The Philadelphia Eagles' offense is explosive. The stable of weapons includes Carson Wentz, Alshon Jeffery, DeSean Jackson, Nelson Agholor, Jordan Howard, a bevy of promising rookies, and one of the NFL's best offensive lines. Yet, head coach Doug Pederson wants them starting a bit faster.
The Eagles struggled to find points in the first quarter in 2018. They scored just 41 in the game's opening quarter in 2018, one of the league's lowest scores. In 2017, they scored a top-three 106 points. Pederson wants to get back to 2017 form and rid his offense of the slow starts from 2018.
In Tuesday's joint training camp (Baltimore Ravens) press conference, Pederson emphasized getting faster to start games.
Pederson said, via the Eagles official website:
“Almost everyday [I've tried to adjust starting faster] with the offense, really with the defense. Because, a lot of times you notice if we win the toss we defer, and our defense goes onto the field.
We [start] fast with a three and out or at least getting a stop somewhere in that opening drive. I've emphasized that quite a bit this summer with our offense. And being kind of open minded but at the same time understanding we have to start faster. We scored 41 points in all of first quarters last year, that's not good enough and that's something we continue to talk about and address.”
Improvement with first-quarter defense will play a big role in how the offense can run in the same span. Whether Pederson sees that improvement is a tale which will be told with the passage of time.
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