Chip Kelly has come under constant critiquing this offseason.
He has revamped his roster in a way that no coach of such experience ever has. Trading out LeSean McCoy for DeMarco Murray, releasing Evan Mathis, trading Brandon Boykin and, most significantly, swapping quarterbacks with the St. Louis Rams. Kelly may not ever tie his status to a quarterback. That is the beauty of his scheme. There's no doubt that Sam Bradford is the most talented player he has had at the position though. Although Nick Foles had an impressive statistical stretch a few years ago, his inaccuracy and inability to perform against pressure meant that the Eagles weren't getting the most they could realistically expect to get out of their offense.
Bradford is a polarizing player. The former first overall pick has had his career to this point ruined by injuries. When he's been healthy and available, his statistical output has been underwhelming. The question with Bradford is just how much blame can be shifted onto his teammates in St. Louis.
Over his four seasons in St. Louis when he actually saw the field, Bradford threw the ball to receivers such as Brandon Gibson, Danny Amendola, Chris Givens, Lance Kendricks, Steven Jackson, Austin Pettis, Danario Alexander and Brandon Lloyd. Those receivers are listed by who had the most yards during those seasons. Brian Quick was also on the roster, but while Bradford was on the field he was struggling to run his routes and catch the ball when given opportunities. Tavon Austin had similar issues, but he spent even less time with an active Bradford. The Rams didn't have a receiving option on the roster who could create matchup problems or consistently get open and catch the ball.
To compound those issues, they also had major offensive line issues and an inconsistent running game. This meant that Bradford was put in positions where he had to make quick downfield throws against four man rushes into crowded coverages with no receivers open or who could win at the catch point. Expecting him to put up big yardage in that situation was unrealistic.
Expectations need to be reset now. There are very few places that are more quarterback-friendly in the NFL than in Kelly's offense. Although the offensive line has been depleted by recent departures, the design of Kelly's offense and the variety of receiving options and running backs are of a different world to what Bradford has previously worked with. Each fo DeMarco Murray, Ryan Matthews and Darren Sproles are better than any running back Bradford has played with, while Jordan Matthews, Nelson Agholor, Zach Ertz, Riley Cooper and Josh Huff offer more upside than any receivers he has thrown to.
All of those players are effective individuals in a vacuum, but Bradford can elevate their production in Kelly's offense. He can do that by consistently making the easy plays that Kelly's offense is based on.
On this play, Foles has three options to the wide side fo the field. Each receiving option is attacking the defense at a different level, but doing so in the same area to create a simple read for the quarterback. Foles is late to let the ball go to his receiver running a curl route and his pass is wildly off target. This is a simple throw that every quarterback should expect to make every single time he attempts it. There will always be rare miscues, but Foles' miscues were too regular for Kelly's liking.
Even throwing screen passes regularly came with poor ball placement.
The simple principles of Kellys offense are that he will stretch the field in every possible direction. He pulls the defense towards each sideline with screen passes, often coming after play action or as options on runs. Placing then ball in front of the receiver on these kinds of throws is important for leading the him downfield, but overshooting the receiver is something that simply should never happen. NFL quarterbacks who can't make this throw comfortably shouldn't be starting in the league.
Unfortunately for Foles, his accuracy to every area of the field was majorly problematic.
In the above chart, every pass that Foles threw last season except for spikes, passes tipped at the line of scrimmage and throwaways are represented by green ticks or red crosses. The green ticks represent accurate passes, while the red crosses represent inaccurate passes. The chart doesn't track completions and incompletions, it doesn't matter if the ball was caught or not. it looks at ball placement, so accuracy in its purest form. Foles' chart is woeful. His accuracy was really, really bad last year and this is highlighted when compared to Sam Bradford's from when he last played.
The most obvious difference between Bradford and Foles is what happened behind the line of scrimmage. Bradford was consistently placing the ball for his receivers on screen passes and checkdowns, whereas Foles was accurate on checkdowns but struggled throwing screen passes accurately. When you look further downfield, Bradford was also a much more accurate deep passer, which may be surprising considering his reputation.
Bradford didn't have a reputation as an accurate deep passer in St. Louis because his numbers weren't good. Those numbers weren't good because of his situation rather than his ability. Bad offenisve line play and receivers who couldn't separate or catch the ball consistently kept his output low. In Philadelphia, he won't have these issues to deal with.
Kelly's offense is brilliantly designed. His use of play action and his route combinations allow receivers to consistently get wide open downfield without over-exerting their skill set. Jeremy Maclin was the Eagles' best receiver last year and Foles repeatedly failed to find him when he was open downfield. On this play against the Washington defense. Maclin comes wide open down the seam. Foles floats the ball far over his head, so far that he has no chance of adjusting to it. With an accurate pass on this play, Maclin could comfortably had run in an 87-yard touchdown.
This wasn't a difficult throw by NFL standards. Throwing the ball downfield is never truly easy, but there are dramatically varying degrees of difficulty for different plays. This is the kind of throw you would expect most starting quarterbacks in the NFL to make consistently.
Multiple examples from the same game could be found to highlight Foles' issues, without even including all of them.
If you paid close attention to what Foles was doing, you wouldn't have been surprised that Kelly traded him. Kelly is smart enough to understand that the statisitcal representation of his pieces isn't indicative of performance. Even when Foles was at his most productive during his first season with the former Oregon coach, he was still throwing bad interceptions and leaving plays on the field. Drops and the overwhelming success of Kelly's scheme with a great offensive line were able to compensate for his poor play though.
The Eagles don't need Bradford to be a great quarterback, they just need him to be an above average one. If he can be that, the offense will enjoy huge success.
A healthy Bradford should make the Eagles offense a top five unit in the league at the very least and likely the favorite for the most productive offense in the NFL. It is one of the very few offenses in the NFL where you should prioiritize getting a piece of over the individual talent of the player you are picking. This elevates players such as Nelson Agholor, Jordan Matthews, Josh Huff, Riley Cooper and Zach Ertz(if healthy).
An unhealthy Bradford puts Sanchez back in the fold. Sanchez should still keep the offense effective and allow for consistent production from his supporting cast, but that production will be more dependant on the quality of opposition. Sanchez doesn't have the same talent as Bradford, so when the windows tighten against better defenses he will look closer to Foles than the franchise's new starter.
Of course, it goes without saying that Bradford will be a very productive fantasy option also.
