PHLY Philadelphia Eagles Podcast - Nick Sirianni’s role as Philadelphia Eagles look to get passing game going | PHLY Sports

Episode Date: December 11, 2024

As the local and national media discuss A.J. Brown and Brandon Graham’s comments, what role does Nick Sirianni play in keeping the locker room together? We discuss some of the recent issues with the Philadelphia Eagles’ passing game: What do the Eagles actually need from Jalen Hurts as they attempt to win the Super Bowl? Plus, Jeffrey Lurie official sold an 8 percent stake of the Eagles for a while lot of money.We break it all down on the PHLY Eagles Show. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hello, everybody, and welcome to a Wednesday edition of the P-H-L-Y Eagles show presented by Bet-365. Download the Bet-365 app and use code P-H-L-Y-365 when you sign up. Whatever the moment, it is never ordinary at Bet-365. So today I am with our good friend, Les Bowen, somebody who has covered the Eagles for a long time, somebody who worked with my dad at the Daily News for a long time, and he can, less, I'm very excited to get his perspective on kind of what is going on this week.

I know Zach is also excited, and ZB has to do some stuff, so we have ZB off the top. Zach, I want to ask you a question. I had a bunch of questions to ask you, but I am a slave to the chat, and I will bow down to them. What are your thoughts on Bill Belichick to UNC?

I was surprised. My guess is that he put fewer out and realized he wasn't getting it. Or he wasn't getting an NFL job. I can't see Bill. But, you know, I saw the story about how he's building this NFL model in college. And frankly, there's a lot of schools that have NFL models in college. Now, the big difference in NFL coaching and college coach is this. In NFL, you're on a contract and you can't get out of that contract.

In college, you can sign a quarterback. He plays well. transfer someone else somewhere else next year. So I can't imagine Bill Belch just going to be there for a long time. But from a football coaching perspective, I think Bill Belchick can run laps around some of those ACCC coaches. Well, you do know the ACC coaching circuit. Well, I know it's been a few years, but you do understand that.

So let's go to the Eagles. And before we get to the stuff from this week, Jeffrey Lurie just got, I think, you know, I did the Mazak. I think it was like 600 million, 700 million, somewhere in the Eagles. the range of that, the new owners, 8% of the team, the family trust of United Communications Group founder Ed Peskowitz and Susan Kim, chairwoman of Amcor technology. So that development became, it was approved today by the NFL, but it is something we knew about for a little while here, whether it's your reporting or really just kind of you eyeballing the situation from afar.

What are your thoughts on why this happened and what Jeffrey Lurie, besides trying to get a little extra cash what the motivation for him is here yeah i would imagine a little extra cash is is probably the motivation i've done some reporting on on this as you can imagine to do the big story here is the valuation the valuation of um over eight eight billion dollars uh really shows kind of how this franchise has skyrocketed even in the past decade uh and so for all intents and purposes like if you're just an Eagle span watching this, nothing changes. Jeffrey Lurie still owns the team. He still is controlling interest.

His family will keep the team. So presumably Julian Lorry will take over the team one day. Other than, you know, there's a few other minority owners who when you're here every day, you, you see them, you know, they might be in the locker room or the draft room. But there's, this doesn't change much for fans. I think from an organizational perspective, what it means is that, A, Jeffrey Lurie has more cash. and be the valuation of the franchise has gone up significantly.

And from Lurie's perspective, I think maybe some fans don't quite understand this. When they value a franchise at $8 billion, that doesn't mean that you have $8 billion sitting in a bank somewhere. It means, you know, if you were to sell the team, you could get $8 billion. Well, you're not selling the team. So how do you realize money from having this evaluation? and this is one of the ways you do it, obviously. Yeah, and liquidity is important. So essentially, it's a cash infusion.

One thing we talk about on the show is that, you know, Jeffrey's different than some of the other owners who maybe owning the team is their secondary job or like their side job. I mean, Jeffrey, his primary thing is owning the fell off Eagles, right? And so like Les said that he buys the franchise for $185 million in 1994. It skyrocketed now over $8 billion in 2024. And he doesn't see any of that liquidity unless he sells a stake. And so this is essentially a $600 plus million cash in fusion for Jeffrey Lurian's family.

Zeeb, you had another piece on all-PHly.com today. You went to a charity event the other night sponsored by Chris Long and Connor Barwin, some other people as well. but those were the two key figures. And you talk to Chris. He seems pretty high on this current Eagles team. It seems like what did you learn from talking to a guy that I know you enjoyed talking to? I enjoyed talking to when he played before the birds. Yeah.

Yeah. So it was interesting to hear him say, like flat out, the 2024 team is more talent than the 2017 team. Now, he didn't say better. He said more talented. And we can look at the depth charts and probably agree on that same conclusion. Yes. But when you talk about the 2017 team, that's a team that won the Super Bowl. That's the last time the Eagles won nine in a row.

