MANNION HANDLES QUESTIONS AFTER ROUGH FIRST OUTING

Eagles new offensive coordinator Sean Mannion woke up Monday morning realizing he was going to have a press conference at noon in the media tent at The Jeff (formally referred as NovaCare).

He was going to have to answer questions about his first game as the OC and play caller on Saturday night against the Baltimore Ravens at M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore.

It was just a preseason game, non of his starters were playing. Even his first round draft pick, wide receiver Makai Lemon out of USC was not playing due to hamstring issues.

The expectations were low, but no one expected the offense to be that bad.

Mannion's backups managed just 159 yards of total offense, 59 of those yards came on the final drive of the game.

Eagles rookie quarterback Cole Payton led the Birds on a 59-yard scoring drive that included 30 rushing yards by Payton, who really found success on unscripted plays including his six-yard touchdown pass to wide receiver Erik Ezukanma with 2:14 left in the game.

Payton save some face for Eagles. The final score was 24-7.

Mannion was asked his thoughts and said the obvious and that was the best thing to do.

“Obviously we want to have a better performance offensively than what we put on tape the other night,” Mannion said. “But we have things that we need to correct. The biggest thing that stood out in the game is we weren't staying on schedule, right?

“We had a lot of first-and-longs, second-and-longs. Penalties led to a lot of that, a couple negative runs.

“If we were able to stay on schedule better and kind of eliminate some of those miscues on early downs, we'll keep ourselves in more manageable third-down situations and lead to a better result.”

Here is the rest of his talk that he seemed to handle with ease.

How much of that is a product of still learning the scheme and getting comfortable inside that?

Eagles new offensive coordinator Sean Mannion answers questions following the Eagles 24-7 preseason loss to the Baltimore Ravens. Photo by Al Thompson

Sean Mannion: “A lot of it comes down to just fundamentals and execution. We're in a good place mentally as an offense. There really weren't a ton of mental errors from the game, which is encouraging. A lot of young guys in there -- [It's] their first time with live game action.

“It's not scripted. It's all calling it from the sideline. I was pretty encouraged with the mental side of things. It's just carrying the fundamental work that we've done in practice to the game setting. That was the biggest takeaway from here.

Do you have a thought process for having TE Eli Stowers in that role? We've primarily seen him just be the third unit, not doing a lot of blocking in the team situations.

Sean Mannion: “We want to see what all these guys can do. Tight end's a position that requires a lot of versatility. We're going to ask all these guys to be productive players in both phases. The preseason's a great opportunity to push these guys and evaluate what they can do, give them things to work on every day at practice, and then see them take it to the game.

“I know Eli's put a lot of work into improving as a blocker, and along with that entire position group, there's a huge commitment to being productive in both areas. We want to see what all of our players in that room can do in both phases of the game.”

What's the process like with you on the field calling plays? Are you indeed going to call the next game from the booth?

Sean Mannion: “It was smooth. I felt comfortable. I thought our staff did a great job. The communication was clear. We didn't have any substitution issues. We didn't have any play calls get jacked up where we got caught with them substituting late or anything like that. I thought the lines of communication were clear.

“I was happy with how the quarterbacks were able to get us in and out of the huddle. We weren't really up against the play clock at all. I was happy with that. I'm planning on calling the next game from the booth. It's an opportunity to get a feel for both and then go from there.

“That's been the plan all along, and I think it'll be an interesting perspective, but I think through this preseason, an opportunity to kind of experience both.”

How would you assess the QB Andy Dalton and QB Tanner McKee in particular?

Sean Mannion: “There was some good and some that obviously could improve. The third downs have to be better there. Some of them were tough spots, to be fair. “You're in the third-and-extra-long situations. It's going to be an uphill battle. I think just play the play. Just stay with the process, stay with your read, [and] your footwork.

“There were some good examples. Tanner hit a slant route. Cole hit one to [TE] E.J. [Jenkins] over the middle of the field. We had to get back on track on the first series of the game. Andy had a nice ball to [WR Darius Cooper] Coop on an out route to get us into a third manageable.

“Then we take a penalty to go back to third and 15. There were some glimpses there of what we want to see, but I think the biggest thing that the whole group can improve on is just stay within the play, trust your footwork, trust your training, and go cut it loose.”

What differences are you keeping an eye on in the operation when you move to the booth?

Sean Mannion: “I think It'll just be more for me and just how I feel I can see the game from there versus the sideline. I've spent the majority of my life on an NFL sideline, on college sidelines. I've seen the game from that perspective. I spent a year in the booth in Green Bay, but in a different capacity. It'll just be to get a feel for it, honestly.

“I just kind of want to experience it once, and I think it'll offer good perspective. Like I said, it was comfortable in game, but the plan all along was to kind of get a taste of both and then move forward with a plan of attack for the regular season.”

What did QB Cole Payton show you at the end of the game?

Sean Mannion: “He ran around, made some plays. His athletic traits, those are the ones that sometimes, in a practice setting with a red jersey, you can't always get a true representation of that. The quarterback's not live in practice, but he ran around, did a nice job. There's some things to clean up. A couple just, again, just smoothing out some of those decisions.

“I'm sure there were some nerves, his first NFL action, third down, kind of throwing into traffic there, but really settled in from that point forward and led us on a nice drive to score and get us on the board at the end of the game.”

What was your personal self-scouting process like after – what were you looking out of yourself as a play caller?

Sean Mannion: “I felt comfortable. I felt the call sheet was well organized. I was really satisfied with our staff, our players. I thought the communication with Nick, the communication with the players on the sidelines, substitutions were clean.

