Eagles' special teams no longer an afterthought

EVERY football coach says special teams are important. But not all of them mean it.

Chip Kelly really, really means it.

"There are three ways to make this football team if you're not a starter," the Eagles coach said the other day.

"Special teams, special teams, and special teams."

Much like the defense, the Eagles' special teams have nowhere to go but up this season. They were awful last year under Bobby April.

But unlike the defense, there is real reason to believe the special teams are going to be significantly improved.

The Eagles finished 31st in punt coverage and 21st in kickoff coverage last season. They were 28th in kickoff returns and 13th in punt returns, thanks mainly to a 98-yard punt return for a touchdown against Dallas by Damaris Johnson. It was one of just five punt returns longer than 14 yards the entire season.

While preseason results often can be misleading, new special-teams coordinator Dave Fipp's units have looked very good this summer. They allowed just 19.8 yards on kickoff returns and 6.6 yards on punt returns. Those numbers would have been good enough for a No. 2 ranking in both categories last season.

Return man Damaris Johnson had an excellent preseason, averaging 21.3 yards on punt returns and 27.2 yards on kickoff returns. He had a 62-yard punt return and a 61-yard kickoff return. Last year, they had just one punt return longer than 20 yards and one kickoff return longer than 33 yards.

"We didn't have the right attitude [on special teams] last year," said safety and special-teams ace Colt Anderson. "This year, we have a whole new attitude, a whole new energy. We're playing with confidence. And when you're confident, you're going to win those one-on-one battles."

Kelly has made a major commitment to special teams, not only shaping his roster with players who can play special teams, but also devoting a lot of time to it on the practice field and in the meeting rooms.

"During training camp, during a 2-hour practice, we would get roughly 20 minutes [to work on special teams]," said Fipp, who joined Kelly's staff after five seasons as an assistant special-teams coach with the 49ers and Dolphins.

"Twenty minutes in a practice block is close to the [NFL] norm. But once a week, we were getting significantly more time than that. So that bumps our average time up. And [Kelly] also gives us a bunch of meeting time, which also helps a lot."

Kelly also has made sure Fipp has a lot of help. He has an assistant - Matt Harper - and as many as 10 to 15 other assistant coaches also lend a hand during special-teams work.

"Early on in talking to Chip [about the Eagles job], I could tell how important special teams was to him," Fipp said. "But you never really know until you get somewhere what exactly that means.

"I had a good idea what the practice layout was going to be coming in. But he's devoted a lot of time to it, a lot of attention to it. He's in all of the [special-teams] meetings. The assistant coaches are in all the meetings."

April was a longtime NFL special-teams coach. But under Andy Reid, he didn't have a lot of input into the shaping of the bottom half of the roster. Not so with Fipp.

"The roster decisions always are a collaborative effort," Fipp said. "Here it was exceptional that way. Definitely special teams factored into it. But it was all parties working together."

Kelly kept five inside linebackers and just three outside linebackers because he felt the fifth inside linebacker - Casey Matthews - could help out on special teams more than the fourth outside linebacker - Chris McCoy. It's also why they claimed inside linebacker Najee Goode off waivers. Rather than bring in a natural outside linebacker who might not be as good a special-teams player as Matthews, they are "cross-training" him to play outside if needed.

"I'm definitely happy with the guys we have here," Fipp said of his special-teams players. "We have a great group. They work really hard. They've done everything we've asked them to do. They're focused."

The Eagles must get better production out of their return game this season. Along with the lack of takeaways by the defense, it was the main reason they finished 27th in average starting field position (their own 25.2-yard line) last season.

As a rookie last year, Johnson was used exclusively as a punt returner. Cornerback Brandon Boykin handled the bulk of the kickoff-return chores. But Fipp had scouted Johnson coming out of Tulsa and felt the 5-8, 175-pound Johnson could handle both jobs.

"I knew he was a kick returner when I scouted him," he said. "We looked at him and really liked him. I was excited about him. I was surprised he wasn't used at all before on kickoff returns."

The last time the Eagles did a deal with the Bills, it worked out very well for them. That was April 2009, when they sent three draft choices, including a late-first-rounder, to the Bills for All-Pro left tackle Jason Peters.

