JEFFREY LURIE: It's been a while since we could do this in person and it's so much better. I feel that in every way. And always look forward to these. And thank you, all, for coming. And get a chance to talk about the NFL, Philadelphia Eagles and football in general.
First of all, we're all here because I think we love American football. And it's more popular than ever. It's unbelievable what's happened over the last few years. And I think you know, 48 of the top 50 television shows are NFL games. 91 of the top 100 television shows are NFL games. And I think there's a variety of reasons for it of why the ratings and everything is so popular.
But it's the only sport where small markets and big markets have an equal chance left in the world. And that is a big foundation of what's happened across the country with the NFL. Yes, it's a great sport; it's amazing. But fans want to know that their team has an equal chance wherever you're from. And that's one of the great things that the NFL has going for it. And the other thing that I think is so, I hope we never experience it again, but what's so starkly important is that as great as NFL is, as great as the sport is, without the fans, it is a much lesser experience. And we literally had a year of that a year ago.
And, yes, it's still great on television. It's an amazing television sport. But the reason we all grew up loving it so much is because you're with your fellow fans. And that's what makes it great. So it was an interesting dichotomy that happened unintentionally with the pandemic. But wow, I think anyone who thinks that it's just so brilliant because the sport is so great, no, it's great because the fans are so intensely in love with it. And it's a mutual thing.
But that's why it's a great sport. Without the fans in the stadiums and in every way, it's lesser. And I think all of us that are part of it, whether you're covering it or operating in it need to have the humility to realize that fans are the basis of why we're all here and why it's so successful.
That's like, I don't know how much more to say to that. In Philly we got the most intense and wonderful fans anybody could ever imagine. And I've said it before, I'm very lucky to have been able to own a team in a city that loves football and loves the Eagles as much as they do. And it's not the case every single market. But without the fans and the intensity, a lot of it is lost.
That being said, I want to say a couple of things. In 2018, the NFL allowed the teams to come up with an alternate jersey. We really wanted to go back to the classic Eagles green, Kelly green jersey. But we wanted to do it the right way. And the right way was to have a matching helmet. And for whatever different reasons existed, it wasn't until June of this past year, in 2021, that the NFL has allowed us to come up with a second helmet.
So I'm here to announce that beginning in the 2023 season, we're going to have the Kelly classic green Eagles jersey and matching helmet and do it the right way. And it's what our fans have wanted. It's what we've wanted, and we're going to be able to introduce that for that season.
And it's going to be, if you all, which I know you do, you remember the '90s and '80s with Randall and Reggie and Jerome and Seth and Clyde and everybody, it's going to be that uniform, and it's going to be as identical to what that existed as possible. And we're working with Nike to make it happen.
We wish we could deliver it right away, but it takes about a two-year process -- and with the material that it's going to be utilized in 2023, they don't have that in their palette. I can't wait. We'll have a way to introduce it and unveil it all. But 2023 season we're going to have the Kelly green classic Eagles green uniform and helmet.
We're also allowed, in the meantime, to have that second helmet. So what we're going to do for this season is to have a black helmet because we have a black jersey. And our players love wearing black. And they love all black. And so we're going to match the black jersey with a black helmet. And that will be this coming season.
Yeah, it's true, we may not be able to continue with that in '23 once we introduce the classic Eagles green, Kelly green, but we're going to try. We're going to try to convince the league that a third helmet and a third matching-jersey-to-helmet is to the benefit of us, our fans and everybody else, because I think we love that, too.
Anyway, can't wait to unveil all these plans but I want all our fans to know we've listened to you. We've wanted this from the beginning when we were able to. And 2023 is when we'll have the introduction of the classic Eagles green, the Kelly green, and this year black, that's the way that's going to go.
I couldn't help but think about John Clayton coming here this year. Somebody I was close to and admired. And he shares the love of the game. He shared the love of the game, the love of the sport, covering the sport in such a high integrity way. He was a pleasure for me as a young owner to deal with 25 years ago. And throughout his life and it was a little shocking to hear that he passed away, and I just can't come here and not remember John a little bit, because great, great guy.