And so I asked in the framework of, you know, how does this nine game, how does this nine game of a street compared to that nine game street? And he said that one kind of came out of nowhere. This year's team, like, this is expected. And he just went through all the town. It was also interesting hearing him talk about J.L. Carter because, you know, the three of us can talk about how well Jailen Carter's playing, Fran, Bo, Denise. We can go on down the list. But when you hear from someone who knows the defensive line to say, like,

I wish I could play with the guy like this and talk about what he's doing for everybody else. That jumped out as well. I think they could use Chris on the edge right now, frankly. Yeah, they could use depth there. I mean, Vic Fangio said he's comfortable with three. But this is going to be one of the big things to monitor during the backstretch of the schedule is there's a lot of guys taking a lot of snaps. And you just want to see if they can hold up going forward.

I'll work here. So two other questions I have for you based off of that night. Zach, can you talk about what is up with Connor Barwin right now? Because he's a coach, but he still seems to have the extracurricular activities that he had as a player. And you don't really associate that with the coach. But as we've talked about, he owns an Italian basketball team, part owner of an Italian basketball team. He's involved in the Kelsey Christmas album. But he's wearing a headset every week on the sideline. So what is Connor Barwin's kind of current setup with the Eagles right now? Yeah, good question. It's kind of a hybrid front office coaching role. He really oversees the development program, which I should say I'm not

by pandering to Connor here. I've heard this anecdotally, in the end, I've heard this independently, that their development program is doing a real good job behind the scenes with some of these practice squad players. Or you think of someone like, for instance, Thomas Booker was on a practice squad last year and now he's part of a rotation. He was part of that development team a year ago. So Connor does a lot of that. He's involved in the scouting process. If you know Connor and I know less knows him well, he's an interesting guy and he's an interested guy too. So there's a lot of things that he's interested in. And I did a story for the athletic two years ago on his ownership with the Italian basketball team.

And a lot of it is kind of learning from Jeffrey Lurie, like we said, how he always been seeing some of the elements that are inside the building here. But he has multiple touch points within the organization and within the community as well. His Make the World Better Foundation, his involvement with Jason Kelsey's and the Offensive Lions Christmas album production company.

So he's a man of many hats right now. I like Connor Barwin, certainly was an interesting, cool guy. to deal with. Also, you know, a very good player for a few years there for the Eagles. Zach, my other question from that night, what was the deal there? I think it was on Broad Street. What was the setup? Did you get dinner there? Kind of can you take us behind the scenes on what that night was like? Yeah, so I didn't get the invitation to the dinner. I got the invitation to like the red carpet outside. So I got to see the celebrities like Connor Varwin, Chris Longst, Seth Joyner, and John Clark, when I'm talking about celebrity. I walked the red carpet.

But no, I spoke to, yeah, I was kind of on the right carpet. I try to go to these things as much as I can. And especially Chris and Connor Barwin were pleasures to cover. You know, they really helped me do my job better when they were here. And so in essence, when they're doing something like that, if I'm able to go, I want to be there. But it was at a nice steakhouse on Broad Street. and yeah i would like to get the invitation inside because i've been there it's a good restaurant don't feel bad i hosted chris long's charity event two years in a row and you know what i got for this

no invitation to anything so uh less putting chris so you're doing better than i am i really frowned chris come on buddy yeah maybe next year you know it's not like you paid me or anything unbelievable yes come on yeah it's this chris long it's an annual dinner so maybe next Next year. Last one, Zach, because I know you got to run. I guess can you just go over what Nick said? Because obviously the Eagles are in the news this week, both locally and nationally. I think you mentioned that there is an increased national media presence before the show.

What did Nick say during his press availability? What stood out to you? Yeah, acknowledging obviously what's happened during the past 48 hours between, you know, AJ Brown and J. One Hertz, the speculations around that, and then Brandon Graham the next day. he said this was addressed in team meeting he didn't want to get into kind of what the conversation was he thinks this team has more 20-22 vibes than 20-23 vibes as I said on the show I don't really know how to qualify or quantify vibes but he spoke about like yeah but he did you know last year I can say anecdotally last year it did not feel like a very healthy workplace at times last year like

it was not, they were 10 and one and it did not seem that way. And despite what kind of, yeah, the last 48 hours, you know, interesting, I, I did ask Nick the question about like, are you emphasizing joy more this season? And that was given what happened last year. And then you saw this past weekend. Yeah, I think, I mean, I would say my read on the player reaction last weekend was that it was actually productive, that it was, it was, it was, feel as productive that even on a nine-game winning streak, these guys recognize the passing game means to be better. Frankly, if they didn't say that when they were sub-100 net passing yards,

I would say they're delusional. But Nick Siriani spoke about how this group, the leadership council, the coaches spent a lot of time during the off-season and trying to rectify some of those culture questions. And that he thinks what they've done behind the scenes, he understands why these questions are asked this week. given what's happened during the past 48 hours. But he thinks this is more comparable to 2022 than 2023.

