Philadelphia Eagles in No Hurry to Name Starting Quarterback
By Josh Sanchez
The Philadelphia Eagles have been praising new head coach Chip Kelly for his innovative and up-tempo offense, but there is still a question of who will be running the show. Kelly is not in any rush to name a starting quarterback, and he may not be ready anytime soon. When speaking with reporters, Kelly said that the quarterback battle between Mike Vick, Nick Foles and Matt Barkley could extend through training camp.
“It’s can we get a ton of reps, get them on tape, that will go through training camp and what not,” Kelly told the media, via Pro Football Talk. “When you have to make an important decision on who a starter is going to be in some position, I don’t think it’s why should we jump to conclusions? Why do we need to name a starting quarterback in May?
“I mean, we’re going to take the full amount of time that we have to make a thorough evaluation of what we do. When you make big decisions like that, I don’t think you want to make a rash decision. You want to give everybody the opportunity to see what they do.
“Right now we haven’t done a thing in front of officials. We haven’t done anything except we’ve had three days of voluntary minicamp before the draft, and today was our seventh OTA. So none of us have had any thoughts of ‘Hey, we’ve got to get a guy named by a certain point in time.’ It will play itself out. It will play itself out over the course of time when we’ve had an opportunity to make a thorough evaluation. It is a big decision. When you make a big decision, you have to take your time and let it play itself out on the field. So we’re not looking at it like that. They rotate on a daily basis.”
Obviously the sooner you name a starter the better, but Kelly is prepared to make an educated decision.
Instead of making an impulse reaction by naming a starter just a few practices in to the installment of his offense, he plans to make sure that he will be getting the most prepared and talented player.
At this point in the competition, it would not be wise to rule anyone out.