Let’s get to the Philadelphia Eagles links …
Eagles, NFC East to appear on Hard Knocks – PE.comThe Eagles will be in prime time even when there isn’t a game at Lincoln Financial Field. HBO and NFL Films announced on Wednesday that the NFC East will be the featured subject for the second iteration of the in-season division format of Hard Knocks, which debuted in 2024 with a focus on the AFC North. The series will kick off in December and be available to stream on HBO Max. Hard Knocks will also document the Training Camp journey of the Buffalo Bills this summer. “We are thrilled to provide ‘Hard Knocks’ fans a summer with the Bills and winter with the Cowboys, Giants, Commanders and Eagles in the first year of our exciting new deal with NFL Films,” said Nancy Abraham and Lisa Heller, co-executive vice presidents HBO Documentary and Family Programming, and Bentley Weiner, senior vice president HBO Sports Documentaries. “There will be no shortage of star power.”
Ranking the NFL divisions by strength heading into 2025 – PFF5. NFC EAST: EAGLES, COMMANDERS, COWBOYS, GIANTS. Cumulative over/under win total: 34. The NFC East sent both representatives to the NFC championship game last January, but those two teams — the Eagles and Commanders — are carrying most of the weight for the division as a whole. Philadelphia lost key talent in free agency, but reloaded effectively enough to remain one of the favorites to return to the Super Bowl in 2025. Washington, meanwhile, struck gold with Jayden Daniels, who earned PFF’s Rookie of the Year honors. The offense looks promising, but the defense must improve after ranking 29th in team grade (60.0), including a 54.2 run-defense grade and just 258 total pressures (21st). Upgrades in the front seven are a step in the right direction. The Cowboys were derailed by injuries at quarterback last season, and while the arrival of Brian Schottenheimer as head coach brings some uncertainty, they still have the talent to be competitive — especially if the run defense, which graded out at a league-worst 49.3 in 2024, can bounce back. As for the Giants, their quarterback situation remains unresolved, with three players currently in contention for the starting role. The offensive line hasn’t seen meaningful improvement, which raises concerns regardless of who starts under center. However, the additions of Paulson Adebo and Jevon Holland should help bolster a secondary that ranked 26th in coverage grade (52.5) last season.
Schedule Talk and Hard Knocks | NFC East Mixtape Vol. 165 – BGN YouTubeSince the NFC East Mixtape last convened the 2025 NFL schedule came out and we obviously have a lot of thoughts on what is going on with it, especially the opener between the Dallas Cowboys and Philadelphia Eagles. Also… there is going to be an NFC East Hard Knocks! RJ Ochoa and Brandon Gowton are here to discuss it all.
The Tush Push lives! Eagles rejoice while Packers totally embarrass themselves as crybaby losers – BGNTHE TUSH PUSH LIVES! It turns out that the NFL will NOT be banning the Philadelphia Eagles’ favorite short yardage play that was widely expected to be outlawed entering Wednesday’s league meetings in Minnesota. The Green Bay Packers’ original proposal to ban the play in early April wasn’t successful and was instead tabled for May. The Packers came back with a revised proposal that gained more support than their first attempt did … but still fell two votes short of needing 24 owners to approve the legislation.
Long live the tush push! The controversial play’s top moments – ESPNBILL SNYDER DOESN’T understand what all the fuss is about. The legendary Kansas State coach, 85 years old and retired from coaching, can’t remember exactly what the Wildcats called the play because it was just an add-on to a sneak. He didn’t — and still doesn’t — think it was very innovative or creative. “It was just a natural thing to do,” he told ESPN of the play that would become known as the “tush push” and eventually inspire a raging NFL-wide debate. “We need to create a way in which we could take the shortest distance to get the short distance we needed to go and not get held up, because everybody put all the people over there, so we wanted to compete against no matter how many people you put there. We wanted to be strong enough not to get held up at the line of scrimmage. And we would bring one or two, or on occasion, three backs up right off of the hip of the center, and on the snap of the ball, we would push the center or push the back of the quarterback.”
The Tush Push Is Forever – The RingerWhen Philadelphia opens the season at home against the Cowboys, the first time Saquon Barkley puts his hands on Jalen Hurts’s backside and the quarterback burrows his way to a fourth-down conversion, the home crowd will go absolutely feral. Head coach Nick Sirianni might do a Lambeau Leap of his own if the Eagles score a touchdown on a tush push when Philadelphia travels to Green Bay for Monday Night Football on Nov. 10. This era of Eagles football is immortalized now, even if the team never returns to the heights it enjoyed over the past three seasons. The tush push is forever, and the league doesn’t want to line up to compete against it anymore.