He says he can only go based on what he has exposure to on a day-to-day basis. And what he has exposure to is Jow and AJ working together. And so that's kind of, we'll see. Look, there's definitely a there there. I'm not dismissing it. I know Brandon Graham walked it back, but something like that doesn't come up unless there is something there. The question is whether it is enough that you think it's going to kind of affect the season. I think that's fair.

Zach, I know you have to run and you will be, I think, invited to the same place as John Clark in a few minutes. So that is good. Let's go enjoy the practice. We appreciate your help, man. And you'll be on tomorrow. Yeah, I appreciate it. Yep. Tomorrow with Bo and Fran looking ahead at the Steers.

So check us out then. Love a good Thursday show with some swooper. See you, man. Thanks, guys. Yep. All right, Les, before we get in to the topic, du jour, I think we should pay some bills here, right, Julia? Good idea.

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Whatever the moment, it is never ordinary at Bet365. And Bet365 is our presenting sponsor today, Les, as we get back into some birds talk. So, Les, you cover this team for a long time. You've taken the temperature to use another one of our sponsors that we will get to a little. little bit later of the locker room for a long time. I'm curious because you have written a couple of pieces for us online. As somebody who's still somewhat involved and still is somebody who's very interested in the team, what do you make of kind of this whole situation? Starting with, okay, the passing game has been struggling and then the media clearly has latched on new and I'm not even

saying right or wrong, but clearly is a story both with AJ Brown's comments after the game, but especially Brandon Graham's comments on the radio the other night. Well, I'm mostly interested in what's going on with the passing game and why they can't do better with the offensive line and the weapons that they have. I just don't understand. You know, I see Jalen drop back. And I don't want to put it all on him because I'm not a Jalen hater. I think he's a very good quarterback in many respects.

but I see him drop back and look and look and look and either throw it away or dump it or take a sack or run out of bounds. I don't understand why they can't get people open, why they can't get him comfortable with the options that they're presenting him. That's my main thing. And then the controversy itself, I've been through a lot of these and not knowing AJ real closely, I don't want to get too into his head. I thought Sunday, here's my perspective. Sunday, Nick Siriani says, boy, our passing game really needs to be a lot better.

And Jalen Hertz says, boy, our passing game really needs to be a lot better. And somebody asks A.J. Brown, what's wrong? And he says, passing. Well, isn't that pretty much what everybody said? You know, why is it a problem? Because A.J. Brown says it. I mean, is he not supposed to say? Is he supposed to say, oh, the passing game's wonderful? Don't listen to Nick and Jalen. I don't get that part. I understand what happened from that point on that somebody, you know, a number of somebody's decided, oh, the diva wide receiver says the passing game isn't working. Well, it isn't. They threw for 108 yards Sunday. It's not working. You know what I mean? And it. And it's, He didn't say, and furthermore, Jalen Hertz sucks. You know, I mean, no, he didn't say that. He just said the passing game was struggling.

And, of course, people would tie that to Jalen a little bit. Right. I mean, he's involved. He's the guy doing the passing. He's the guy doing the passing. But you're right. And I do think it frustrated me a little bit when people were getting on A.J. For maybe being as blunt as he was.

Because I don't know, like, I feel like we can all be adults about this, right? The passing game struggled, and he said the passing game struggled. The only thing I can see is he was very, maybe he should watch his mood a little bit, because he was very terse and very more than Hertz and Siriani were. Maybe that's what made his message different. I don't know. I was really, I wasn't shocked, but I was surprised that Brandon Graham, I know Brandon's on social media a lot.

I remember, I don't know if you did, you were probably in college, But early on in his career in Philly, when Brandon was really struggling, he would get on Twitter and argue with people, you know, and block people and, you know. Les, I have a story about this. Oh, okay. So I was, and I am ashamed to say this, I was an original Earl Thomas Truther, where I might have gotten an argument in 2013, 2014. Sure. Where, and by the way, I was not adding whatever his handle is, Brandon Graham, 50s. Yeah.

But I was in an argument saying, man, I really wish the Eagles would have drafted Earl Thomas. As you remember, it was the heyday of the Legion of Boom. Earl Thomas was a very good player. But I must have typed his name because a few days later, I was blocked by Brandon Graham. There you go. And it got to the point where I was blocked by Brandon Graham until the Eagles won the Super Bowl. And by the way, a few years later, I was covering the team. I took the fan hat off and was a little more professional, delightful guy to deal with.

with. Obviously, we didn't know he was going to become a complete Eagles legend at that time, but a great guy had to deal with. And I believe it was Jimmy Kemski who made the bet with him after the Super Bowl. If the Eagles won the Super Bowl, Brandon Graham had blocked, I think, like thousands of people. And Jimmy went into his account. BG gave it to him because they won the Super Bowl. And by the way, when they made that bet, Jimmy didn't know that BG would have made the game winning play to win the Super Bowl as well. But BG through Jimmy Kemsky, everybody got unblocked. I am unblocked and I am never going to bring up Earl Thomas ever again. That is a very good story.

