Eagles coach Nick Sirianni has needed seven years to hold up his end of a bargain.
It was Sirianni’s first month as the Indianapolis Colts’ offensive coordinator, and he was searching for a wide receivers coach. Los Angeles Rams defensive line coach Giff Smith, one of Sirianni’s old co-workers with the Los Angeles Chargers, recommended one of his former colleagues, Kevin Patullo, for the job.
Smith thought they would be a perfect fit for one another. So why not raise the stakes?
“You hire (Kevin) in a year, you’ll be taking me out to dinner,” Smith told NJ Advance Media this month about his conversation with Sirianni.
Sirianni hired Patullo entering the 2018 season and brought him to Philadelphia as his pass game coordinator in 2021.
Four years later, Patullo became Sirianni’s new offensive coordinator, fulfilling Smith’s prediction of them prospering together.
After all these years, did Sirianni ever take Smith out to dinner?
“Well, no. But he just signed a new contract, so I should get like two or three meals,” Smith joked. “But no, it was good. Like I said, I’ll never be hungry. I know I still got a free meal out there with Sirianni, so I’m good to go.”
Smith is not the only coach who has bet on Patullo’s potential, but for now, that’s all it is.
This will be the first time Patullo, 44, has been an offensive coordinator at any level, and it’s not an opportunity where he can learn on the job. Philadelphia’s high-profile OC position has made and broken careers. During the last four years, two Eagles OCs became head coaches (Kellen Moore and Shane Steichen), but the other OC (Brian Johnson) got fired after the 2023 season and joined the Washington Commanders last year in a lesser role (passing game coordinator).
That’s a lot of pressure for a young coach, and how he responds to it could determine his fate because the Eagles’ offense is a key to their return to the Super Bowl. Patullo’s play-calling will directly affect its success.
But Patullo’s former colleagues have little doubt that he will thrive.
According to six former colleagues who spoke to NJ Advance Media, Patullo has demonstrated every quality of a great offensive coach since his first season as a graduate assistant at South Florida: making difficult concepts easy to understand, pushing the right buttons to maximize each player’s potential, and innovating to stay ahead of defenses.
“When Kevin was with us, he was ready to be an offensive coordinator,” said former Colts head coach Frank Reich, who was also the Eagles’ OC during the 2016-17 seasons. “He had the experience and the tools and the gifts to do it then.”
Here’s how Patullo rose to become one of the most important figures in the Eagles’ organization.
‘The why’
Eagles Camp Football
Eagles offensive coordinator Kevin Patullo will get his first chance at running an offense this season.AP
Patullo was different from the beginning. Even as a quarterback and wide receiver (1999-02) at South Florida, the play call was not enough for him. He wanted to understand the intricacies of each play — and how it influences the overall game plan.
“He would always ask those questions, the ‘why’ questions that some quarterbacks or wideouts don’t always know when they’re playing the game,” former South Florida wide receivers coach Tom Pajic said. “They just learn the concept, the system. They don’t always know the why. Well, Kevin was just wanting to know the why. ‘Why are we doing this offensive concept? What are we reading? What’s the progression?’
“He went from A to Z through the quarterback’s eyes and receiver’s eyes.”
He also put in the work, often holding extra sessions with teammates to review the plays again. It mattered to him that everybody was on the same page, and as a backup, it was also the best way he could contribute to the team’s success.
Patullo broke down the nuances that the coaches wouldn’t spend as much time on, and that helped his teammates improve.
“Sometimes he would say, ‘Here’s the concept offensively, but here’s the defense. Here’s the ‘why.’ Here’s the explanation why,’” Paijac said. That’s what he would do. It took young players and older players from the eyes of their own concept offensively to okay, ‘This is what we do, but this is why we’re doing this.’
“Kevin would go to the ninth degree after the fact and say, ‘Okay, here’s the coverage, here’s the front, here’s the blitz, here’s the why.’”
It was only natural that Patullo was hired to USF’s coaching staff out of college. Two years later, he joined Mike Canales in the same role at Arizona and stayed there from 2004-06.
From every Sunday to Thursday during the season, Patullo basically lived at the facility, leaving at 1 a.m. after he cut up film of practices, previous games and future opponents. He also inserted pictures of run designs and passing concepts into a computer to show players how each play was supposed to look. Then, at the end of each week, he helped Canales build the game script.
Canales told NJ Advance Media that Patullo’s focus was always, “How can I become a better coach?” Every time Patullo met with Canales, he introduced new ideas to the Wildcats’ playbook — a testament to his growth.
When Patullo left Arizona for the Kansas City Chiefs, he had a good grasp on the X’s and O’s. But his knowledge grew exponentially when he worked under Kansas City offensive coordinator Chan Gailey in 2008.
Gailey taught Patullo how to attack defenses in different ways. They spent five more years together — three seasons (2010-12) with the Bills and two seasons (2015-16) with the New York Jets — as mentor and mentee.
“In 2008, it was, we lost a couple quarterbacks,” Patullo said this spring. “We ended up having (former NFL QB) Tyler Thigpen come in, and I’ll never forget, we get into a staff room, and the walls are all white, there’s nothing out there. He goes, ‘All right, we got to figure out a new offense for this week. He was willing to do anything and try anything to be successful. We ended up developing this no-huddle system. We were in the pistol, and in 2008, nobody knew what the pistol was in the NFL.
“We were successful for the most part. We didn’t win a lot of games, but we moved the ball with a bunch of guys that we didn’t know really if we could do that with. So him being able to show, look, we do what we have to do to win, it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t have to look a certain way, was huge.”
