First rule of sports media:

If somebody tells you they don’t pay attention to the media, it means they pay attention to the media. It’s an old school cover up that sometimes doubles as a diss. These guys know exactly what’s being said about them. They scroll Twitter, Google their own name, and pay attention to what we would call “outside noise.”

Doug Pederson was asked straight-up on Wednesday about how he blocks out the noise and said this:

“For me, personally, I don’t listen. I don’t listen to the radio. I don’t read print media. If Brett (Strohsacker, PR guy) doesn’t tell me what’s going on outside of our building, I don’t know. Or if Dom (DiSandro, security chief), doesn’t inform me of what our players are doing, I don’t wanna know, right? Because my focus is on the team and helping our football team get better and improve. That’s my job. I understand my job is also to make tough decisions with the roster, who plays and doesn’t play, things of that nature. Every coach, every player here, there’s a ton of pride, and everybody is an expert, everybody is an armchair quarterback and has an opinion. Listen, I respect that. People are entitled to that. I have to do what I feel is in the best interest of the Philadelphia Eagles, Mr. Lurie, and the players in that locker room. It comes down to having to make tough decisions. 

One of the things I’ve learned as a player and seen as a coach is that tough decisions have to be made in this business. Whether it’s a decision to move on from a player in the offseason or the decision now as to whether you’re gonna make a move at quarterback or not. These are all decisions that have to be made by me. For the most part I focus on the players and getting better each day.”

Maybe it would benefit Doug to hear the noise, to hear what the “armchair” quarterbacks are saying, because less is more and sometimes there are obvious solutions being presented by people who aren’t coaches, but aren’t idiots either. Solutions like benching 38 year old Jason Peters.

As a follow up to that answer about outside noise, Pederson was asked if he was making a quarterback change, and said this:

Doug: “Not today on Wednesday, no.”

Tim McManus: “Possibly for Monday?

Doug: “Uhh, I’m focused right now on getting better today. I mean, we’re looking, I don’t know, I would say no. No.

Tim McManus: “Carson is your starter for Monday?”

Doug: “Yes.”

It was kind of a quirky exchange with some odd hiccups.

Rob Maaddi decided to end the press conference with a follow-up, which resulted in this:

Maaddi: “Your hesitation to answer that question about the starter on Monday is going to be over-analyzed and micro-analyzed, and I know you’re not paying any attention to it. But can you explain why there was a hesitation? Are you thinking about it? Has that even crossed your mind?”

Doug: “I think about a lot of things. The question was, ‘is Carson Wentz my starter?’ He’s my starter, end of story. You guys can blow it up however you want, and that’s fine. I’m focused on this team, these players, this coaching staff, and the Seattle Seahawks.”

So there you go. Maybe we can get a body language expert here to look at the video. Maybe we can sleuth and analyze every single word. Let’s talk about it on sports radio for the next 72 hours.