It Lives – Iggles BlitzWow. Lurie got fired up about this and really fought for his team. That’s good to hear. Owners don’t often get a chance to make a difference. The opportunity came Lurie’s way and he took advantage of it. I’m sure the league will try to ban it again next year. That’s fine. Maybe they’ll have enough support to finally make it happen. Or maybe defenses will find a way to slow it down this season and other teams won’t care as much. I do think the ban would have been a bad look for the league if it went through this year. The Eagles just won the Super Bowl. If one of their best plays got banned, it would make the league and the other teams look petty. Now there will be another season of information, good or bad. If another year goes by and there aren’t injuries, that will help the case for the play sticking around.
The Tush Push lives for Eagles: 8 notes & thoughts, from Jeffrey Lurie’s message to key behind-the-scenes figures (including Jason Kelce) – PHLYLurie closed the speech by saying if the Eagles leave the meeting and the play is banned, they’d still feel like winners — with a Lombardi Trophy to show for it — knowing that a play that they created and refined needed to be banned because opponents had no other way of stopping it. There was also a sentiment that the Eagles would be successful regardless, but they wanted to fight for the principle of the play. If a quarterback has a unique delivery that’s effective, the league does not ban that delivery. The Eagles felt it was easier to try to ban a play than a player, and they were spirited and detailed in their defense. It was either persuasive enough or the league sentiment against the play was miscalculated. Either way, the Eagles flew home with a different result than they expected Wednesday morning — and a key offseason victory.
How is Jalen Hurts adjusting to yet another new OC? – NBCSPIt doesn’t sound like there are that many wholesale changes coming in 2025 as the Eagles prepare to defend their Super Bowl title. “There’s some nuances that are different,” Hurts said on Tuesday. “I know in the past, I gave a number on that matter. But things evolve and things change as time goes on. We’re just really bought into that. That’s an important thing. That’s something that I’ve learned as well, that you have to be able to evolve as time goes on. Given Coach Kevin Patullo and his new role now and him being the one in charge of offensive leadership, you get new pieces and new ideas that come from everyone.”
Reviewing the NFL’s rule changes, and how they might impact the Eagles – PhillyVoiceIn an effort to encourage more kick returns last season, the NFL adopted an entirely new look for kickoffs, including a starting spot at the 30 yard line after touchbacks. And yet, not a lot changed, as most teams simply booted the ball through the end zone anyway. That will probably change in 2025, as teams will be less likely to concede their opponents’ starting position at the 35. So, you know, expect to see more kick returns going forward. How does this affect the Eagles? If there was one area where the Eagles were shaky in 2024, it was their kick coverage, notably in their Week 16 loss to the Commanders. They did (surprisingly) finish 13th in kick coverage DVOA. Their kick return unit finished 16th. The Eagles would prefer that their offense and defense decide the outcome of games, not their special teams units, so this is probably not a great rule change for them. It certainly is better for any fan that actually likes seeing kick returns instead of touchbacks.
2025 NFL season: Player departures that will have biggest impact on their former teams – NFL.comFORMER TEAM: PHILADELPHIA EAGLES: C.J. Gardner-Johnson has not played for the same team in consecutive years since 2020-2021, when he was on his rookie deal with the Saints, but he helped the Eagles win a Super Bowl last season in his second stint with the team. Fresh off a championship, Philadelphia traded him to the Texans with budgetary concerns in mind. Moves like that one can help the Eagles remain competitive, but such deals only work if the replacements produce. Enter Texas product Andrew Mukuba — a second-round pick in the 2025 NFL Draft — who might be asked to step in and fill the void right away. It will be no easy task, even on a talented defense. Meanwhile, Gardner-Johnson will aim to follow up a career-best season with a stellar campaign as a member of the Texans, where he’s joining one of the best secondaries in the NFL.
Packers’ tush push ban falls short in NFL meetings – Acme Packing CompanyThe next time the Packers and Eagles will face off will be in Week 10 on Monday Night Football, a game Philadelphia will have an extra week to prepare for as they’ll be coming off a bye week. Expect to hear a lot of noise about this proposal and its failure to secure 75 percent of the league’s votes going into that mid-season matchup.
Why keeping the tush push is a win for the Detroit Lions – Pride Of DetroitWhile the Eagles’ frequent use of the tush push would have been most impacted by this rule change, the Lions would have been impacted, too. There are two notable plays from the Detroit Lions’ 2024 season that would’ve been considered illegal under the proposed ban.
