now out the window.

“You guys know I love Anthony and he's done great job for us and helped us a lot last year,” Gannon said, “but when we had the chance to add Chauncey that's what we decided to do. That kind of went into the decision of letting him go.

“I wish Anthony the best, but feel really good about that room.”

While Gardner-Johnson will be the guy against the Lions, a formed Eagles defensive coach estimated the package Gardner-Johnson will be working with at about 70% of the defensive call sheet with 10 or 15 hours of extra time put in by the coaches and the player himself.

“The way it usually works is that the position coaches [in this case Wilson and McDonald] will put together a scaled-down install and [McDonald] will monitor as [Gannon and Wilson] finish the planning for the [Lions],” the former coach explained.

Gannon also admitted that Gardner-Johnson will not be able to ingest the entire defense in 10 when asked that by SI Eagles Today on Tuesday.

“I think from the standpoint of once he gets something, like any player, once he gets a concept and gets a call, then you move on and you see there will always be sticking points of, well, there's a lot of adjustments in this call," sad the DC. "Maybe we steer clear of that one. Or, ‘Hey, we know we're going to need this call, we have to learn this one.’

“Certain calls are a little bit easier than other ones, and it's just - your kind of instincts of being a coach, hey, he's ready for this or he isn't ready for this, and then you make the decision and go.”

-John McMullen contributes Eagles coverage for SI.com's Eagles Today and is the NFL Insider for JAKIB Sports. You can listen to John, alongside legendary sports-talker Jody McDonald, every morning from 8-10 on ‘Birds 365,” streaming live on YouTube.com and JAKIBSports.com. You can reach John at jmcmullen44@gmail.com or on Twitter @JFMcMullen