When the Packers went to back-to-back Super Bowls after the 1996 and 1997 seasons, one of quarterback Brett Favre’s backups was current Eagles head coach Doug Pederson.
Pederson referenced those teams this offseason when discussing the talent level of this year’s Eagles squad. Pederson thinks the Eagles compare favorably to those Packers teams on that front, although he also referenced a past Eagles “dream team” to make it clear that talent alone won’t get the team where they want to be.
“You’re capable. ... I look back at my time in Green Bay as a player when we were making those playoff runs and those Super Bowl runs there, and do we have as much talent on this team than we did then? We probably have more talent, right?” Pederson said, via ESPN.com. “But we also had a lot of talent in [2011] here and where did that get us? So there’s got to be a combination of blending all this talent with the coaching staff, with my ideas and philosophy, to bring that all together, put the egos aside, put pride aside, and just go focus on winning this game that we have in front of us. I’m a big believer [that] if you do that, then you look back at the end of the season and you’re probably going to be where you want to be, and that’s playing in the postseason.”
Comparing the talent on two teams two decades apart isn’t the easiest task and it’s not overly enlightening if you hold the belief that the level of talent in the league has risen across the board over that span of time. What’s more pressing is how the Eagles, who rank 18th in our preseason power rankings, match up with the other teams in 2017 and, as Pederson mentioned, how the staff is able to bring the talent on hand into a cohesive unit.
If they do a great job of it, the Eagles should be able to better last year’s 7-9 record despite a tough schedule and division. If not, Pederson will have to redouble his efforts in order to keep the team from wondering if someone else might do a better job of having talent meet results.