The Philadelphia Eagles are 13-1; they've beaten very good teams in commanding ways, they've beaten bad teams in very underwhelming ways, and they've even lost a game to the Washington Commanders where Nick Sirianni's offense possessed the ball for just under 20 minutes.

Fortunately for fans in the City of Brotherly Love, after watching the Cowboys drop a stunner to the franchise's only Super Bowl-winning head coach, Doug Pederson, Philly is now in a very good position to win the division thanks to their three-game lead over Dallas and will remain the number one seed heading into the playoffs if they can win at least two of their last three games. Unfortunately, the team's Week 15 win over the Chicago Bears was ugly with a capital U, and left fans wondering whether all of the regular season hype could be leading to a big-time letdown come the playoffs.

Asked about how Philadelphia was able to secure the win by sideline reporter Pam Oliver, Jalen Hurts doubled down on his support for the team and his teammates.

“I think there was so much that we overcame,” Hurts said. “It was ugly at times, but we found a way, and the great teams find a way. Our defense played their tail off against a really good quarterback, he’s able to make plays in all types of ways. I think we stuck together. There was adversity, we turned it over, we kind of gave them some things offensively and defensively, but we always control… when it mattered most, we found a way, and that’s what the great teams do.”

For better or worse, the Eagles have been a true team through the 2022 NFL season, with basically no public dissension, even from players like Nakobe Dean, who should probably be playing more but has been stuck behind starters T.J. Edwards and Kyzir White. In the end, all that matters is that Philly is winning, morale is at an all-time high, and Howie Roseman has assembled a roster of talent that Hurts should be “freakin' lucky” to command.

Jalen Hurts is thankful for his Philadelphia Eagles' offensive weapons.

Speaking of “freakin' lucky,” Oliver also asked Hurts how “freakin’ lucky” he is to play in an offense with A.J. Brown and DeVonta Smith, to which the third-year quarterback doubled down on his team-first mentality.

“I think we have big-time players, you know?” Hurts said. “And those big-time players have got to show up in big-time games. I kind of got on everybody for asking me about this defense we played this week because this is a really good team. They’ve been in really close games, and they’ve played everybody really well all year, so we’ve got a lot of respect for this team we just played. But we found a way to get a win in the end.”

RECOMMENDED (Article Continues Below)
Denver brought back Patrick Surtain for another season.

Nick Meyer ·

Eagles' defensive back Isaiah Rodgers.

Benjamin Adducchio ·

Eagles, Falcons, NFL, Saquon barkley, Kirk Cousins

Jackson Stone ·

It's not often that a team has two wide receivers who go for over 100 yards in the same game, let alone one who picks up 181 yards on nine catches (A.J. Brown) and another who hauls in five catches for 126 yards (DeVonta Smith), especially when neither were able to score a touchdown through the air. Granted, some of that may come down to Hurts' injured shoulder, as the OklaBama prospect came down awkwardly after being tackled. Did hurts have an update on his shoulder immediately following the game in his interview with Oliver?

“I don’t know, we’ll see,” Hurts added. “I’ll put my Anita Baker on to take this flight home and try to enjoy my teammates.”

On one hand, with the division all but wrapped up and the playoffs guaranteed regardless, it wouldn't be the worst imaginable outcome for Hurts to take some time off and give his backup, Gardner Minshew, a chance to take some meaningful snaps from under center ahead of his impending free agency period. While the Eagles would obviously prefer to keep their winning ways going, both to secure the top seed in the playoffs and to deliver another loss to the New Orleans Saints in Week 17 in order to optimize their draft pick's positioning in 2023 – a pick the Eagles own thanks to some wild wheelin' and dealin' from Roseman – priority number one has to be to enter the playoffs with a healthy Hurts taking snaps from Jason Kelce. If taking a foot off the brakes and easing off of Hurts' MVP campaign is the best way to ensure that happens, then, unfortunately, so be it; a Super Bowl win means a whole lot more than a top-3 MVP finish, especially when the player in question is only 24 and is about to get paid to play at that level for a very long time.