Jim Schwartz isn't satisfied. After today's practice, which he described as particularly bad, the Eagles new defensive coordinator was quick to shoot down a lot of the praise that was heaped onto his unit by the media during his press conference.
With it being only May and players not wearing pads, Schwartz noted that patience is a virtue during these early practices.
"You have to be patient this time of year," Schwartz explained. "We don't have any games scheduled on Sunday and the most important thing is making progress and technique and fundamentals and building a good foundation that you can [build] on in September, that you can [build] on in December and January."
Schwartz also noted that his job will be making the game simpler for his players so they can play an attacking brand of football. One player in particular he believed would benefit from this transition is former first-round pick Marcus Smith.
"This is a scheme that greatly limits what he's asked to do," Schwartz said. "It's very easy in theory, difficult in execution, but easy in theory. It should allow him to play fast, attack certain spots and give him a little bit less responsibility, but hopefully allow him to make a greater impact. He's very athletic, he's got great size, he's done very well so far, but let's reserve judgement on these guys until we get the pads on."
Reserving judgement seemed to be a reoccurring theme for Schwartz, who noted that the entire point of these voluntary practices were to help players gain an understanding of the playbook and the technique that they will be using when the pads come out in training camp. However, two players have caught his eye during these workouts, and it is safe to say he is excited to see what they can do when the snaps start to count: Malcolm Jenkins and Rodney McLeod.
"I'm sort of violating my rule with judging too much this time of year, but linemen need to have pads on before you can judge them and rookies, let's not judge those guys on anything yet," Schwartz noted. "But both of those guys are veteran players and you can see that right away.
"They're both multi-dimensional, they communicate very well, they can cover a lot of ground, they can blitz, they can play man, they can play zone. I'd be very surprised as the year went on if they're not one of the better safety tandems in the NFL. They've been very impressive so far."
Schwartz put a big emphasis on needing versatile players in today's NFL in order to combat the growing number of offensive sets that opposing teams can throw at you each week. Schwartz also said that head coach Doug Pederson has reached out to him a few times regarding his head coaching experience, and the rookie head coach is very good about using the people and resources he has available to him.
But when asked about the development of new quarterback Carson Wentz, Schwartz, who oversaw the development of Matthew Stafford when he was the head coach of the Detroit Lions, said that the city needs to allow the young signal-caller to develop at his own speed.
"Don't judge him [compared to] somebody else and also, don't predetermine the results of the race. Just let him go play, don't put pressure on him and I can't speak for Carson what's going on, I have my own worries going on."
So, in other words, let's reserve judgement.
Tucker Bagley is a columnist for Eagledelphia. Follow him on Twitter @tbagley515.
