By: Charles Skipper

TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services

The Jacksonville Jaguars recently announced the hiring of Doug Pederson as their new Head Coach. Pederson will become the seventh Head Coach of the organization.

Pederson’s hiring comes after Urban Meyer was fired with cause during the 2021 season with the team sporting a 2 – 11 record at the time of his firing.

Meyer brought unwanted negative attention to himself and his team with some of his off the field shenanigans. These actions coupled with lack of respect from his players, treating his assistants and other team employees badly plus poor on the field performance led to owner Shahid Khan showing the Golden Boy of College the door. The firing ended his first and probably his last professional coaching job.

The Jaguars have had a total of six head coaches in the 27-year history of the team. The men whom have been at the helm of the ship in chronological order are Tom Coughlin, Jack Del Rio, Mike Mularkey, Gus Bradley, Doug Marrone and Urban Meyer.

Coughlin was the first and by far the most successful hire for the organization. He had almost complete control of team operations even though he never wore the title General Manager. He commandeered the most successful expansion team in league history.

Jacksonville entered the playoffs with a win in the last game of the season and made it all the way to the AFC Championship Game in only its second year of existence.

Coach Coughlin was fired after a 6 – 10 finish in 2002. He finished his career in Duval with a 68 – 60 regular season record and a 4 – 4 slate in the playoffs. After leaving the Jaguars he went on to coach the New York Giants for 12 years securing 2 Super Bowl victories along the way.

Nineteen seasons and five head coaches later the Jaguars have not been able to equal Coughlin’s four trips to the playoffs. Del Rio with 2 and Marrone with 1 represents all the playoff appearances since their initial success.

Quickly achieved success is not foreign to the fifty-four-year-old Pederson. He led the Eagles to a Super Bowl Title in his second season as leader of that squad.

Coach Pederson spent 13 years in the NFL as a backup quarterback although he did make some starts for the Eagles and Browns during his playing career. He won a Super Bowl ring with the Brett Favre led Green Bay Packers in Super Bowl XXXI.

The victory with the Eagles as a Head Coach puts him in the category of only four people to win the ultimate prize as a player and Head Coach.

The new head honcho for Jacksonville and his extensive NFL background is the polar opposite of the College background of Meyer.

Pederson comes to the Jaguars touted as a creative minded offensive play caller. Andy Reid served as mentor to the new Jag leader while he was his assistant at Philadelphia and when he served as his offensive coordinator at Kansas City.

Reid is known as an offensive whiz and Pederson displayed some of those traits while at Philadelphia. The signature play of his team’s Super Bowl victory was run on fourth and goal minutes before halftime. The trick play became known as the Philly Special and will forever be associated with the win.

It remains to be seen if the Jaguars new leader will be able to quickly turn the franchise around like he did the Eagles. I am absolutely certain that they are in better hands than they were heading into the 2021 season.

Who knows? Maybe winning is in the future for the River City gang and the Black, Teal and Gold will become something special to watch.