And, you know, BG's on social media a lot. He sees this stuff. I don't think he was probably even around for AJ's interview after the game because Brandon's not playing now. I don't think he probably wasn't even in the locker room. But he sees this stuff on social media, people implying that A.J. Brown was upset with Jay. And just takes it as, okay, well, AJ's upset with Jalen Hertz. This is disappointing.

And as a player, you have to be, I wrote about this on PHLY. You know, one of the wonderful things about Brandon is that he's guileless. He's just not a real, he's not someone who thinks a lot about an agenda when he's saying things or anything like that. He just says what he thinks. Well, sometimes you need a little guile, you know. Sometimes you need to sort of think through what he's. exactly has happened here, maybe get a better handle on what has happened before you shoot from the hip. And I can kind of see how he would, he's in a weird spot where he might be done played.

And the media world is full of former athletes who do stuff like this all the time, who take, you know, you didn't even play in Green Bay, but somebody said something in Green Bay and you're on ESPN now running and raving about. you know what this guy said and you don't have any idea what the situation really is. That's kind of what our sports landscape is about these days. Yeah. And, you know, he just has to be, and I think he understands this. His statement yesterday laid out exactly what he needs to figure. You know, he needs to sort of make sure he grounds what he's saying in reality

and think about its effect. sometimes. I don't think, I know there are going to be some people who say, well, BG said it and therefore, you know, it must all be true. You know, I just don't think he had any idea. I honestly don't. Yeah. Maybe I'm wrong, but that's my take. Yeah, and look, we all have opinions about this stuff. But I think to your point about, it's former players and people running and raving about stuff they don't really know about, the three words that don't really get brought up a lot in the modern media environment is, I don't know. Yeah.

Oh, God. I don't know. And we don't know. Like, I... Look at... I liked dealing with him when he was an eagle, but look at Emmanuel Ocho's career. The guy just... I don't remember anything about it.

I just remember him being the loud mouth. Well, I just mean his career now. Oh, okay. Yeah. Where he basically does stuff like this. He takes outrageous stands and, you know, that... Frankly, on things that he doesn't know much about. And I'm not signaling him out.

There's a whole, you know, skip bailist to Stephen A. Smith to the punter with the no sleeves. It's ridiculous, you know. But that's what people want to see. And it's not going to go in any other direction anytime soon. That's a funny chat by Player 1 and the Mad Cats. Thank God it was BG. if it was a player with less goodwill. Yes.

With the fans, it might be a bigger deal. That's exactly right. It would take a lot more for BG to lose that goodwill. Everybody loves BG. Yeah, it's great. No, I completely agree with you. And I'm with you where it's not that I don't care about their relationship. I certainly don't know about it.

Right. But whether it is good, bad, or indifferent, the bigger issue is that the passing game needs to get fixed. Yeah. And their relationship will be fine when that happens. But I'm saying like, Les, they could be best friends right now. Right. And it still wouldn't matter. It still wouldn't matter.

They're exactly right. Yes. They're not performing at the level that they need to. And that is the thing that matters more. And obviously there are plenty of examples that you do not need to be best friends with everybody you work with to perform at a high level. But even if, even if they are best friends, even if the Nick Siriani stories are true and him saying that they eat lunch every day, they're not doing the non-exiriani. the Assamois eat in the car move, you know, to get away from each other. That doesn't matter to me.

They just need the passing attack to be better. Yes, they do. And we'll get into that. Now, I understand why it has become a bigger story because, like, you know, this is a human game played with people with real human emotion. So if they're to the average fan, if there is some drama that is infecting the Eagles, that's going to get them more likely to tune in, right? And they're going to enjoy the game work.

But as an Eagles fan, I do understand why you would feel. also that it's a little much. I get people do. The average fan looks at the passing game and wonders what the hell is going on, as we do. But it's kind of an opaque. We're not getting a lot of like Kellyn Moore talked yesterday, and it was just useless. By the way, he is so boring. You have dealt with a lot of different coordinators.

For my newsletter every week, I try to watch the two press conferences on YouTube. Sometimes I'll tune in to Michael Clay, but it would have to be. if Jake Elliott or Braredman. So in fairness, I have been watching a little more Michael Clay. Clay was good yesterday because they talked about the thing that happened, the Cowboys game, the blocked punt and things like that. But yeah, go ahead. It was good.

Every week, I find the Vic Fangio press conferences. Very fun. I enjoy it. He's delightful. He is a curmudgeon. Bo had the great question to him yesterday of what's up with all these shots of you in the coaching boot. Do you like that?

