After firing Chip Kelly as coach and head of player personnel last week, Eagles Owner Jeffrey Lurie "should give" Exec VP/Football Operations Howie Roseman "full control" of the team's personnel department, according to Jeff McLane of the PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER. Lurie should hand Roseman the "draft and free agency and even let him choose the final 53-man roster." The suggestion "may sound outrageous considering Roseman's dubious tenure" as GM, but there is "no point in speculating about a future without Roseman." He "isn't going anywhere and he likely has as much power as he ever had." But Lurie should "hold Roseman as accountable as he held Kelly," and that means "clearly defining his role so that there isn't any more ambiguity about his record." Lurie had "never spelled out" Roseman's responsibilities in a "way that showed a direct trail." He again is "heading into the same murky waters." Lurie last week said that Senior Dir of Player Personnel Tom Donahoe "would run the day-to-day player personnel department, but that will be only on an interim basis." A source said that the Eagles "have begun their search for a second-in-command to Roseman." McLane noted the next coach "could affect how Lurie divvies up responsibilities" (PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER, 1/3).
DETAILS OF THE FIRING: The MMQB’s Peter King reports there were three main reasons why Lurie fired Kelly -- the "downward trajectory of the team in 2015," the "lousy personnel moves" and how Kelly "buried Lurie favorite son Howie Roseman, removing him from any football authority after last season.” Lurie to a lesser degree “disliked that there wasn’t harmony in the building,” but the fact that the building was “disconnected from Kelly wasn’t a big reason for the firing.” Kelly had “no idea this was coming," and Lurie never “offered him a chance to stay if he ceded personnel control.” The firing came “less than four months after talking about Kelly like he was a young Paul Brown,” but the sentiment now is that Kelly is a “culture-wrecker, a bad coach, a poor communicator and showed sides they never saw in the interview.” King: “Interesting how none of those things surfaced in his first 31 months on the job” (MMQB.SI.com, 1/4).
HAPPY HOLIDAYS? CBSSPORTS.com's Jason La Canfora noted Lurie has "always taken considerable pride in the team's holiday party, going to great expense to throw the large gathering." But sources said that Kelly "basically refused to attend it this year on its normal Monday night, and ultimately Lurie had to move it to a Friday afternoon onsite to facilitate Kelly's schedule." Lurie "apologized to the organization for the haphazard way the party was conducted this year and told others it would not happen in that fashion ever again" (CBSSPORTS.com, 1/3). In Philadelphia, Rob Tornoe cited a source as saying the holiday party was "just part of a long list of reasons" why Lurie fired Kelly, but the "whole thing with the Christmas party just epitomizes the split from what Jeffrey wants the Eagles to be, and what he felt like they were becoming" (PHILLY.com, 1/3).