Q. Your thoughts about Howie Roseman and your thoughts about Fletcher and Derek Barnett. Let's start with Howie. What went behind giving Howie another contract.
JEFFREY LURIE: In all the ways of evaluating a general manager, it is truly a broad position. And you're managing a lot of information, a lot of departments, and it's a very important leadership position in an organization. And in all the ways of looking at it, whether it be how to best organize all those departments, how collaborative, how effective with other general managers in the league, talent acquisition, there's always sort of a controversy over hitting and missing on a draft pick. I have to deal with the reality of how did we evaluate the players. What were we seeking to acquire? You only end up with a small sample in the draft.
A lot of it is based on who the other teams took before you. So I have to be the one that makes the much harder decision of were we evaluating the players appropriately, were we gathering enough information from all sorts, were we collaborating enough in different departments. And just in every way Howie deserves a lot of credit.
Obviously over the last five years we've been in the playoffs four of the five years and won a Super Bowl. He's really good at building a roster and rebuilding a roster. And he's very, very well regarded in the league. And it's always a hard decision to take every single instance and evaluate it and it was a pretty easy decision to make when it came to really looking at the facts.
People like to concentrate on hitting on a draft pick. The reality in the NFL is about 60 percent of first-round picks become starters, and that's if you're drafting in the upper half of the first round the odds go up. If you're drafting in the bottom half the odds go down quite a bit.
And then you hit baseball batting averages. So second round, even. It's like 30-something percent of hitting. So you've got to base it on what the rest of the league and what the rest of the sport is able to accomplish through the scouting, through all the different information, psychological testing, medical testing, everything else and then who is available.
And so when you're in my position as the CEO, you've got to really kind of treat it like that's my reality. And those are the batting averages in the league. And then I compare it very specifically to the rest of batting averages of other teams.
I don't just say, this is a good guy, he's a good executive, he collaborates. Re-sign him. That's not the way it is. It's a very, very intense and detailed process. And I go through it as if I barely know the man and basically go through it as if I'm coming from another planet, and I'm going to look at it, then what are the positives, what are the negatives, and the strengths really outweigh the weaknesses.
Q. How do you evaluate where you guys are in the quarterback position?
JEFFREY LURIE: Let me just finish with Howie. Fletcher Cox, very valued member of the team. Is the question why --
Q. What are your thoughts, some people question why he was brought back at the number he was brought back at.
JEFFREY LURIE: Obviously I'm not going to go into contract details, but it was kind of a contract that made a lot of sense for us. We knew exactly what some other teams were interested in in signing Fletcher for. He's been a very valued member of our team.
We think he can do even better in terms of this year's play with the same defensive coordinator. And it was not a hard decision. But every player has their own sort of parameters where you might sign that player at a certain level of percentage of resources allocated and another -- and then you hit one where if it's too high, no, we'd rather use the resources some other way. So, again, with Howie, Nick, they recommended that we do that and that was what I supported.
Q. We haven't talked to you since the Carson Wentz trade. What did you learn from that process that informs the way that you will go about trying to identify your next franchise quarterback?
JEFFREY LURIE: The Carson Wentz -- let me just say Carson, 2017, we'll never forget it. Probably played at an MVP level. There's no way we'd be the No. 1 seed going into the playoffs if it weren't for Carson. I doubt we would have been able to win the Super Bowl if we didn't have the No. 1 seed. It's hard to know. But that was the best of Carson. That was the best of Carson. When we drafted Carson, that's what we hoped for. It was like almost an MVP -- it was an MVP-level quarterback.
Not every quarterback and not every player is able to sustain that level of play. You have injuries, you've got lots of factors. It didn't end how we envisioned it to end. But I'm always thankful for -- winning a Super Bowl is not easy. So Aaron Rodgers has won one. Dan Marino zero. It's not easy. And we were able to ride the quarterback play of Carson in that year and put us in the position to win the Super Bowl.