And Vic says, you know, I don't know why people want to see my face that often. But I, you know, and it is funny that they're doing that. Like it feels like you can almost like it's a little gross. It's a little invasive. You know, you can like almost count his nose hairs at this point. Yeah, it's a weird setup. But in fairness, they're doing it because your defense is playing great. And you are the big.

And because you're coordinating from the box rather than on the field. Yeah. But to get to your point, Kellynmore, he is just completely useless every week. It's nothing. They won't give you any insight into what they're trying to do, any idea about why it hasn't worked. And these aren't things that I know they're going to be fans will say, whoa, the other teams will see. Well, other teams have a very deep understanding of the concepts involved,

and they're watching film. The other teams could probably tell us if they wanted to what the hell is going on here. I mean, them not discussing it doesn't gain. They don't gain anything from that. I understand you don't want to say, well, Jalen just sucks or something like that, which I don't think is true. But you can say, okay, on this concept, we just haven't been able to get, we were expecting this defense and we got that defense, you know? Yeah. The world won't come to an end if you say that.

And the next opponent won't be, you know, scribbling it down frantically. you know, you can actually give an answer to a question once in a while. It's brutal, man. He is so boring. But that's how you end up. People grab onto whatever they can in a situation like this where something is clearly screwed up. You know, it, a controversy.

Sports talk abhors a vacuum, just like nature, you know. And here we are. So let's, let me ask you about a few different things. First of, I thought Bo had an interesting point the other day, because we kind of go to the page. passing game needs to be better for them to win the Super Bowl. And I thought Bo put it well the other day when he said, well,

there's a chance that it does it, right? They are a very good team. No, no, no, I agree with you that it's likely going to have to be better at points for the Super Bowl.

But last, like, let's say Detroit loses a couple of games here down the stretch. They have a tough schedule. Like, the idea that they couldn't just pound Seekwan in January and the defense wouldn't be awesome. I'm not saying it would be ideal.

Right. But I'm just saying, like, to make the blanket statement that it has to be so much better, I think it would help a lot. Yeah. Well, you're looking to catch lightning in a bottle there, I think, a little bit. I mean, that does happen.

You're right. I was just, when you were saying that, I was thinking about the Super Bowl in Detroit, the year after the Eagles went to the Super Bowl, it was Pittsburgh and I believe Seattle, maybe. Pittsburgh and somebody. And Ben Rafflesberger was a young quarterback then. And I think he ended the Super Bowl with a 14-point something. Yeah, that's what I mean. Sometimes you get the right.

match-up. And nearly gave the game away, you know, but they won. You know, you can win. But, you know. So let me ask you. So you have covered a couple of teams that have made the Super Bowl. And I'm specifically thinking about that 2004 team. We will see what happens over the next month here because they still are in play for the number

one seed, but they may help for Detroit. But their floor really looks like the number two seat. So they, it's, I don't want to say they're playing pressure-free football. Well, I guess the Vikings are in that too, aren't they for the number two? They are. They are. And as De Niz is kind of laid out, there is a tiebreaker that I can't even wrap my head around. It's strength of victory or whatever.

I'm not even going to think about that at this point. But they are playing, I don't want to say pressure-free football because it would be awesome to get that one seed. The one seed in the current NFL setup is a huge deal. The only buy, and you get to play in Philly. And I also think if you got to play Detroit in Philly in the playoffs, I would be very curious what Jared Goff looks like in the cold, considering he's going to play, I think, one game in the cold the entire year. I think it would be a big difference for the Eagles to play at home.

But as I'm saying that, there's a little something in my ear reminding me that the Eagles haven't played a good home game yet this year. All of their good games are on the road, actually. Their most impressive performances have been road games. And there have been a lot of them too. So, yeah, it's just, you know, Jacksonville, they just don't seem to to play well at home. Cleveland, you know, that Cleveland game that got everybody so upset and started the wind streak was at the link. You know, I don't understand it, but I do think it would be an advantage from how it would affect Detroit.

You're right. Yeah. But they are going to play relatively pressure-free football and that if they lose a game, it's all right. They're going to be the number two seed. they're going to have a nice road. The only place they could play is whoever wins that NFC North and gets the number one seed. I like it better when the top two seats got buys. Oh, me too.

Because I think for a team that had such an early regular season by having that extra week at the end of the season would also be very, very important. Totally. But I will say two years ago when the Eagles were clearly the number one seat, I didn't mind that they made San Francisco play that earlier game. No, I'm with you. I agree with you. The NFL wants more games. They want more money. Such is life.

So it seems to me like the next month is going to be about, let's get back and sync in this passing game. And it's like you said, there's no reason why it can't be. Like they can still be a run the ball pounding Saquan type of team, but they need to be more efficient with the passing game. And there's no reason why. Right. The offensive line is. Just can't lose touch with the past. What they've done here is they've become such a running team that.

