👋 Good morning! Completing passes in second halves is completely overrated.

Today’s newsletter is brought to you by Righteous Felon Craft Jerky.

This Chester County based company has the perfect snack that satisfies your hunger and provides the right amount of protein to fulfill your body’s daily needs, and they have been doing it for over a decade. if you are the kind of person who wants a deal and snacks delivered right to your doorstep, you can order online using discount code PHLY20 for 20% off. Righteous Felon has all kinds of cool variety packs and bundles on the site.

As always, you can reach me at [email protected]

I had a pretty neat narrative in my head about midway through the game.

On the broadcast, Erin Andrews was talking about the oppressive heat, and how much Baker Mayfield and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers were relishing that early-season climate advantage. And it just felt like they were laying it on a little too thick. It felt like the inverse of the 2002 NFC Championship Game (in ‘03), with how much of a talking point that the freezing temperatures were leading in to that one. I can still remember the temperature readings on the Vet turf. Well, we all know what happened there.

And midway through the game, despite Chase McLaughlin channeling his inner Matt Bryant a few times — and that is not fair to Matt Bryant, who did not kick in this crazy era — the Eagles just felt like the better team.

And then the second half happened. The Eagles hung on to win 31-25 (with a little on-purpose safety at the end), but man, that was not a fun experience after halftime. Oh well, 4-0 against a tough schedule. Pod’s here.

The Eagles offense was yet again chaotic from half-to-half. But “chaotic” is probably not the right word, they really did go from 100 to 0. Nobody does volatility like this group on the offensive side of the ball. Three games with stretches of complete brilliance paired with stretches of complete futility. We can argue about whether all of this is good or bad, but it is undoubtedly weird.

In that dreaded Tampa sun, Jalen Hurts was excellent early on against Todd Bowles’ blitzes and Kevin Patullo got into his bag in the red zone. I felt like we had rewinded the clock two decades with all of these shovel passes around the goal line.

The underrated biggest reason that the Eagles are 4-0? They are 11-11 in the red zone on the young season. That is not even close to sustainable, but they are absolutely cooking with a condensed field. And on this day, it was the play-calling that was the driving force even more than the execution. This was a beaut.

Jalen’s numbers after the first half: 15-16, 130 passing yards, 2 passing touchdowns.

Jalen’s numbers after the second half: 15-24, 130 passing yards, 2 passing touchdowns.

That’s right, after a surgical half, the Eagles passing game did not complete a single ball coming out of the locker room. A.J. Brown finished with two catches for seven yards, and boy, I am not looking forward to that being a storyline for another week. I know they lost Lane Johnson midway through the game — Jalen Carter is definitely banged-up, too — but I do not get the wild swings. So, yet again, here we are with the “tale of two halves” framing. I am sick of this framing!

And yes, also a win. Not sick of those. But the offense was fortunate that the defense had enough energy to finish out this game. They had seven drives in the second half (which is a ton for a half!) and five of them were three-and-outs. They cannot run the ball with Saquon Barkley at even close to the level we saw last season. Saquon is having some issues in pass protection. There is just a lot going on.

The positive moments are there, though. And hey, Super Bowl champs and all that jazz (but seriously), so I will keep the faith.

On defense, I thought it was mostly a dominant performance from Uncle Vic’s unit… with two major exceptions that were very much rookie mistakes:

Of the two plays, the Mukuba one bothered me more just because it looked he was more out of position. The rookie safety had already surrendered a few of those long pass plays in the first few weeks, and had been fortunate on some others. No matter how much good you do, weekly 70-yard touchdown plays/opportunities just cannot happen on your watch as a safety. My guy Vic was very annoyed.

But the defense stood tall, and Campbell made two critical plays in the second half: A forced fumble against Irving and a key interception of Baker Mayfield in the end zone. That is why you roll with rookies, as long as you can eventually cut down on the killer mistakes. It should be noted that Quinyon Mitchell was a monster all day as well.

And how about Deniz predicting the Cameron Latu blocked punt that was actually the difference in the game? You actually heard it here first.

As always, the Eagles can clean up a good bit of stuff… but they are also 4-0 against a difficult schedule. Same as it ever was. Credit to them for Beating The Heat.

Hey, do you know how we offer a Diehard deal for $36 for your first year? All of our premium writing and event perks, and that deal includes any t-shirt from the store that you want.

Well, now we are offering a hat as an option for a Diehard deal from one of our favorite partners… Branded Bills! Come join the party, our hats are already selling fast… and once they are gone, they are gone!

Boston 4, Flyers 3: As Charlie has been talking about on the pod, Nikita Grebenkin probably has a lower ceiling than some of the players competing for the one definite roster spot in the Flyers’ Top-9. But Grebenkin has made the most of his opportunity, by simply doing his job. And as Charlie wrote, he scored the other night in Beantown to make even more of a push.

Who was Grebenkin playing alongside, you may ask? Trevor Zegras and Matvei Michkov. Last week, we wrote about how that if you play those two offensive-minded players together, you probably need more of a defensive-minded grinder in the third spot. Maybe Grebenkin can be that guy.

