An 18-game streak vanished last Sunday. For over a calendar year, Jalen Hurts had known only victory. That feeling was suddenly silenced. The echo in Philadelphia is a strange, unfamiliar silence. It’s the quiet of a quarterback’s house after a defeat. And the mood inside must be palpable.
Hurts faced the media on Tuesday. He delivered the headline himself. “Thank God it's a short week,” he stated. Then he offered the raw, revealing truth. “Tough week in my house.” This was more than a soundbite. It was a window into the soul of a competitor. His following words confirmed it. “You can be on top one day and on the bottom the next,” Hurts said. He is navigating that brutal NFL reality.
His response was not to point fingers. Instead, he looked inward and upward. He even checked in with his old college coach, Nick Saban. “We had a conversation, caught up a little bit,” Hurts shared. “It’s always good to get good direction from him.” The lesson?
Always win the fourth quarter, something the Eagles failed to do against Denver. But this is how leaders process adversity.
The offense’s struggles are a complex puzzle. The running game was oddly absent. Saquon Barkley had just six carries. The play-calling, full of RPOs, is under a microscope. Meanwhile, a reported meeting between Hurts, Barkley, and A.J. Brown sparked controversy. What was really said behind closed doors?
Jalen Hurts & Co. Finding a New Recipe
Barkley quickly shut down the drama. “That wasn’t a players’ meeting,” he clarified. “It wasn’t that at all.” He described it as simple teammates talking. Hurts echoed this, calling it “teammates being teammates.” Their focus is solely on the collective. They are searching for consistency in a fluctuating season. And Hurts pinpointed a key issue.
He’s on his fourth offensive coordinator in four years. He offered a perfect analogy. “It’s like having all the same ingredients, but having a different chef in the kitchen,” Hurts explained. The dish, unfortunately, has tasted different each time. The challenge is mastering a new system while expectations remain sky-high.
The entire unit feels the pressure. Barkley acknowledged the uneven performances. “There have been halves where we look untouchable,” he said. “And there have been halves where we look really bad.” The mission is to eliminate the bad halves. The Giants’ 25th-ranked pass defense offers a prime opportunity for a breakout.
Read more: Seth Joyner declares he's 'done' with 'A.J. Brown not getting targets' discourse
So, the Eagles march into MetLife Stadium. The short week is a blessing. It forces immediate action. Hurts’ tough week now fuels a critical divisional battle. His fire, stoked by a rare loss, is now Philadelphia’s guiding light. It reminds everyone that in the NFL, as in life, perspective is everything. Or as the philosopher Carl Jung once noted, “I am not what happened to me, I am what I choose to become.”