They don't have any rhythm or any synchronization in their passing attack. It's like, oh, my God, we're going to pass. Okay, let's see if we remember how to do that. It's gotten too far in one direction, and they definitely need to do more passing, frankly. And I don't think that necessarily means that Saquan gets fewer carries. I just mean you need more plays. I mean, they didn't, that was the big thing Sunday against Carolina. Sequin only had 20 carries and people were bitching about that

because they weren't on the field. The defense couldn't get off the field and the offense couldn't stay on the field. The defense had its worst game in a few weeks. Yes. But in fairness, like because they have been so good during the stretch, I think it's a little easier to give them a moment. It is. And I was, after that Baltimore game, I was, this is the bestest,

Eagles defense I have seen, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then I watched them Sunday against the Panthers, and I thought, you know, without BG, that edge rush really isn't very good. Yeah. You know, that's a problem. It really is. And I just, Jaylake's hunt or somebody is going to have to really step up here for them to be, because edge rush is important in the NFL.

I have learned. No, definitely. And, you know, that's a big hole to have. You know what that game felt like a little bit to me? It felt like the 2022 Monday night game against Washington where I didn't think they were getting shredded. If you look at the rushing stats at the end of the game, it's really like they're not that impressive.

But they were getting the key, the Panthers, that is. They were getting the key five and six yard runs. And the Panthers were converting third down. Yeah. Sometimes third in longs. You know, and that defense hasn't been doing that. I don't know if it had a lot of it might have to do with Reed Blank. Lincolnship not being there.

But yeah, it was not a great, even though the points weren't bad, given who they were playing. And that's another thing, too, though. When I say that, I think a lot of fans look at Carolina's record and don't really follow the league that much. This is the worst team in the league. Well, no, you know, they lost to Tampa in overtime the week before. Yeah. They lost to Kansas City by three the week before that. and suddenly they're not playing like a three-win team.

That doesn't mean they're good, but they're not the worst team. They're not the Giants. The Giants are the worst team in the league, unless it's the Jets. Carolina is actually, Bryce Young is a talented, he hasn't put it all together. He threw a terrible interception Sunday,

but you could see on some of those throws and some of those plays he made, this is a very talented, you know, top of the draft guy who has, that kind of ability, and he has a good offensive line in front, which I wasn't really, so I didn't really understand that, but after I looked at who they've got and what they've done the show, yeah, offensive line, actually pretty good.

Do you pay attention to them at all? Because that's where you're from, right? You know, it's funny. I'm from Charlotte, but there were no Panthers there. I left in 1983. That's fair. And one of the reasons I left, well, the main reason I left is my wife got a job at the inquire, but the other reason I wasn't really pushing to stay as a sports writer in Charlotte is there were no pro teams. There weren't even any Charlotte Hornets. In the summer, you would interview 12-year-old tennis player, you know, stuff. I mean, it was just really, the colleges and NASCAR were the big beats. If you were the ACCC writer for the Charlotte Observer, that was, you know, that was high cotton. You got to live, they actually had a, they had a

place for you that they rented up in Raleigh, you know, so you could cover the real teams, you know, and if you're the NASCAR rider, you traveled all around the country and did whatever you wanted. Did you ever do any NASCAR? I did sidebars, yes. I did, I was the guy in the infield if

Dale Earnhardt, you know, wrecked. I had to, you know, like, ooh, what happened, Dale? You know, that kind of stuff. So he steps out of a car after, now obviously we know Dale Earnhardt. Yeah, but it was many years before. when he was a very young racers.

Just a normal crash where the... Say Darrell Waltrip. Yeah, Darrell Waltrip blows a tire or something like that. Exactly. And you're putting a recorder in his face. Yeah, there's like five or six guys late back then. You know, five or six guys and some radio guy from the NASCAR network. In fact, at one point it was Eli Gold, who became the Alabama football legend announcer.

He was the young guy sticking the microphone in front of people in the infield. I got to say less. like a Charlotte. I enjoyed on my time on the NBA beat the times I got to stay there. That could be a place I would have lived. These days, it's a very vibrant place, especially for young people. It was not so much when I was growing up. In fact, it was a pretty boring place. And the one criticism I would have of it is it's one of those places where everybody is from here or Buffalo or Pittsburgh or Chicago. Yeah. it doesn't have a sense of self, really, I don't think.

It's not like a Spanish moss-draped southern town like Charleston, South Carolina or anything. It's just a, it's kind of like Atlanta. Yeah. You know? Good, good food city, I think, cousin Chris. It really is, yeah. That Carolina barbecue. I guess we do need Z.B. to come in.

He is the man who has the final word on that. Okay, Les. Let's pay a few more bills, and we're going to get back into the Steelers game. in addition to I have a couple more questions for you about Jalen Hertz as well, but let's pay some bills first. All right. Unless I am here to tell you about our friends at Rite Aid, where you can get your pneumonia shot.

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Last Jalen question for you, because this is something that Fran has brought up. Do you think, or Fran actually had a massive breakdown with the film, So I don't want to attribute this to him. This is something I think Zach said, but something I also agree with. And that is when you look at the stats that Fran laid out yesterday, where Jalen is holding the ball for a long time, but he's not throwing the ball downfield.

