Doug Pederson is under fire for benching Jalen Hurts, which isn’t deserved.
If you haven’t heard, there was a game to determine the NFC East’s champion that featured a Philadelphia Eagles Week 17 tilt versus the Washington Football Team. Simply put, if the Eagles won, the 6-10 New York Giants would have made the playoffs. Had they lost, a 7-9 Washington team got in.
The Eagles have been ransacked by injuries all year, and with several other starters banged up, Doug Pederson and company decided to sit quite a few of them. Then, comes the Jalen Hurts situation.
Get a load of this if you’re a Philadelphia Eagles fan.
Early in the fourth quarter, the Eagles coaches saw that their team had a chance to win the game and decided to treat the last game of the regular season as a preseason game. Doug Pederson decided to yank Jalen Hurts in favor of third-string quarterback Nate Sudfeld.
It was a move Pederson referenced earlier in the week. The NFL community at large, however, is outraged at Pederson for ‘tanking’ and allegedly losing on purpose by putting Sudefeld in the game. They’re shocked that Pederson would actually pull such a move that, again, he alluded to doing before the game. They’re also upset about Philly essentially handing Washington a playoff spot in what’s believed to be a move that was done to assure they’d pick sixth in the upcoming NFL Draft.
Okay Philadelphia Eagles fans, let’s discussed what happened.
There’s a lot to digest here, so let’s get started. For starters, if you’re upset at the notion that the Eagles, by resting their starters, gave Washington a playoff spot, keep in mind the fact that the Pittsburgh Steelers did the same thing for the Cleveland Browns a few hours earlier. That eliminated a 10-6 Miami Dolphins team.
Yes, Hurts probably gave the Birds their best chance to win, but he was also seven of 20 as a passer with 72 yards and an interception. Yes, he ran for two scores, but he was awful throwing the ball. Let’s not act like Jalen Hurts was balling out there. As a matter of fact, he was awful. Also, as mentioned, a plethora of other regular starters were out as well, so why this Eagles loss came as a surprise is anyone’s guess.
That’s neither here nor there though. We all know that Doug Pederson may not be honest when he says he was coaching to win. Here’s the thing with that. What’s the issue really? The Eagles don’t owe a division rival with six wins a helping hand. How many of you are thinking about the New York Jets screwing themselves out of the first-overall selection though? Remember a couple of weeks ago?
They called two house blitzes against the Las Vegas Raiders to lose the game on a last-second deep pass. Their storyline was seen as comical, but apparently, this one isn’t being viewed the same way. The Jacksonville Jaguars aren’t exactly trying their best to win games by benching Gardner Minshew. The argument can be made that the ‘integrity of the game’ wasn’t tainted for the first time last night.
At the end of the day, the Eagles and Doug Pederson did what they felt would benefit the team in the long run. If you want to bash Coach for ‘tanking’ (or performing his mini-version of ‘trusting the process’) then have at it, but don’t act like other teams aren’t employing the same strategy. One can argue that this was the right decision and was the best decision for the Eagles in the long run, but the idea that Pederson owed the Giants anything is bogus. Some blowback is warranted. Full-fledged outrage is unnecessary.