So it's very, very difficult to project what you call franchise or what we might call franchise quarterback. It happens. It just happens. After year one or year two, was Josh Allen a franchise quarterback? Was he even thought to be a franchise quarterback when Buffalo drafted him? I think the answers are very clearly no, no, and no. He developed into one. So now we have a young 23-year-old playoff quarterback who gets better every year in college and in the pros.
He's had really one full year. No one knows where that's going to end up, but I think what you do know is you have a guy that is incredibly dedicated, excellent leader of men. Players around him gravitate to him. He will do anything and everything to get better, work on every weakness he has and maximize every strength he has. That's why we're committed to Jalen at age 23. Who knows what the future holds, right?
That's where it goes. We all have this vision, myself included, that's an automatic franchise quarterback. It's almost nonexistent. And when it does exist you're very, very lucky to have that. And even when you have that, it doesn't guarantee you winning Super Bowls. That's kind of one of the lessons there.
But anyway, that's a long answer. But I welcome Carson when he comes back. I think I'd rather take the road of he really helped us in a very important way in the 2017 season, and I wish he had been able to maintain that level of growth throughout and it didn't pan out that way.
Q. You've long known the importance of the passing game in this modern NFL. Yet this pass season you had a run-heavy offense that got you guys to the playoff. But with Jalen being obviously more of a seasoned runner he is than passer how do you feel about him in that spot and how do you feel about the offense with Nick Sirianni kind of favoring that type of system? Do you think it's sustainable?
JEFFREY LURIE: I think what Nick has done -- and I applaud him tremendously -- and we can talk about Nick because I've never had a chance to really -- I'll start with that. Everything that we loved about Nick in the interview process and in the research process came to fruition in his very first season. It was not an easy year for him to take over. We were handicapped in different ways.
And it was really a transition season. And what he was able to do was connect to players, everybody in the building, manage his coaches in a very, very effective way, and bring a vision and an energy and a real -- when you use the word "connectiveness", you can throw it around. This guy connects. This guy connects on a really human level.
You've probably seen it with yourselves, but he connects in a very personal and important level with players of all types, coaches of all types, people in the building. He treats everybody with respect and lives it that way.
And I think that's what we saw in the first year of Nick. Assembled a great staff. Not an ego-driven coach. A confident coach, who is very comfortable in his own skin. And will only get better and better as the years go by, I think.
And worked wonderfully with everyone in the building, worked wonderfully with his quarterback. Knew what our strengths and weaknesses were as an offense. Adjusted in the middle of the season to emphasize what we were better in. And yet everybody, I think -- whether it's Nick, Jalen, all of us -- we want to have both a dynamic passing attack, excellent running attack and all built around a great offensive line. That's the important thing.
And that offensive line, I think we're always going to be a team that emphasizes the trenches. And it gives you the capability of being able to adjust your offense to what is happening around it because you're always going to have injuries. You're always going to have just lots of things happening.
Look, when we won the Super Bowl, big V was our left tackle. We didn't plan it that way. We don't win a Super Bowl without a great performance by big V. So you've got to adapt.
I think in the NFL these days you want to be able to have a dynamic passing attack, and you want to have a really good running attack. And it's all built around the trenches. And that's where we're at. There's nothing Jalen, I don't think, will be able to not do. We just have to keep evolving that offense in every single way and time will tell, right? But Nick's an aggressive offensive guy, and I know he feels there's just so much growth in what we can do on offense. And he's very bullish on all the things we can do this coming season and in the future.
Q. There's a perception that you've become more hands-on over the last few years whether it's in draft picks or game planning that type of thing. Do you think that's fair? Do you feel you've become more hands-on over the last few years?
JEFFREY LURIE: Right, if I really had to say, I'd say slightly less involved because I'm awfully -- I believe in who we have in the building. I'm very trusting of the different departments we have.
