Eagles’ Jordan Matthews ‘adamant’ that he wants Sam Bradford back

This is all hard to sort out.

The Philadelphia Eagles fired Chip Kelly on Tuesday night, after most of the players had left the building, and left us to guess what the future of the franchise will be.

And not just the next head coach. After all, these are mostly Kelly’s players that he and Kelly’s handpicked personnel chief, Ed Marynowitz, chose to fill out the 53-man roster. So in a lot of cases, Kelly’s successor will be working with Kelly’s roster just as Kelly worked with Andy Reid’s roster in 2013.

But will Sam Bradford be one of them?

The free-agent-to-be quarterback was brought in, shipped away in a net loss of draft picks for Nick Foles, to wun Kelly’s offense. The team even offered him a long-term extension when Kelly was still on solid ground, and Bradford turned it now. How now, brown cow?

Bradford — who improved steadily this season after a rough start — openly spoke this past week about his preference to remain in the same system, having switched offensive schemes so many times over the years. So instead of learning nuances and building on knowledge from one year to the next, Bradford too often has had to switch gears, learn new terminology and adapt to different calls, route depths and other subtle changes from one coach’s offense to the next.

And so here Bradford is again, switching one way or another. Kelly is out, and so even if Bradford is back in 2016, he’ll be learning yet another system. But will Bradford be back? that’s far from certain now.

If it’s up to Jordan Matthews, the Eagles’ leading receiver, that question should be answered definitely and swiftly. He wants Bradford back.

“I’m very adamant about that,” Matthews said after Tuesday’s practice, before Kelly’s firing was announced. “Having a quarterback that you can build with, that you can grow with, is huge.”

Matthews’ lack of quarterback chemistry over his football playing days is similar to Bradford and his offenses. It always seems to be in flux.

“I’ve only had it one time in my career … high school, college and pros,” Matthews said, per NJ.com. “It was coming out of my second year of college, going into my junior year. We started it and during the summer going into junior year, we’d get together and work out. That was my best season in college because I had that relationship already built.”

After an inconsistent start, Matthews has bested his strong rookie numbers. So it’s understandable why he might want Bradford back, even though a lot of things stand to change with a new regime next season.

Right now, we have no clue. Who is the next head coach? Who ultimately will make personnel calls and what do they think of Bradford? Another year of change is on the horizon for the Eagles, and it involved big questions about the direction at quarterback.

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Eric Edholm is a writer for Shutdown Corner on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter! Follow @Eric_Edholm