For his entire coaching career, Eagles offensive coordinator Kevin Patullo has aspired to be an NFL play-caller.
That dream came true when former Eagles offensive coordinator Kellen Moore left this offseason to be the head coach of the New Orleans Saints.
The Eagles promoted Patullo, who has been the team’s passing-game coordinator for the last four years, to be their new offensive coordinator eight days after Moore departed. As Patullo makes the transition to offensive coordinator, the pressure on him will increase, especially when the Eagles’ offense struggles.
“I think the biggest thing is (to) just be me. I mean, I’m not going to change who I am,” Patullo told reporters on Wednesday.
In his first year as the Eagles’ offensive coordinator, Patullo must adjust to different looks that NFL defenses present, including stacking the box against Eagles running back Saquon Barkley.
This is a strategy that the Kansas City Chiefs used in Super Bowl LIX, and more NFL teams will utilize it during the 2025 season.
Moore did a great job of countering Kansas City’s game plan with a strong passing attacking and scored 33 offensive points in the Eagles’ Super Bowl victory.
The Eagles will need Patullo to be effective like Moore and to be more successful than their past internal offensive coordinator hires.
After their previous two Super Bowl trips (2018 and 2023), the Eagles lost their offensive coordinators (Frank Reich and Shane Steichen) to the Indianapolis Colts’ head coaching job and struggled to replace them.
During the 2018 and 2019 seasons, former Eagles offensive coordinator Mike Groh was blamed for Philadelphia’s offensive regression, which led to him getting fired after 2019.
Four years later (2023), Philadelphia’s offense disappointed under new offensive coordinator Brian Johnson, especially during the team’s late-season collapse in which they lost six of their final seven games. After receiving most of the criticism for their problems, Johnson was fired that offseason.
If the Eagles’ offense crumbles in 2025, Patullo could experience the same fate as Johnson and Groh. He’s confident that won’t happen.
“To be honest, you’re just kind of doing your job,” Patullo said. “If you look at something like that big picture, I guess it could be overwhelming, but this is what I do, this is what I wanted to do. I’ve been wanting to do it, and I have an opportunity to do it and like I said, I’ve got a great staff around me, great players, great organization, everything. So it’ll be fun.”
Patullo has been Eagles coach Nick Sirianni’s right-hand- man since the two coached together on the Colts’ staff. So, it wasn’t surprising that Sirianni picked him to run their offense.
The Eagles’ offense, which returns 10 of its 11 starters from the 2024 season, won’t look too different this season, but Patullo said, “You’ll see some new wrinkles here and there.”
“My approach is to put the players in the best position they can to be successful and then that’s what it comes down to,” he explained. “You want to make sure they’re confident in everything that they can do, and you want to be confident as a coach that you put them in that position so that they can go out there and do their best.”
Throughout the offseason, Sirianni has seen Patullo take command of their offensive meetings and share new concepts with his players.
“I really have been impressed with how hungry Kevin is for this opportunity and all the good new ideas that he’s bringing,” Sirianni told reporters last week. “Even though Kevin’s been with me for eight years, there’s still things that when you’re in charge that (you’re) like, ‘Hey, now let’s do this. Let’s give this an opportunity.’”
Patullo is in a better position to have success compared to Groh and Johnson.
Those coaches didn’t have the same level of talent and continuity that Patullo will benefit from. It’s hard to imagine this Eagles’ offense falling apart — unless Patullo is bad at his job.
“I think just like every year you go in saying, okay, this is the core fundamental what teams want to do and then you just have your checklist of things that you got to go down, they could do this, they could do this, they could do that,” Patullo said about his philosophy against defenses. “Then you have to have your core plays that you know you trust. We talked about all the 11 guys are back essentially, so they know how to problem solve out on the field and as coaches, we have to be ready to adjust.”
