👋 Good morning! The Eagles were so sloppy last night that they broke the Monsters, Inc. broadcast.

You gotta laugh so you do not cry. Jalen Hurts really had trouble diagnosing where Sully was lining up on defense, which seems tough to do. Sully’s huge!

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One year ago yesterday, A.J. Brown was asked what the Eagles offense needed to improve.

A.J.’s answer? Passing.

Well, 366 days and one Lombardi Trophy later, here we are again. Time is a flat circle.

Here are is all of our post-game stuff. EJ will have The Early Bird for you in the AM.

Really hard to win a football game when your quarterback turns the ball over four times. Well, five, but I am not gonna hold that split-second fumble against Jalen Hurts.

What a wild game. Ugly as hell, but one that marks a pretty fascinating point of Hurts’ career in my humble opinion.

All season, we have criticized Nick Sirianni, Kevin Patullo and the design of this Eagles offense, with all of the hitches and coward’s draws and inside runs to nowhere. We have acknowledged that this offensive line is an absolute shell of the group that played bully-ball all the way through New Orleans. Those things can still be true.

But the unknown element of this, the part that was in the background as Jalen Hurts protected the football at all costs, converted in the red zone at an elite rate and went three-and-out more than anybody in the last decade: How much should we be looking at the quarterback, both for on-field performance and what is going on behind the scenes in how this whole thing gets structured? If “the offense is gonna look how Jalen Hurts wants it look,” well, that is a problem.

I have struggled with how much to include Hurts into the analysis. For the off-field element, we are at an information deficit. And the on-field play did not paint a clear picture, either. In the season opener against Dallas, he was scrambling at an elite level. For most of the early wins, Hurts and the offense submitted one dominant offensive half and one terrible offensive half. It was hard to know what to do with such up-and-down performances. Hurts’ games against Minnesota and the Giants before the bye were anything but up-and-down, some super high-level quarterback play.

Well, Jalen Hurts will not be in the background this week. And nor should he be. Since the bye, Hurts’ last five games have been brutal. There is just no way around that.

It felt like in a lot of ways, the Eagles tried to play a more modern offensive game in Los Angeles. The film grinders might push back on that, and they might be right. It certainly was not a perfectly called game by Kevin Patullo. We saw the dreaded hitch routes on an interception and key failed third-down. We saw the screen to DeVonta Smith against pressure with a chance to ice the game, a play that never works. Every second half and overtime run that was not a trick play felt dead on arrival.

With that said, nice job on the Fake Tush Push. Not exactly a one-for-one analog, but a little reminiscent of LeSean McCoy against the Giants in 2010.

But yeah, I thought the Eagles mostly tried to play a more aggressive style of football. They threw the ball over the middle, looking to create yards after the catch. They schemed together some nice drives. If so, I think that was the right call. But ultimately, I am left wondering if Hurts was prepared to play this style of football. He vacillated between great throws and looking completely out of sorts, and maybe it was too much of a culture shock for him. Was Hurts ready to let it rip over the middle after playing so conservatively for so long? Maybe not.

When Hurts did make decent/good/excellent throws, A.J. Brown sure did not help. Three plays stand out there:

I am not saying any one of those high-leverage plays were easy. But I would expect A.J. Brown to make at least one of them, and if he does, the Eagles probably win. If you are gonna talk the talk, you better walk the walk.

Ultimately, here is my uncomfortable takeaway: Over these last four games, I want to see the Eagles continue to play aggressively.

I just think that this running game is never gonna get back to good this season, much less the dominant fashion we saw a year ago. Saquon Barkley’s overall numbers looked fine (20 rushes for 122 yards), but 52 of those came on the well-designed trick play. He went 19 for 70 otherwise. Nothing crazy there, and it got worse as the game went along. Obviously you still have to run the ball sometimes, but the Eagles offensive line just cannot get consistent push on the ground.

The defense can turn up the heat, and they did so against Justin Herbert. Textbook Uncle Vic game: Terrible first drive, a quick adjustment, and then Herbert was running for his life the rest of the game.

(Some great plays by the front-four, some well-timed blitzes by the linebackers and it was great hearing Cooooopppppp! in what sounded like a home game for the Birds.)

Nevertheless, this feels like a good Eagles defense, but not a great one. That Chargers offensive line was banged-up, and I do not think you can expect that level of dominance on a week-to-week basis.

So, that leaves Hurts and the passing game. After turning the ball over like crazy the first few weeks of last season, he changed to a more conservative style of play that was really not available to any other quarterback in the NFL. But that was because of the favorable conditions (running game, defense) that the rest of the roster provided, conditions that are clearly not available to Hurts right now.

If this were Madden, at times Hurts could play on Rookie Mode last season. Maybe this is not All-Madden, but I think it is probably something close to All-Pro. Let’s see what Hurts and this offense has in store for the final month of the season, going up against four below average defenses.

I am not doubting Jalen’s ability to overcome adversity. After all, this is the same guy who got benched in the national championship game and then delivered two absolutely lights-out Super Bowl performances. But I do think he will need to be a more adaptable quarterback, both in the final month of this season and moving forward.

Can Hurts find that balance between playing an aggressive style of quarterback and not turning into a turnover machine? Bad start on that front last night, but I hope we continue to see him at least try.

That’s all I got on a late night. I will get y’all caught up on the slop from the Winter Meetings tomorrow.

Your tentative Tuesday schedule at PHLY:

Let's make it a good one.

Rich Hofmann
Daily Newsletter Editor
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