Doug Pederson is still employed in Jacksonville, and he’s taking the blame for the Jaguars’ rough 2-9 start to the season.
Pederson, speaking one day after what was the worst loss in franchise history, said that everything is on the table when it comes to making changes within the organization as they enter their bye week.
“I think you’ve got to be really, really careful when you start pointing fingers at certain people. It’s a dangerous thing, and I’m not going to do that,” he said, via ESPN’s Michael DiRocco. “As a head coach in this league that’s going through what we’re going through, you’re pointing a finger and if it’s got to be pointed, it needs to be pointed at me. Start with me.”
The Jaguars have come unraveled in recent weeks, and Sunday’s loss to the Detroit Lions was a perfect example of that. The Lions cruised to a 52-6 blowout win at Ford Field and racked up 645 yards — which is the second-most the Jaguars have allowed in a single game in franchise history. The Jaguars had just 170 yards as a team, by comparison, and only 41 yards on the ground.
Over the last three games, the Jaguars have allowed just shy of 1,500 yards of offense while putting up only 528 yards in return. Those are both franchise records over a three-game span.
The loss marked their fourth straight, and ensured that the team would finish with a losing record. It will be the franchise’s 11th losing season in the last 14 years. The team has made the playoffs just twice over that span.
After the loss Sunday, many expected that Pederson would be fired. Pederson, who won Super Bowl LII with the Philadelphia Eagles, is in his third season with the Jaguars and has compiled a 20-25 record. He’s responsible for two of the team’s three winning seasons in the last 14 years.
But Pederson said Monday that he didn’t have a meeting on the books with owner Shad Khan, and he was continuing on normally into the bye week.
The break, he said, is much needed. Everyone is “mentally” and “physically fatigued.”
“Where we are and still six games to go, I think it’s time to just hit the reset button and just sort of rewind, kind of get fresh again, coaches and players,” Pederson said. “And the coaches need to — this is what I challenged them to this week, we’ve got to go back, and we’ve got to look at everything from a schematic standpoint, player standpoint, personnel standpoint, all that kind of stuff this week.
“If we come out of this bye and we just kind of keep doing the same things and trying to expect different results, it’s probably not going to happen, right? So, we’ve got to do some little things, some minor things. We’ll do it, and that’s what we’re going to spend these next couple of days doing.”