Report: Eagles scrambled after Vic Fangio retirement scare, contacted 2 former DCs

Well, it turns out those Vic Fangio retirement rumors may have actually had some legs. According to PhillyVoice’s Jimmy Kempski, the Eagles were informed that Fangio planned to retire from coaching, but the organization was able to convince him to stick around for at least one more season.

Eagles almost lost Vic Fangio out of the blue

Sources: Eagles considered Jim Schwartz and Jonathan Gannon for defensive coordinator job after Vic Fangio retirement scare https://t.co/cCl7ZbcmfI

— Jimmy Kempski (@JimmyKempski) February 1, 2026

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Per Kempski, the Eagles brass was scrambling once they found out Fangio might call it quits. They reached out to two former Birds defensive coordinators as contingency plans in case Fangio walked away — Jonathan Gannon and Jim Schwartz. Gannon had just been fired by Arizona at the time, while Schwartz was still in Cleveland under the impression he might be the next Browns head coach.

Thankfully, the Birds didn’t have to go down this road. Could you imagine having Gannon back in Philly? After leaving to fail miserably in Arizona, and after telling fans he wasn’t going anywhere, I don’t see how that wouldn’t have been a terrible situation.

As for Schwartz, I honestly could have talked myself into that. But by all accounts, it seems like he still wants a head coaching job, so there’s no guarantee he would’ve stuck around in Philly long term.

This PhillyVoice report doesn’t give an exact timeline for when Fangio informed the team he was retiring. Everything is just framed as “recently.” That makes me wonder whether this happened before or after Christian Parker left to become Dallas’ defensive coordinator. Would the Eagles have fought this hard to keep Fangio if Parker was still in their back pocket? It’s impossible to know for sure given how murky the timeline is.

Nevertheless, Fangio is back, at least for this season. That’s a bridge we can cross another time.