I think our areas of expertise in terms of injury prevention and the steps we've taken to do that, which is a huge correlative with winning, whether it's statistics and analytics, whether it's psychological analysis, scouting, you name it, we've got great people in place. And I would say, if anything, the last few years I've probably taken a little bit more of a back seat.
I sometimes ask myself that question because I'm kind of a -- I don't want to be -- I want to provide the resources, provide the support and yet ask a lot of questions in the meantime because that's what a good CEO does. You don't just say here it is, go with it. No, you want to be an active questioner of strategy and information and all that. And that's what I do.
But there's probably been -- I sometimes look in the mirror and say, have you ever felt like, geez, maybe you overrooted for something or overextended yourself in terms of what you wanted to see happen.
And yes, there's probably been three instances, as I look back, on whether I should -- well, should I have been so excited or rooted for something to happen.
And it's never been based on my evaluation; it's been based on you get excited when you're in a draft preparation process. And I'll tell you what they are, just so you have some feel for it.
Jeff Stoutland is a great coach. He's a great talent evaluator. He works great with coaches and with Howie. Just great. The detail that he goes into on analyzing, I wish -- you could make a movie about and watch Jeff. Some of you have seen scenes. It's a lesson in offensive line play in real detail.
And so there was a young player several years ago and he just thought, you know, he said -- I remember he said to Howie, he said to me, he said to the room, this player is not the best tackle day one, but if we just look at it like who is going to be the best tackle in the draft in two years, in three years, this guy is going to be so much better than the other two tackles that were at the top of the draft.
And so you probably can understand, I'm talking about Lane Johnson. And so from that, I'm thinking, gosh, if we're in a position where we're choosing between players or where Lane is, we really need to elevate Lane to a position of where we have a chance to have him. And it wasn't automatically going to be the case, but that was one where I felt like I was maybe a little too rooting interest. But it was warranted, because of supporting Jeff and Jeff was a new coach with us at that time.
And anyway, he was right. He was better than Eric. And Stout's been right, more right than wrong, ever since. Second was a player we didn't get. And I will always regret it. But it was based on Andy Reid and Howie's enthusiasm. And you all know, I'm sure, who it is. It's somebody that I really wish we drafted in the second round and didn't wait. But we really didn't think anybody would jump us and take Russell. So that was that.
And the third was really a strategy based on Jeff Stoutland and Howie -- and it was really Jeff, where he saw a young talent and he said, this guy -- you're talking about all these first-round, second-round tackles, all this -- let me tell you if I can get my hands on this guy -- and if he loves football, and he knew nothing about football -- we have a chance to have a major star. And we don't need to take him before the sixth or seventh round. But I'm telling you -- you know how Stout talks, I'm telling you -- and so we didn't have a seventh-round pick. I was like, oh boy, we've got to get back in this draft. And Howie manipulated it in a great, great way.
He knew of another team that wanted to do what we wanted to do. And got to the top of the seventh round, and we took Jordan Mailata. It's a risk to take a guy who's never played football, didn't know what football was about. But was a sixth- or seventh-round pick with a huge upside.
Those are three instances I look back and said I kind of made my opinions known of what our strategy should be, but it was based on others' enthusiasm. So that's much more -- I'm only human. That's the way it goes.
There have been really no other instances of that. I know some of you thought I was trying to pick J.J. or whatever, no, that was not the case. There was a tie. There was a tie between J.J. and Parris in that room and they said to me flippantly, who do you want. I said they're both red-star players. That means A plus character. You've got my blessing whatever way you want to go.
And I think they probably went based on injury risk. Parris had some soft tissue injury risk. And like everybody in the NFL, up until that point, kudos to Washington. They got the player that has had a great career in the next round, actually the fourth round was it, Terry McLaurin. Kudos to them.
