Brian Dawkins shares advice for new coach Nick Sirianni originally appeared on NBC Sports Philadelphia
Brian Dawkins was just a few years into his NFL career when Andy Reid took over for the Eagles in 1999, so he has an idea of what it’ll take for new Eagles head coach Nick Sirianni to be successful as a first-time head coach.
The Eagles legend was the latest guest on Takeoff with John Clark and gave some insight.
Get Philly local news, weather forecasts, sports and entertainment stories to your inbox. Sign up for NBC Philadelphia newsletters.
“You have to be a leader of men, the way that I see it,” Dawkins said. “That’s not so much in your first meeting, that’s not so much in your second meeting. It has to be something, not necessarily your words even. There’s just a presence that a leader has. You step up.
“Andy stepped up when he presented himself. You can feel, you can sense the confidence that he had in himself about what it is that we were going to do. We may not have understood why he was doing some of the things that he was doing but he was very direct in what he wanted. ‘These are the things we’re expecting, this is how we’re going to handle practice, these are the things, these are the changes and this is how we’re going to roll.’ And that’s how he presented himself.”
Sirianni has been on the job for a few months but now we’re really entering his first duties as an on-field coach, beginning with last week’s rookie camp.
Dawkins, 47, said it’s not just about what Sirianni says but about his actions. That’s what Dawk saw from Reid over two decades ago.
“Over time, that leader still earns that respect,” Dawkins said. “So along the way, we’re watching, he’s watching, they’ll be watching one another. And you have to stay down that path of being an extremely concrete on how you handle situations. Whatever situation comes your way, you have to be very steadfast in how you handle that. And it can’t be a whole lot of fluctuations in how you do things with that team early on. We’re gonna see. We’re gonna see how it spells out for this young coach.”
In addition to talk about the next chapter in Eagles history, Clark also talked to Dawkins about mental health, his foundation, Harold Carmichael’s HOF nod and plenty more.
Check it out here:
