The Inquirer’s Jeff McLane asks a lot of pointed questions at Eagles press conferences.

He asks about injuries and the medical staff and tries to dig into areas that you would consider more “sensitive” than others.

To that end, he’s had some pseudo-contentious interactions with Doug Pederson this year, interactions that resulted in the head football coach rolling his eyes, giving brief non-answers, or just responding with relative disinterest.

Apparently that extends up the food chain as well, if today’s season-ending press conference is any indication. Howie Roseman was in front of reporters Tuesday and asked McLane to repeat a question after seeming to poke fun at the clothes he was wearing.

Volume up:

Look at Les Bowen and Tim McManus and Zack Rosenblatt laughing in the background. McLane also pulls a power move by waving off Reuben Frank in order to keep the microphone and ask a follow-up question.

The exchange:

Roseman (to Pederson): “He’s throwing me off with this.. there’s a lot…”

Pederson: “There’s a lot going on right here.”

Roseman: “Ummm… I’m sorry. One more time. “

I guess Howie and Doug were not fans of the fingerless gloves.

Anyway, Roseman pretty much shrugged off every question Jeff asked him about the medical staff. McLane asked about turnover in that department:

“Well we had three changes on our medical staff. All three of those reasons were different, all three were personal in nature. Those were guys who had been here for as long as I had been here. Certainly when you’re coming off a Super Bowl victory it’s not something you’re anticipating, making a lot of changes in that area. You have a shortened offseason. But by the same token, we put people in place that we have a lot of confidence in. We have to allow them to grow in their jobs and continue to show faith in them because we do have faith in them.”

McLane tried at the end of the presser with another question: “why wasn’t Carson Wentz’s stress fracture identified earlier than it was?”

Howie: “Again, I’m not going to go into specifics on injuries. Carson talked about the injury, his own injury, (it’s) spoken for and we complied with the NFL rules.”

McLane: But did the team come to any conclusion about the process?

Howie: “Jeff, I’m gonna stand by Carson. He talked about his injury and I’m going to stand by everything we’ve said to that point. We complied with every NFL rule.”

They really don’t like him.

But, honestly, good on Jeff for asking those questions. The answers the team gave in regard to Wentz earlier this season were not exactly convincing, so you ask the General Manager about it when you get him in front of a microphone. In Jeff’s case, though, I think because he only asks harder and more annoying questions, he rarely ever gets decent answers out of these guys. Maybe throw a bullshit softball in there every so often to balance it out. It’s a push and pull, a give-and-take in order to be tough, but fair, and actually earn some respect.

Anyway, more non-medical notes from the presser:

  • Doug: Carson Wentz is the quarterback going forward
  • Doug: offense wasn’t good enough to win the Saints game, lost Brandon Brooks early, had a turnover, you could feel the momentum switch as the game went on, the 18-play drive took some gas out of the defense
  • Howie totally dodged three non-McLane questions regarding when the team discovered Carson Wentz’s stress fracture: “my understanding is that Carson talked about the injury yesterday and Coach Pederson has talked about it as well, so I stand by what they said…. when we talk about injuries, injuries are personal in nature, I don’t want to get into timetables, excited to have Carson back” (Bob Ford asked)
  • Doug confirmed that all three coordinators will be back (Mike Groh, Jim Schwartz, Dave Fipp)
  • Howie says the team has a lot of confidence in Carson to hopefully “be a 19 game starter,” didn’t seem at all concerned about his injury history
  • Howie says there’s a good defensive line group in this draft, the QB class is less than it has been and running back was heavier at the top in 2018
  • Doug says Carson Wentz improved over the season, time lost in the summer and OTAs was hard to do (he sort of dodged the question, which was about whether or not the ACL affected his play)
  • Howie on Nick Foles: “it’s always got to be what’s best for the Eagles, but there’s always a respect factor for guys who have done a lot for us.. but the bottom line is we have to do what’s best for us” 
  • Howie on whether the Golden Tate trade was worth it: “no question, when we made the trade we were 4-4 and looking for a spark, looking for more firepower.. we knew the price to pay, we wanted to make a playoff run and we’re always going to put our foot on the gas.. we don’t look back with regret and we’re going to be aggressive.”
  • Howie says he would love to keep Nick Foles, but that sounded like lip service/non-answer stuff to me, just a canned response
  • Howie on Darren Sproles: “everybody needs time to get away, then we’ll reconvene and have those discussions”

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