JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – It is time for a change. It is broken and everything broken can’t be fixed. At 0-4 after Sunday’s 24-20 loss to the Texans, there ain’t no coming back from that for the Jaguars. Not for a team that had playoff expectations. A team that Shad Khan said was the best in franchise history. A team that just paid a franchise quarterback who is averaging less than 200 yards per game a $275 million contract. A team that paid a franchise pass rusher who has one sack in four games. There is enough blame to go around.
One thing that Doug Pederson said Sunday is right, and the fingers should all be pointed at him. This is a systematic problem. There is not question that Trevor Lawrence needs to play better. Who all on the team doesn’t need to play better? When there are problems at every layer of the team that is on the head coach. This the third year of the Pederson era and it should be the final year of it.
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The problems start and end with Pederson. Look, the defense is bad but he gutted the defensive coaching staff last year and used those guys as scapegoats for the late-season collapse. You can’t point the finger there for the second year in a row. After that, there were reports that one of the fired coaches said the problems were still in the building.
Whoever that guy is knew what he was talking about. Somewhere, he’s just laughing because look at all those problems showing up every Sunday. One of the biggest problems is the offense is just not functional. Pederson was hired because he is an offensive guru. Well, three years in with the same core of guys and the offense looks lost. We have questioned players, but at some point it is on the coaches.
It is like if a teacher has a classroom full of students and they all keep failing the tests. At some point, the students aren’t the problem, it is the teacher. Right now, Pederson and the coaches are the problem.
To quote the late Denny Green, “they are who we thought they were.” Pederson is exactly who we thought he was. In Philly, he won a Super Bowl and got shown the door because he was over loyal to his offensive coaches who were struggling. His young quarterback regressed and he didn’t have the answers on how to fix the problems. Does that stuff sound familiar?
It is all happening again here. Pederson is exactly who we thought he was. Think about this, Pederson brought Philly its first Super Bowl. The man has a statue outside the stadium and they showed him the door. How hard is it to get fired when you have a statue in front of the building? Think about if a coach won a Super Bowl here in Jacksonville, they would be basically royalty. That should tell you how quickly that honeymoon ended.
Now, those same problems should probably end the honeymoon here in Jacksonville. It is time for a fresh start. And just so I’m clear right now, fresh start does not and should not include Bill Belichick. I have heard the whispers of the old ball coach but that would be making the same mistake that Khan made with Pederson all over again. It is time for a fresh start. A really fresh start with a young offensive-minded head coach. It is time.