If Nick Foles goes on to be the Eagles franchise quarterback and leads them to great things in the future, he will become part of Andy Reid's lasting legacy in Philadelphia. Photo: Philly.com
It's almost fitting that Eagles quarterback Nick Foles and first-year Kansas City Chiefs head coach Andy Reid are off to historic starts this season.
Reid of course guided his Chiefs to a 9-0 start, the last of the unbeatens, before falling to the Denver Broncos on Sunday night football and Foles is on the verge of becoming the Eagles franchise quarterback thanks to his landmark performance since coming on in relief of Michael Vick last month.
As well as Foles is playing this season, the seeds to his 2013 campaign were sewn as a rookie last season.
Foles, Andy Reid's third-round choice in his final year as Eagles head coach, made history becoming the first rookie in the history of the National Football League to average 60 percent of his passes (Foles finished with a 63 percent completion percentage) and average 240 yards passing per game (Foles averaged 243 yards per game).
All the while, Foles was throwing to the likes of Damaris Johnson and Clay Harbor with Bryce Brown in the backfield behind four backup offensive lineman while playing for a lame-duck head coach.
"I'm going to stick with Nick," Reid said last December when he turned the reins of what would be his final season in Philadelphia over to Foles, even after Vick was cleared from a concussion. "He's got a real strong arm, you can put his arm up against anybody in the league."
It's no small feat this season, his second in the league, Foles will have mastered two radically different offensive schemes while playing for an equally variant pair of head coaches.
While Foles showed glimpses as a rookie, he has flourished under Chip Kelly's watch and in a scheme where many said he was ill suited to succeed.
Now that he's attempted enough passes to be ranked among the league's passing leaders it's time to realize that this kid is good, and not just the benefactor of some luck.
After five starts Foles is the league's most efficient quarterback, besting Peyton Manning 128.0 to 118.3. The 24-year old has thrown fewer passes than Aaron Rodgers, Tom Brady, Eli Manning, Robert Griffin III, Jay Cutler, Joe Flacco, Cam Newton and Colin Kaepernick yet Foles has thrown for more touchdowns than each of those quarterbacks.
Reid thought so highly of his former third-round choice that there were multiple rumors that Reid made overtures to his former employer to make an off-season trade that would send Foles along with him to Kansas City.
Foles didn't just impress Reid enough to nab him in the third round last year, Eagles offensive Coordinator Pat Shurmur admitted last week that as head coach of the Cleveland Browns, the University of Arizona product was on his radar.
"We liked him a great deal," Shurmur told reporters. "Yeah, we see why the Eagles drafted him, and it wasn't any surprise to us because he had all the attributes that I know. I know [general manager] Howie [Roseman] and I know Andy [Reid] and Marty [Mornhinweg] and those guys were looking for in a quarterback."
As Chip Kelly's first season has evolved and with defenses beginning to solve the read-option offense conundrum, Foles is proving week in and week out that he is more than deserving of the Eagles franchise quarterback label. His sound, quick decisions, repetitive accuracy and functional mobility will prove to be an asset for kelly moving forward.
And to think, if Foles does wind up the Eagles starting quarterback for years to come Philadelphia fans have to at least partially tip their hat to one Andrew Walter Reid.
Matt Lombardo is the Editor-In-Chief of Eagledelphia and also an on-air personality on 97.5 FM The Fanatic in Philadelphia. Join the conversation and follow Matt on Twitter.
