Eagles Playmaker Sounds Off on Jalen Hurts: ‘It’s Just Jalen’

Miles Sanders, Jalen Hurts


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Miles Sanders and Jalen Hurts take in the Eagles-Jets preseason game from the sideline on August 12, 2022.

It seemed kind of odd that the best player during the first 10 practices didn’t see a single target in the first preseason game. Odder yet since that offensive playmaker is best friends with the starting quarterback.

A.J. Brown and Jalen Hurts were on the same page, though. Hurts had pulled Brown aside before kickoff to tell him he wouldn’t be looking his way. He wanted to showcase some of the other playmakers on offense.

“Going into the game Jalen told me he wasn’t going to throw me the ball so that was it,” Brown told reporters. “That’s how it was going to go.”

Was Brown upset or surprised that Hurts stuck to it?

“No, we had already talked about it,” Brown said, “and he said he wasn’t going to try and throw me the ball. So, he just did that.”

Hurts was probably sick and tired of answering questions about the controversial sideline hit. He was standing across the locker room smiling as Brown relayed their pre-game conversation to reporters. When pressed one more time as to why Hurts didn’t throw him the ball, Brown laughed.

“Look at him. I don’t know,” Brown said. “It’s just Jalen. It’s Jalen being him.”

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Eagles Like Getting Everybody Involved

Hurts was lined up in the shotgun eight times on nine plays on the first and only series for the first-team offense. The only non-shotgun snap was also a designed pass, a 28-yard completion.

Hurts went 6-of-6 on the drive for 80 yards and a touchdown. He hit four different receivers: Quez Watkins, Miles Sanders, Jack Stoll, Dallas Goedert. Head coach Nick Sirianni allowed Hurts to read the defense and spread the ball around.

“It was really Jalen going where the coverage took him. We have an idea where the ball might go based off the coverages teams play, but that’s the beauty of the offense,” Sirianni said. “We like getting everybody involved. There is no doubt. Just makes you harder to defend. But, yeah, it was nice to see him spread it around early tonight.”

That meant zero catches for Brown. But the big-bodied receiver was responsible for clearing out space for Goedert to haul in a 22-yard touchdown. The safety and linebacker got trapped, stopping a late-moving defenders dead in their tracks.

“It was fun out there,” Goedert said. “I think that’s what we have in store for the season. We want to be a detail team with people in the right spots and it was a good start today.”


Don’t Read Too Much into Preseason Opener

The Eagles looked like a pass-happy team in the preseason opener. No scripted running plays, although Hurts did take off twice with his legs when the pocket collapsed. He made the right reads, according to Sirianni. And don’t read too much into the run-to-pass ratio.

“We are working on some things, and we wanted to be able to coach off some things, and that’s what we did today,” Sirianni said. “If we need to run the ball 20 times to start a game, we’ll do that. If we need to pass the ball 20 times to start a game, we’ll do that. We will do whatever we need to do to win the game, but it was nice to see them go out there and execute when we were passing.”

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