And so I probably backed off, not that I was super involved ever, but I think I get excited. I'm a football fan. I love the possibilities of players. And it's always to support those that are excited about players in the draft. It's never my valuation. I don't do the work. Come on.
Q. Challenge that just a little bit, the reference, the positives?
JEFFREY LURIE: Yes. Yes.
Q. There's plenty of other reporting --
JEFFREY LURIE: Reporting.
Q. Reporting does come from somewhere and a lot of hard work from a lot of people. So Mike Groh and Carson Walch pushing back on Doug Peterson pushing back the idea of (inaudible)?
JEFFREY LURIE: Are you talking about coaches?
Q. Yes, as a result of that, in the draft and Jalen Hurts, there was plenty of reporting that you were a champion of his. So are you saying that it's (inaudible) there weren't any ones --
JEFFREY LURIE: Those are the ones I looked back did I overstep in any way. I didn't really overstep in those. In terms of, I have to evaluate a head coach on his management of coaches and who he wants to entrust on his coaching staff. That's what an owner does. That's what a CEO does.
So, yes, I will never tell a coach who to hire, but I will evaluate the head coach on exactly how good their staff is, how good their opposite side coordinator is. All that stuff goes into play, who is going to develop our quarterback the best. Those are very important for a franchise. And if I see that a coach is hiring somebody that may not be ideal to advance that quarterback's career, I have to make the hard decision there, right? Yes, absolutely.
Q. Julian, what's that process been like as he learns about it and have you given thought to how long you want to stay as involved as you are now?
JEFFREY LURIE: So yeah, my son, Julian, he grew up obviously in the family that owns the team. He's an avid Philadelphia sports fan. He loves the Eagles, loves the NFL. Really has a great feel for many aspects of the sport. After college he went into the NFL rotational program to learn much more about the business side and sort of the league side from living in New York and working at the NFL those years.
I've always, sort of, like a lot of children of families that own teams, kind of bring him along in terms of I want to expose him to all aspects of both the business side and the operational side, the nuts and bolts, yet also the strategy side.
And he's a real sharp guy. And he's going to have so much more going into it than I ever did if he chooses to want to some day own and run the team.
He's going to have a gigantic advantage. Maybe he won't make some of the early mistakes I made. But he loves all aspects of it. And so what I do is I expose him at different times to different things. I let him observe coaching searches because those are big decisions to make. I think he gets exposure to the business side. Football side. And inevitably there's a formal aspect to it if he aspires to do that. But at this time, it's much more wanting to expose him to any and every aspect. And that's kind of like a lot of as you see next generation in families that own teams, that's exactly kind of what happens.
Q. A few moments ago you spoke about Nick. You look at the state of the team, the state of the roster, when you see it at this point, what type of timeline do you see to be competing in those late January games?
JEFFREY LURIE: I think I said last year was kind of a transition year, and I meant it. I think right now we're at a point where we build for the present and build for the future. And that's what smart management does.
You balance both. And you don't want to sacrifice the future, but you also want to maximize the present. So that's always the push-pull. I think we can do both at the same time.
I think we've got an excellent, excellent teaching, coaching staff. I think we'll have dynamic strategy and excellent relationship and culture with players and it's about building the roster and building it for now and for the future. So that's how I see it. No timeline. When we won the Super Bowl were we odds on to win the Super Bowl? Was Cincinnati odds on this year to get into the Super Bowl? I don't know. I'm not smart enough to know that. But I know if you're disciplined and focused on maximizing the present and the future at the same time, you have a chance to build a really good roster.
Q. With that said, you have three first-round picks.
JEFFREY LURIE: Yes, we do.
Q. Not a usual thing.
JEFFREY LURIE: That's a big part.
Q. How has that affected your outlook on this offseason in evaluating --
JEFFREY LURIE: The offseason, you know, it started recently, we have almost half a year until we play a meaningful game. We look at it as there is no -- there's so many tools to improving the team. And every day that's the goal. And it's five and a half months until we play a meaningful game. I expect Howie, Nick, everybody to address every area of concern between now and September.
