I have a friend from law school who did all the reading. We had 100+ pages of the most boring ass reading imaginable every night and he read every damn word of it. Nobody else did that. He was always prepared. I had another friend who lied about literally everything no matter how trivial.1 He couldn’t help himself. Well, these two were on some kind of law competition team and lost in the finals. The liar came back and blamed the honest one, saying he didn’t prepare enough. Obviously, I didn’t believe that for a second.
This relationship always reminds me of Jalen Hurts. You are telling me that the son of a coach who does nothing but live, eat, and sleep football while holding himself accountable for everything and doesn’t engage in any off-field nonsense except giving air conditioners to schools isn’t going to be doing everything to win? Why, because a bunch of failed NFL players and radio personalities who make their living off of getting attention said so? To say I trust Jalen Hurts is a delirious understatement. Why would I trust anyone else?
Eagles Win
The Eagles beat the Titans yesterday. This shouldn’t have been a big deal. However, Saquon Barkley was hurt on the opening play, the offensive line stunk again, and the Titans were making the most of their opportunities (including basically a pick-6 on Hurts). The score was 20-17 bad guys with 2 minutes to go. Jalen completely took over accounting for all 65 yards needed on one scramble and some of the prettiest passes you’ll ever see all with All-Pro Jeffery Simmons acting like a Hurts-seeking missile. Eagles win 24-20.
A simple look at the box score would have you think Hurts played badly. That’s why you never rely on the box score with Jalen Hurts. He was on the money on basically every play but his two interceptions. I’m not going to pretend those weren’t his fault either. Mistakes happen. What matters is that despite the picks and the defense letting him down and the line being awful and the late deficit and it being 157 degrees on the field, it didn’t matter. He still won. Don’t try to take a win off the board because it wasn’t a blowout over a bad opponent. This is the NFL. The team wasn’t pretty, but outside of those two bad throws, Hurts was.
Jalen Hurts Extension Nonsense
There was a media talking point this summer about Jalen Hurts not getting a contract extension as being some kind of referendum on his place within the organization. Are the Eagles not ready to commit to Jalen Hurts? I cannot stress this enough: It was all BULLSHIT. Unless a player is still on their rookie contract, they can get extended at any time. However, practically speaking, early extensions happen when a player either has a high cap hit or no more guaranteed money left.
Don’t believe me? When Josh Allen signed his 6/$330m extension before the 2025 season his cap hit was about to be $45m and he only had $15m in guaranteed cash that season. His new contract dropped that cap hit by $9m and upped his 2025 cash guarantee to $58m. How about Patrick Mahomes, recipient of a new 8/$504m extension this offseason? A restructure brought his cap hit down to $35m but it would have been around $75m. He was also at the part of his deal where the majority of the guaranteed money was only year by year (meaning each year’s guarantee did not kick in ahead of time like it had in previous seasons). His new deal guarantees the next 2 seasons completely, but also locks in $30m in each of 2028-31 a year ahead of time. It was time for both.
The media perpetuated a falsehood that Jalen Hurts had no more guaranteed money left on his deal. Guess what, Hurts’ entire 2026 salary was guaranteed last season and $22m of his 2027 compensation is already guaranteed. The “reporting” was simply not true. Further, his 2026 cap hit is smaller at $32m than when Allen got extended two seasons ago (the salary cap is much higher too). Now, next season is when it finally creeps up to bad territory at $42m. It was ALWAYS the summer of 2027 that he was going to get his next deal. ALWAYS.
Now we see Hurts with a real offensive coordinator2 and, even though the protection has been bad, he’s thriving. When guys like Simmons dare him to be a QB, he shoves it down their throats. When the media says he’s carried, he carries the team. When you need him to be prepared, he’s not playing with his girlfriend’s hair on the practice field like 0-2 Justin Herbert. He’s performing at an elite level despite adversity. There is ZERO doubt in my mind that Jalen Hurts is the QB of the foreseeable future for the Eagles. Anyone who says otherwise doesn’t know what they are talking about.
- We once had a late-night conversation at a bar where I said to him, “you know, you and I would be a lot better friends if you just stopped lying all the time.” He responded with a solemn, “I know.” ↩︎
- Not to beat a dead horse, but Kevin Patullo was terrible and incredibly unqualified. ↩︎
Photo: All-Pro Reels, CC BY-SA 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Contracts: Spotrac
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