It's not because holding the ball for a long time is not inherently a bad thing. You know. You look at some of the better players in the league. That's where they create those big plays out of structure. He is not doing that. I wonder if the first month of the year, and I will fess up to this, I was pretty frustrated with the turnovers earlier this year. I'm saying, Jalen, you can't turn the ball over.

Well, he's not turned the ball over. But I wonder if he has swung a little. He doesn't want to let go with the ball. It's, you know, it's, I mean, it's, I wouldn't liken it to Ben Simmons, but, you know, he just, he does not want anything bad to happen with that ball. And that's how it looks to me. And you're right. For lots of Eagles quarterbacks, the really good Eagles,

quarterbacks over the years, if you saw him stand back there and they were giving him like four or five seconds, you would think, oh, boy, he's going to find somebody, you know, McNabb, Wentz, when he was going good, Foles, especially Foles, you knew that the longer he had, the more chance you had of getting a really big play. With Jalen, it's almost the opposite. It's almost like the longer he goes, the more likely you're going to see him take a sack or run out of bounds, you know, behind the line of scrimmage or something like that. It just doesn't seem to, and I've often wondered, are guys doing the scramble drill right? You know, are they really working? Because you're talking about the normal sequence is broken down.

They've run the route, you know. Are they getting themselves open? Are they standing there looking at him, expecting that he's going to run? I don't know, but it's confounding. It really is. Yeah, and that's something you can't always see on the TV tape. What is going on behind the scenes. And that's also the point that we can bring up to where, you know, it is an overall

passing game, right? There are probably things they could do a little bit better. Yeah, I just think, like we know that Jalen, he still leads the league in that completion percentage over expectation. Right. And I think some of that is the function of the receivers. fascinating to me. You know, that, and we saw a little bit of this Sunday, you're right, the receivers are very,

very good, but he will not see guys or misfire or something, and it'll be like third and 20, and he'll be running headlong to the sideline and fling the ball, you know, through four people to Devante Smith. That was a great play. That was a great play. How can you do this and not be able to? able to just run a normal passing offense. I don't understand it. I really don't. It's like when he really has to, when it's like, okay, we're going to, just like with the running, the 35-yard run Sunday.

You know, so many times, you saw him run up Lane Johnson's butt there that one time. What the hell was that? You know, we don't know. But when he needed to gain 35 yards, there he goes. I appreciate it because I went back and watched the TV the broadcast and I appreciated Mark Sanchez making a joke about dancing around the that was hilarious although I will say on the he probably should have made a joke about how he loved to check down the passes because the John Dodson checked down when AJ was streaking wide open down the right side of the field obviously Mark I will say I do have this is random I have some positive memories of the Sanchez that that Thanksgiving Day performance he obviously

Look, when he was your quarterback for over a month, you saw the warts after a while, but I don't know, he had some good games. Two things. One is, nicest guy in the world. Literally, nicest guy in the world. His brother was his agent. His brother was also very, very nice. But what would happen with Mark Sanchez over and over and over again?

He will lead you down the field. He'll be hitting people in stride. He'll be making the right calls. They'll be do, do, do, do, do. Okay, first and goal. from the six interception. Every time. Not every time.

That's an exaggeration. But more often than one would like, you know, it just, it never quite, a lot of good points along the way, never the finish line. Yeah, yeah, for sure. And I think you saw those kind of, those backbreaking plays, the more he played. I remember 2014 when he first took over for Foles when he was injured. I know 2013 was the height of chip, but they were still, like the fact that he had Mark Sanchez, I remember there was a Carolina game on Monday night where absolutely smoked them,

played great against Dallas on Thanksgiving. That might have been the height of chip to me, where it was like he had the backup to the backup initially and he still had the offense humming. Well, at that point, I kind of thought Sanchez would end up being like what you're seeing now with Sam Darnold and Gino Smith and the guys that, you know, have gotten a bad rap for playing for teams like the Jets, but they're actually, Baker Mayfield, not the Jets, but, you know, the guys that flamed out and then went somewhere else and became good quarterbacks, but it didn't ultimately turn out that way for Mark.

Yeah. One more observation than I have to make on this whole thing, and we'll get into the Steelers. I know people in the chat really want to talk about the Steelers, but that's what, that's what Fran is here. for to do tomorrow and all that stuff. The one thing, Zach mentioned Siriani's comments. I have found it interesting that Nick Siriani for most of the last year has had a lot of main character energy where he has been the person involved in a lot of the quote unquote drama with this team where he has injected himself into it.

I think it's nice that Nick, regardless of where you stand on this J-O-N-A-J thing, is it a thing? I only care about the passing game, which again, the two of them. us mostly only care about the passing game, that he is the one handling this as a guy to the side, where he is kind of offering his perspective, but he is not the one under fire here. Right. It's nice. It's nice. That's what Nick should be, right?