“I'd say one game in, I'm very, very happy, with our process -- We'll always keep, like anything, whether it's scheme or the process on the sideline and calling plays, we'll always try to see if we can make it better. Honestly, through one game, I felt really good about it.

What is something that you learned -- Something that you can't learn unless you are actually doing it?

Sean Mannion: “That's a good question. When you're in a game, and especially when you're kind of up against some longer-yardage situations, I think it's just always having a feel for the quarterback, especially when in the preseason it's dictated that a new quarterback's going into the game.

“We're rotating all of our guys through, but how do we get them into a rhythm? I feel like that's something -- Just new quarterback enters the game, might be in a tough spot early, what are his comfort calls?

“That's something we get a feel for every day at practice with the guys. Then certainly in the game, it kind of came to life there with a couple long yardage situations early.

Did you have much communication with QB Jalen Hurts during the game in terms of how he was seeing things from the sideline?

Sean Mannion: “He was on the sideline with the QBs the whole time. Great teammate. He was always around, he was engaged. Between him and [Quarterbacks Coach] Parks [Frazier], there was a lot of resources there to support the quarterbacks on the sideline.”

How did T Markel Bell show up on film?

Sean Mannion: Markel did a nice job. We talked about it I think last week. There's a crop of young linemen that we're really excited about.

“Markel, obviously some of our interior players, [C/G] Willie [Lampkin], [C/G] Drew [Kendall], [C/G] Jake [Majors] did a really nice job.

“A lot of them, and I could name all of them, but a lot of them have done a nice job in practice.

“It was cool to see them in live game action. You could feel the play style, the effort. That was the one thing that stood out. I know we didn't have the performance we wanted, but the effort was there across the board. Markel certainly had a big part of that."

With T Markel Bell, I noticed there a few times where he was in a two-point stance, and the rest of the line is in a three-point stance. Is that just because he's so tall, it's hard to get down on the ground? What goes into that decision making?

Sean Mannion: “We use both and we train all of our guys to be in both. Sometimes it's based on the alignment where they may be in a two, they may be in a three, but [Offensive Line Coach Chris Kuper] Coop does a great job. We're going to train all of our guys to be able to use both stances.”

How limited was the menu, so to speak -- As you watched the game back, do you think this is what I would call in this situation if I had the playbook at my disposal?"

Sean Mannion: “You always do kind of in a little after-action report and a self-scout in terms of how you call the game and things you could do better, things that you want to lean into further.

“The scheme and the game planning and the preseason is almost a little bit secondary to wanting to evaluate the guys in terms of their execution [and] their fundamentals.

“We kept things pretty close to the vest there. Again, we wanted to see these guys go out, play, execute their assignment, and play with good fundamentals.

“It wasn't really a setting to kind of totally turn it into a game-plan specific type of game.

Can you dip into the playbook a little more in joint practice because there won’t be film for other teams?

Sean Mannion: “Anytime you're practicing, you're always kind of exploring new things, you're tinkering with things, you have your system in place. How do we make little tweaks?

“How do we build off of some things we've been doing? Practice does give you an opportunity to explore that further, especially a joint practice going against a different team, a different defense, front structure, so on and so forth.

“There is a little bit of a window to do that in the joint practice setting.”

Kind of following up on that, it's obviously a big opportunity for the starters to get a lot of action. What are you kind of looking for from those guys when you run into others?

Sean Mannion: “It's largely the same. The starters, they didn't get the work in the preseason [game] one. It's an opportunity for us to see them execute, get aligned, play with great fundamentals. It'll be a good opportunity for us to see them think on their feet, too.

“There could be some looks that you see in joint practice that are unscouted, but it's a great opportunity to see us kind of problem-solve as an offense, to see our players play with great football intelligence, react to maybe an unscouted look, see different fronts, different personnel for our offensive lineman to block a different rusher, maybe as a different arsenal move.

“There's a lot of advantages to the joint practice for the starters, especially [since] they didn't get that live action last week.”

There was a series in the game where you were leaving the ball on the ground pretty well with RB Will Shipley in there. What did you like about just the execution of the run game on that drive?

Sean Mannion: “Will ran really well. It's always a group effort. I thought our guys were running off the ball. They were attacking their aiming points. Will had a couple nice creases on a couple different run schemes, and he's a talented player.

“He's been a great special teams contributor here. He's got great protection ability. It was nice to get him going. Again, unfortunately, we kind of stalled out after a penalty, but you could feel the momentum kind of shifting with our run game there for a minute. We just have to sustain it. That's the challenge. Will did a nice job.”

C/G Willie Lampkin's unique size and skill set -- Is there ways to get him involved creatively outside of sort of the normal structural role?

Sean Mannion: There may be. Right now, we're just excited about what Willie's been doing every day at practice. He's had a really strong camp so far. He competes. He has a great play style, physicality every day, and he's done a nice job.

“We're just going to keep evaluating him from there, and down the road, maybe. We're excited with what we've seen. We just want to kind of keep him on the path -- keep him on track with what he's been doing so far. He's off to a nice start.”

A guy like QB Andy Dalton, who has such a wide range of experience and tape, what matters in terms of evaluating him in a preseason game?

Sean Mannion: “It's really no different whether you're in year one or year 17. It's execution, it's accuracy, it's playing on time. It's all the same things. With Andy, it's not his first go around like it is say, for [QB] Cole, [Payton] but it's the same evaluation.” *

Email Al Thompson at al.thompson@footballstories.com