Might it be time for the Eagles to look into acquiring yet another top-of-the-line player who wants out of Buffalo?

Two-time Pro Bowl safety Jairus Byrd, who is unhappy with the Bills for slapping the franchise tag on him, reportedly is trying to engineer an escape to any team willing to grease his palm with a hefty new deal.

Byrd, 26, out of Oregon, would be a nice addition to a secondary that gave up a franchise-record 33 touchdown passes last season and had no interceptions in the preseason. The team's only preseason pick was by a linebacker, Connor Barwin.

With 18 interceptions in his first four seasons, including five last year, Byrd is considered one of the best young coverage safeties in the league.

He obviously wouldn't come cheap. The Bills would want a high pick for him, and Byrd would want a new deal that would make him one of the league's best-paid safeties. He is guaranteed $6.9 million this season, which is the franchise-tag value at the safety position.

Also, Byrd has plantar fasciitis, a painful foot condition that could affect his availability from week to week until he's had a chance to rest it.

The NFL trade deadline is Oct. 29. By then, the Eagles should have a pretty good gauge on Patrick Chung, Nate Allen and rookie Earl Wolff. By then, they should know whether improving the safety position still is near the top of their list of things to do.

Include Howard Mudd among the many people in the Eagles organization who got hoodwinked by Danny Watkins.

Mudd's opinion of Watkins carried a lot of weight 2 years ago when the Eagles selected the then-26-year-old Baylor offensive lineman with the 23rd overall pick in the draft, just as it did 168 picks later when they took undersized center Jason Kelce. Kelce turned out to be a great pick. Watkins turned out to be a major bust, and now is with the Dolphins after the Eagles cut him.

Mudd, one of the best offensive-line coaches in NFL history, was 100 percent convinced Watkins could be a productive NFL starter. Here's some of what he told me on Draft Day 2011:

"I have a funny definition of 'tough.' It's how much you can take, not how much you can give out. A lot of times, you mistake aggression for toughness. This guy is a very tough-minded guy. He hangs in there. If he has a bad play, he doesn't go in the tank. He might have two bad plays, even two in a row. But he keeps fighting to do his job. He's determined, driven."

* There still hasn't been a resolution in Drew Rosenhaus' grievance against DeSean Jackson. The agent filed the grievance in June with the NFL Players Association, claiming Jackson owes him $400,000. Jackson severed his relationship with Rosenhaus shortly before the grievance was filed. Rosenhaus negotiated Jackson's most recent contract, a 5-year, $51 million deal that he signed in March 2012.

* The Broncos are 6-1 favorites to win the Super Bowl, according to oddsmakers Bovada and R.J. Bell of Pregame.com. The Eagles? Bovada has them at 50-1. Bell has them at 60-1.

* Thanks mainly to games at Oakland and Denver, the Eagles will travel 15,932 miles this season, 10th in the league. The league's four West Coast teams - San Francisco (32,948), San Diego (26,932), Oakland (26,240) and Seattle (23,914) - will log the most miles.

* Mike Vick has a 110.6 career passer rating against the Redskins. That's the highest of any quarterback in history with at least 100 attempts vs. Washington. Trent Green is second (106.8), Peyton Manning third (106.0), Tom Brady fourth (102.1) and Steve Young fifth (101.6).

In seven games against the Redskins, Vick has completed 61.8 percent of his passes, averaged 8.79 yards per attempt and thrown 10 touchdown passes and just two interceptions.

* Just two of the Eagles' 10 preseason TD drives ate up more than 3 1/2 minutes off the clock, and seven lasted 2:15 or less. They averaged a play every 19.4 seconds on those drives, and one every 22.3 seconds overall.

Last season, the Patriots, who led the league in plays per game (74.4), averaged a play every 24.7 seconds.

* When Jeremy Maclin tore an ACL, the Eagles lost their most productive red-zone receiver. Over the last 3 years, Maclin had 27 receptions inside the 20, including 14 for touchdowns.

The rest of the Eagles' red-zone pass-catching totals since 2010: LeSean McCoy, 28 catches/8 TDs; Brent Celek 19/7; Riley Cooper, 7/5; DeSean Jackson, 8/3; and Jason Avant, 13/2.

On Twitter: @Pdomo

Blog: ph.ly/Eagletarian.com