As a first-year NFL coach with the Jets, Marcel Shipp, who handled running backs, had meetings with Patullo, the QBs coach, to learn more about Gailey’s philosophies. Sometimes Patullo shared ideas that Gailey hadn’t contemplated. A few of them were eventually incorporated.
“Chan turned some things down,” Shipp said. “Kevin will push back and try to get this, and Chan is like okay, ‘Let’s do it this way.” They’ll come to an agreement at some point, but they always had their meeting afterwards. So that’s how I knew Chan really respected where Kevin was at offensively because they’ll have extra meetings afterwards, and then you’ll see the offense change a little bit from the big team (meeting) that we had together. You could tell that was a little more input from Kevin.
“Even in the headsets, he would like tell Gailey, ‘Hey, we had this open. Look at this, Chan.’ Things like that. He always had input on each play. You could tell that he was really gearing up and was ready to have his own offense.”
Even though Gailey had been coaching for over 40 years and Patullo was still relatively inexperienced, the younger coach occasionally took control of New York’s offensive meetings, drawing designs on the whiteboard and leading a discussion about the game plan. Those designs included several ways to get wide receiver Brandon Marshall the ball.
“I’m like, ‘This is the guy right here,’” Shipp said. “I thought that he would have had an offensive coordinator job before this, to be honest with you.”
‘The separator’
Philadelphia Eagles running back Saquon Barkley (26) reacts to the touchdown with wide receiver A.J. Brown (11) during the NFL championship playoff football game against the Washington Commanders, Sunday, Jan. 26, 2025, in Philadelphia.
Eagles offensive coordinator Kevin Patullo gets to work closely with running back Saquon Barkley (left) and wide receiver A.J. Brown (right). AP
Patullo’s wealth of knowledge has provided a foundation for his career. But there are a lot of smart offensive coaches in the NFL, and not every one of them has had success.
“You got to be able to tell the truth,” Smith said. “I know that sounds like an easy concept, but it tends to be a struggle with a lot of coaches, and Kevin was truthful with them. … When you’re that kind of guy, guys respond to it. Whether it was (former Bills wide receiver) Stevie Johnson or whoever, he was able to connect with different individuals that some people might deem as difficult, but they’re not. … And when you have that kind of connection and trust, then you get the feedback back and forth. And I think that’s really the separator between average coaches and great coaches.”
Patullo develops mutual respect with his players by taking the time to show them he cares. He doesn’t scream to get his point across, and he listens.
“Kevin would be the guy who would be more, ‘Hey, let me run down there,’” Reich said. “The receiver just ran a route down the field. Now he’s jogging back down the field. Kevin’s running down to meet him halfway to kind of talk him through, ‘Hey, here’s what went right there. Here’s what went wrong.’”
But how will he jell with Sirianni, whom Reich described as “pretty fiery,” an obvious description to anyone who has observed Sirianni’s temperament during games and practices in the last four years.
Patullo’s steady approach calms him down, a quality Sirianni acknowledged last week.
“Nick trusted him completely, and Nick knew that Kevin was a voice of reason. Kevin didn’t get emotionally hijacked easily like some people can get,” Reich said.
In times of trouble — which can come within games or week-to-week — Patullo’s no-panic presence will be important.
Former Titans offensive coordinator John McNulty, who is now an offensive assistant for Rutgers and lives in the same neighborhood as Patullo, said the one season (2014) he coached with Patullo was “a tough year.” The Titans did not have a lot of offensive talent and ultimately finished with a 2-14 record.
But Patullo never stopped searching for solutions. Instead of worrying about what was wrong, he focused on what could go right. He would ask McNulty, “How can we help this wide receiver get off press or stack this wide receiver to create easy vertical separation?”
With A.J. Brown and DeVonta Smith, two of the best wide receivers in the NFL, Patullo won’t face those problems in Philadelphia, but there will inevitably be obstacles.
“It’s hard not to,” McNulty said about Patullo being aware of the pressure that the Eagles’ OC is constantly under. “I don’t think he’s going to turn the radio on. I think he understands that an awful lot of people are counting on success on that side of the ball. But on the other side of it is, I think he knows he’s got the most important thing: good players that have done it and an incredible staff around him and great support from the head coach. ...
“Probably after the head coach, the OC job is probably the most targeted spot. The coach that is getting all the criticism. The guy has been around. Obviously, he knows that, but I think he knows that he’s more than up for it.”
The one advantage Patullo has compared to other new offensive coordinators is his familiarity with the players and coaches. He has worked closely the last four years with quarterback Jalen Hurts, Smith and Brown and tight end Dallas Goedert.
“I have no doubt Kevin will do an outstanding job,” Reich said. “It’s not a one-man job. Nick has assembled a great staff. ... I know during my years there as the offensive coordinator, the two years I was there, it was a real collaborative effort.”
It’s reasonable to be skeptical of Patullo’s inexperience as a play-caller, but the Eagles are not the only team who have admired his work. The Jets interviewed Patullo for their offensive coordinator position in 2023, and he might have received more interviews this offseason if the Eagles hadn’t promoted him.
Patullo will be tested early in the year, including when he faces Smith’s defensive line in Week 3. But Patullo has been working for this moment.
“Kevin’s going to do a great job,” Smith said, “He’s been prepared for this opportunity, and I think he’ll stay humble within that process because this game can humble you really quick. He’ll do a great job, and the connection he has with Sirianni, that will be special. I hope they win every game except for when they play us.”
Thank you for relying on us to provide the journalism you can trust. Please consider supporting us with a subscription.
If you purchase a product or register for an account through a link on our site, we may receive compensation. By using this site, you consent to our User Agreement and agree that your clicks, interactions, and personal information may be collected, recorded, and/or stored by us and social media and other third-party partners in accordance with our Privacy Policy.