PHILADELPHIA -- Less than 24 hours after his confrontation with Philadelphia Eagles fans after a victory, head coach Nick Sirianni apologized for his remarks made towards his own supporters. Sirianni addressed the media in his Monday press conference, explaining he needs to use better wisdom when he's trying to create energy on his sidelines.
"What I was really doing was trying to bring energy, enthusiasm. And I'm sorry and disappointed about how my energy was directed at the end of the game,' Sirianni said. "My energy should be all in on coaching, motivating, and celebrating with our guys."
Sirianni got into a shouting match with fans after Sunday's 20-16 victory over the Cleveland Browns, which improved the Eagles to 3-2 on the season. The win was far from pretty, as fans became frustrated with the lack of consistency on offense and how Cleveland was driving to tie the game late in the fourth quarter. At halftime, fans below the press box were chanting "fire Nick" as the Eagles headed into the tunnel.
While a talk with Eagles owner Jeffrey Lurie didn't happen, according to Sirianni, some damage control was in order.
"I've got to have better wisdom and discernment of when to use that energy, and that wasn't the time," Sirianni said. "We have the best fans in the world. There is no place like this. They show up and show out no matter where we are: Brazil, Arizona, it doesn't matter, New Orleans.
"In that game, too, it was loud. I thought it was really loud, energetic. And those two false starts that the Browns got that forced a field goal instead of -- who knows, they're fourth-and-8 at the 8-yard line, and then they get a penalty and don't go for it on fourth-and-13, who knows how that would've gone?"
This isn't the first time Sirianni has had outbursts towards fans at the end of the game. In 2022, Sirianni was caught jeering at Indianapolis Colts fans after the Eagles beat the Colts in Indianapolis. In 2023, Sirianni was yelling at Kansas City Chiefs fans heading into the visitors tunnel after the Eagles upset Kansas City.
This is the first time the jeering was directed at Sirianni's own fanbase, potentially a sign of how the pressure is affecting Sirianni each week. The Eagles are 3-2, but 4-8 in their last 12 regular seaosn games. They haven't been playing good football all season, marked by inconsistency and slow starts.
A close win over the Browns didn't alleviate the pressure on Sirianni.
"There are play calls in the game you go through and game management things you go through and say, 'At the time, I thought this was the right thing,' and then you evaluate everything," Sirianni said on his process toward changing his mind after his comments Sunday. "You evaluate the way the players played. You evaluate the things that you did as a coach to get them ready to play, or the calls that you made, or the management of the game that you did.
"You do the same thing with other things, which this one is."