And that's exactly what they're doing. And I'm obviously thrilled we have three number ones. Kudos to Howie for putting us in this position. And it's a great asset to have. It's obviously in the offseason, re-signing your best young corps, making strategic acquisitions and drafting really well. Those are the keys. And then role players, between now and September, you know, as we did like we did with Steven Nelson last year, could be in September, could be in August, could be in May, June, right now, every week there's opportunities. And so that's --
Q. You talked about the fans to begin your opening statement.
JEFFREY LURIE: Yes, very much.
Q. What would you say to the fans who are worried about the fact that Howie Roseman will be making these first-round picks especially since there were some misses early on?
JEFFREY LURIE: It's a misnomer to think that one person is actually making the picks. It's an organization. And if we miss -- the organization missed, maybe it was information. Maybe we collaborated and there was a reason that it wasn't seen as a good scheme fit, or maybe there was a medical reason to worry that didn't end up happening or maybe it was a misevaluation in some way.
Today's NFL, I can't think of any team, maybe -- well, I'm sure there's exceptions. But there's no one person doing that. In the end, it's his responsibility to collate and get all the information and try to make the best decision, and you hope the players you want will be there or trade up, trade down, whatever it is. But I have a lot of faith in where we're at. The processes we have today at the Eagles I think are excellent.
And I'm excited about the first three players we picked, the first four players I guess we picked last year, process is really good. And I think you've got to trust your leadership. And I really trust our leadership.
Q. You mentioned Russell Wilson, disappointment, missing out back in the day. What does the process look like when you may be interested in trading for a player like him or Deshaun Watson, what's your role in that in terms of giving the green light to let Howie go and try to work a deal?
JEFFREY LURIE: We just have a policy. We will do our due diligence on every single player. There's not a pro player or a college player that we don't do as much due diligence as necessary. And that's just a standard. There should never be a player we don't fully vet. And it doesn't matter their circumstances.
We will fully vet them and then that's where it goes. You've got to do your due diligence. There's so much information about every player. About every player. And so much of it is medical, psychological. Motivational. History of how they treat people in college and high school. In the pros. How are they a culture fit? Are they going to maximize their abilities or do they love the game of football?
There's just so much that goes into this. And so we are really heavy on due diligence no matter what the circumstance of the player is.
Q. When the information is brought to you you decide whether it's okay to green light it?
JEFFREY LURIE: There's no situation. It becomes clear through the due diligence what you should do. The due diligence tells you. Every organization, I guess, is different. But the due diligence tells you exactly, is that player a smart acquisition for you in every way possible. And so that's what you do.
Q. (Inaudible) wanted to come to the Eagles, would you have welcomed him to the organization?
JEFFREY LURIE: We do our due diligence. Any player who is on another team, I really don't want to comment on. It would be easy to do it. But I don't want to comment on it at all. I've never done it.
Q. Do you think Deshaun's contract has kind of skewed the market now for quarterbacks (inaudible)?
JEFFREY LURIE: Again, I've never commented on another contract that another team made with a player. I just don't think -- every team has to operate the way they think is best for them. And I don't want to be presumptuous. I don't have all the answers. So I just can't comment on it.
Q. Follow-up on Julian. Will he have a formal role with the team eventually?
JEFFREY LURIE: If he wants to, yes, he will.
Q. Do you know if he wants to succeed you?
JEFFREY LURIE: I don't know that exactly. No, we haven't fully talked about that. But what I can say is he has my passion for the sport and the Eagles. And that I can tell you.
Q. Given the situation with Deshaun not commenting on it itself, but if there's a quarterback that received that much guaranteed money, would you feel comfortable guaranteeing a contract of that size?
JEFFREY LURIE: I'd rather not comment on contracts whatsoever. I've never even commented on our own player contracts, much less hypothetical contracts. What value does it really have, you know?
FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports