The sky is falling in Philadelphia.
Eagles star wide receiver A.J. Brown is tracking toward the worst season of his career and two weeks ago made an offhand comment calling his situation, and presumably the offense at large, a “[expletive] show.”
Frustration with quarterback Jalen Hurts leaked from the locker room to the public, putting him on the defensive despite two Pro Bowl selections and a Super Bowl MVP.
Nick Sirianni never seems to be off the hot seat, even with the best winning percentage of any active coach, and has faced criticism for everything from his sideline demeanor to his offense being too predictable.
“It’s not good for me to read anything,” Sirianni said last week.
And that was all before the Eagles coughed up a 21-0 lead in a loss to the rival Cowboys on Sunday. They’re still one of the top favorites to win the Super Bowl, but perhaps the Bears will be catching them at the right time when they visit Friday.
Nonetheless, they’re still the defending champions, and it’d be foolish to assume that the team with arguably the most loaded roster in the NFL is plunging.
At 8-3, like the Bears, the Eagles are one game behind the Rams for the top seed in the NFC and have beaten the Chiefs, Rams, Buccaneers, Packers and Lions. The main complaint is that they haven’t been winning impressively enough. Champagne problems.
Big picture, though, their track record is phenomenal. Since 2022, when Hurts had his breakout season and was runner-up for MVP, the Eagles are a league-best 47-15 in the regular season. They lost the Super Bowl that season, then stormed back to win it last season and thwart a Chiefs three-peat.
Struggles aside, they present daunting challenges on both sides of the ball.
They dominated last season as the No. 1 defense by a wide margin under coordinator Vic Fangio, then returned seven of their starters from the Super Bowl and added pass rusher Jaelen Phillips at the trade deadline.
They have allowed the eighth-fewest points per game (20.5) this season and have been a nightmare for opposing quarterbacks, allowing a league-low 57.3 completion percentage. The Cowboys’ Dak Prescott and the Giants’ Jaxson Dart are the only quarterbacks to reach a 100 passer rating against them.
Offensively, Hurts, Brown and running back Saquon Barkley all are having down seasons, but it’d be dicey to bet against them.
Barkley might have been the best player in the NFL last season. Brown averaged more than 1,300 yards receiving over the last three seasons. Hurts’ career-high 106 passer rating is sixth in the league.
Hurts gets the majority of the blame, but even in the loss to the Cowboys, he completed almost 70% of his passes, threw for 289 yards and a touchdown and added 33 yards rushing and two touchdown runs. He torched the Vikings and esteemed defensive coordinator Brian Flores last month for a perfect passer rating.
Brown had eight catches for 110 yards and a touchdown in that Dallas game, 121 against the Vikings and 109 against the Rams.
Barkley’s dip from 125.3 yards per game to 62.2 is the most perplexing. The Eagles still have an elite offensive line, and he’s healthy. It still seems likely he’ll get rolling sooner than later.
He’s a constant threat. He had seven touchdown runs of 65 yards or more last season, including one against the Saints when Bears defensive coordinator Dennis Allen was their coach. The Saints had held him to 61 yards before Barkley burned them in the fourth quarter.
“Every time he touches the ball he’s a threat to go all the way,” Allen said Tuesday.
People say that about running backs all the time, but with Barkley, it’s legitimately true.
That persistent sense of inevitability applies across the board with the Eagles. They’ve been too good for too long to be dismissed.