The tush push survives after NFL owners fall two votes short – Hogs HavenNFL owners are in Minneapolis, Minnesota today to vote on several rule change proposals. The proposal making the biggest headlines was from the Green Bay Packers, and that failed to get enough votes today. The tush push, made famous by the Philadelphia Eagles over the last few years, will remain an option for all NFL teams. The Eagles successfully lobbied to prevent the ban, and team owner Jeffrey Lurie brought Jason Kelce to the meetings to dispel rumors about the reason for his retirement.
NFL.com has Dallas Cowboys among lowest projected win totals across NFC teams – Blogging The BoysAs far as overall win totals though you can see that Frelund listed the odds for under 7.5. It is worth noting that she has the Cowboys at 7.2 projected wins with the Carolina Panthers, New York Giants and New Orleans Saints as the only teams with fewer. This seems a bit harsh and like it is discounting the return of so many players who Dallas lost to injury last year. It isn’t a homer take to say that the Cowboys should have more wins than groups like the Atlanta Falcons, Arizona Cardinals and/or Seattle Seahawks who are directly in front of them on this list. Clearly that is why they play the games, though. Dallas happens to play three games against teams who Frelund projected to finish worse off than them so it would stand to reason that this would at least help.
Jerry Jones: Am I really against the tush push, or just don’t want Eagles to have an edge? – PFT“Any play that’s out of the ordinary gets some extra scrutiny just because of the competition in there,” Jones said. “Here we are, the world champion is the main focus of the tush push, and here we are debating it, and having to decide. I thought, am I really against the tush push, or just don’t want Philadelphia to have an edge?” Asked which it is, a principled opposition to the play or just wanting to stop a division rival, Jones answered, “I don’t know. I flip flop.” Jones is saying out loud what others in the NFL won’t admit, that part of the opposition to the tush push is unrelated to the merits of the play. Instead, it’s about one particular team doing that play very well, and that one team winning the Super Bowl, and other teams wanting to ban the play to take away something that the best team in the league is doing better than everyone else.
Better or worse in 2025? New York Giants running backs – Big Blue ViewWhy they could be worse: As much as Tyrone Tracy deserves praise and fans should be excited about what he can do, he did show a concerning weakness in 2024. Tracy fumbled five times last season, and only Rhamondre Stevenson of the New England Patriots (seven) and Breece Hall of the New York Jets (six) fumbled more times. Worse, Tracy had far fewer touches than any of the backs with five or more fumbles. He averaged one fumble every 46.0 touches. On top of that, he dropped five of 53 passes thrown to him, 9.4%. Tracy’s ball security could be something that holds him back. As much as it is easy to fall in love with Skattebo, what if he can’t run over defenders and through tackle attempts in the NFL the way he could in college? What if his middling speed for a running back proves to be a detriment? What if the Giants wind up relying on Devin Singletary and the thus-far unreliable Eric Gray more than seems likely right now?
Aaron Rodgers signing with the Steelers would be beyond boring at this point – SB NationRJ: It is always important to be honest and I am doing so in telling you all that I am a Dallas Cowboys fan. Aaron Rodgers has ruined many of my seasons as a fan. They all sucked. Whatever bias you want to call that aside… it is stating the obvious to say that we are all exhausted at this point. As noted we have passed go and collected our $200 several times this offseason, so many times that the offseason is basically over as mentioned. The Steelers, a once proud and mighty franchise that has seemingly bent the knee here, waiting in the wind as Aaron does whatever we want to call all of this isn’t even sad anymore. It even passed boring. At the time of this writing our friends at FanDuel listed the over 8.5 wins line for Pittsburgh at +120. If you could lock that in right now with a future guarantee of Rodgers starting 17 games for them… would it even feel like a bargain? This is all yawn.
Jim Irsay, Colts Owner & CEO of 28 years, has died at 65 – Stampede BlueJim Irsay, the Indianapolis Colts owner and CEO, has died at the age of 65, the team announced Wednesday. Despite battling numerous health issues over the past few decades, it was unexpected. The Colts announced Mr. Irsay passed away peacefully in his sleep Wednesday afternoon. The son of Robert Irsay, who purchased the Baltimore Colts franchise in 1972 for $12 million. The elder Irsay moved the Colts to Indianapolis overnight on March 28, 1984. At just 24-years old, Jim was named team vice president and general manager, setting a never-before-seen precedent in the NFL. Jim inherited the franchise from his father following his passing in 1997 and became the youngest owner in the NFL at age 37.
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