I am more excited Michkov and Zegras infuse some talent onto what has been a dreadful power play in recent history. You see it in the clips from practice, these guys work hard at their craft together. Nice to see some proof of concept in the game.

Oregon 30, Penn State 24 (2OT): To all of my Penn State readers, I am truly sorry. Great comeback, brutal ending.

The good news? One loss in college football does not matter nearly as much as it did ten years ago.

Phils win 2 of 3: Trea Turner played on Sunday and became the first Phillie to win the batting title since Richie Ashburn. Whitey did it in 1958. And that is great, but the bigger story…

Thank you to old friend Tyler Phillips for finishing that one off. In honor of Tyler, I just slapped myself in the face.

84 wins could have gotten the Mets in the playoffs, and they could not do it. 2 of 3 in Miami to close the season could have gotten the Mets in, since the Reds lost to Milwaukee on the last day as well. Could not do it. I still believe that the 2024 Mets had a ton of stuff break right for them down the stretch, and they did not back it up even a little bit. A long winter ahead in Queens. That’s a shame.

So, what the means for the Phillies is that next Saturday, one of two teams will be at Citizens Bank Park: The Los Angeles Dodgers or the Cincinnati Reds. Those two teams will play a three-game series at Chavez Ravine this week for the right to head to Philly.

And man, Ranger was an inch away from disaster. He said he’s fine, though, should be good to go for the playoffs.

The Sixers are either flying to Abu Dhabi or in Abu Dhabi as you are reading this. They are gonna be over there for a week, which will include a couple of preseason games against the New York Knickerbockers. But they did do some stuff over here, namely media day and a couple of practices.

I am not gonna get into everything that we learned, because we have so much good #content on the YouTube page and on the site that can provide you with all of that. A few examples…

Here is one key takeaway from what I will call “The Big Three.” You know, since Quentin Grimes is not signed and Jared McCain just got injured… and people were just like, “Oh yeah, VJ Edgecombe is good and cool.”

🌉 Tyrese Maxey, The Bridge: Maxey is still just 24. His prime years are still likely ahead of him. He still very much possesses the infectious upbeat personality.

But Maxey is also entering Year 6 with the Sixers, and there are signs that he has grown up. He will make $38 million this upcoming season. He is absolutely chiseled, you can tell the work he has put into his body.

Nowhere is that change more apparent than with Maxey’s standing on the team. Devon and I talked to him one-on-one for an interview we will put out later, but he actually beat me to a point that I planned on asking him about: Maxey referred to himself as “the bridge” between the vets (Joel Embiid, Paul George) and the young guys (Jared McCain, VJ Edgecombe) on the team. It’s true, he has the full respect of both groups.

It’s always easy to be positive on media day. But when Maxey says things like, "We need a standard" and "When you see the Philadelphia 76ers, this is what you see," I believe him. The Sixers need Embiid and George to be the best version of themselves, but for better or worse, Maxey is the unquestioned culture-setter here.

❓Joel Embiid, honest but not satisfactory: There was some question about whether or not Skinny Joel would not be ready for training camp, because he did not give a timeline in that huge ESPN profile. And he was ready, with Nick Nurse saying that the big fella participated in most of the first practice, including some live scrimmaging. Seemingly not full-go, but not crazy restricted either.

But like in that profile, Joel did not give a timeline. Kyle has more here.

So, we’ll see with Joel. But he seemed to be in pretty good spirits. Here is a nonsense answer about him chilling in the dunker spot, Ben Simmons style.

4️⃣ Paul George, willing to play power forward: Uh oh, this seems like a challenge.

All joking aside, George is still recovering from the knee injury he suffered during offseason workouts. He is not gonna participate in training camp, but George is already doing pretty much everything except scrimmaging. So, hopefully not too far away.

Compared to Embiid and Maxey, though, I thought George’s most interesting comment was more on-court, strategic based. He said that he is willing to play the 4, not something he wanted to do in the past. The NBA is getting more athletic, and ideally, you would like to keep up with that trend while not sacrificing size. The Sixers do not have the personnel to do that, so moving George to the 4 is the best they can do.

Union 6, D.C. United nil: How about that for a bounce-back after the loss in Vancouver a few weeks ago? A little six-spot never hurt anyone, huh?! The Union are still in pole position for the Supporters’ Shield, with two games left:

Those are two playoff-caliber teams, so the Union have their work cut out for them. But man, what a season from Bradley Carnell and co. Nobody who follows the MLS thought they would be in this position entering October.

The only game on the docket tonight is a Flyers preseason game in Boston (7:00 p.m.). Besides that, a busy day for all of us at PHLY. Eagles day-after, Red October prep and the Flyers and Sixers shows are recapping busy preseason weekends from their squads.

Your tentative Monday schedule at ​PHLY​:

Let's make it a good one.

Rich Hofmann
Daily Newsletter Editor
PHLY SPORTS