Yeah. He's got a nine-game winning streak. His hair grew back faster than anybody I've ever seen. Well, you know, when he grows a beer, shaves it, and two days later, he has like he looks like Ryan Fitzpatrick. I don't know how in the world, you know, but. Nick looks like me after like three days. Yeah.

It's impressive. I don't know. He does not need glad hair restoration. Yeah, no, he's... I'm jealous, yeah. So, I don't know. I just found that kind of notable that he is the one,

the wise coach, offering the perspective. Okay. What do people want to know about the Steelers? Let's talk about the Steelers. Yeah. So, Les, I look at this game, and I wonder a little bit, especially on the defensive side,

when I made that comparison to the Washington game a few years ago, maybe the Eagles' trap game. They just weren't taking the Panthers as seriously. They will take the Steelers seriously, right? that is a very good team, good record. But I think Vic Fangio in that defense has the chance to completely stifle that Steelers' offense. They are playing like they did every week but last week.

I just think no George Pickens to catch those. I was just going to say, if they don't have George Pickens, I don't think they win. You know, I mean, he's marvelous. I know he's a pain in the butt, but he is marvelous. He is a great player. and Tomlin said doubtful yesterday, but that's early in the week. I just wonder if he's setting us up to be, oops, he's playing, you know. Little Willis Reed moment for George Pickens.

So George Pickens is good, less, but I got to say, every time I watch him, and this is just completely uneducated thing, I feel like he pass interferes with people all the time. They throw the ball up to him and he pushes off and oftentimes they don't call it. Sometimes they do or whatever. Yeah, I mean, that'll be an interesting matchup. I wonder if that'll be a big Quinyon Mitchell matchup. Even last week, by the way, I find it absolutely remarkable. And Jamie's not here who's like the number one Quinyon Mitchell fan in the world.

They barely throw it the guy. Like I don't even notice he's playing. Good point. Yeah. So I wonder if that is the case. You're right. It was much more about Slay and the nickel and Dijin than it was about Quinyon. Maybe it was who he was covering.

I don't know. But yeah. But so it seems to me like the Steelers. offense, hopefully, is the worst of the four major units in this game. But when you look at Jalen Hertz and you look at A.J. Brown and Devante Smith, this is going to be the best defense that they face the rest of the year, right? Yeah, this defense is really good on third down. There's some categories that it isn't great, but it points allowed.

It's right there. The Eagles, I think, are allowing 18.0 and the Steelers are allowing 18.3. I had all this stuff written down on the pad and then I left it at home. That happens. I'm pretty sure that's the deal. Yeah, it's a good defense. It isn't, there are some things they don't do especially well. They're not really, they're a better run defense than they are a past defense, which is interesting to me because this, you know, we're so much focus on the passing right here for us.

One thing I worry about is Eagles have never beaten Russell Wilson. And you can say it's a bogus stat. Oh, and six. He's never come here as a stealer before. But there is something about that guy. He's very elusive. When he's going good, he's just, I saw some games. There were a couple times around the time of the Eagles Super Bowl,

those seasons right around there. When Seattle would come in and Seattle was really on the downslope and was not as good as the Eagles, and he would run around and, you know, find a way to, to get them what they needed. It was exasperating for Eagles fans. And he's still capable of doing that. Completely agree with you.

I am not the biggest Russell Wilson fan. I just think he's really corny and all of those things. But in the middle of the decade, when, like you said, even when they were on the down swing, but before that as well, I remember, I think it was 2014, the first game that kind of turned around that season in the wrong direction was Seattle came in here.

and when he was at his best, he just completely, you couldn't get him on the ground. And he would run around for hours. And then he would, those scramble drills that we're talking about that the Eagles don't get, it felt like he just lived on those. And it was so deflating. It was very rarely rarely about the plays that they had, you know, called. It was something he was doing out of sequence. Yeah.

So he has owned the Eagles. And like you said, in the Super Bowl season, when the Eagles were much better than Seattle, Seattle beats them in a Sunday night game. Yeah, that was in Seattle. In Seattle that year. Yeah. So he is not that quarterback now. He still has a little bit of that elusiveness.

I know there has been a lot of talk in recent weeks of like he's been a bargain for the Steelers, where he has provided them competent quarterback play for nothing because Denver released them and released him. And the Steelers basically got him for free. You know, Tomlin is a great coach, obviously. And this, to me, illustrates one of the things that makes him a great coach. when he made that switch everybody was like what why in the world would you do that because they were winning with fields they weren't scoring a lot of points but they were winning

they had like their most impressive wins and again I had this written it was on the pad their best wins were early in the season the toughest teams they have beaten were early in the season with fields and in week seven he just decides yeah let's go to russ and suddenly they're scoring a lot more points Now one thing I'll say, though, in the Eagles' favor here, if you look at the Steelers' schedule, it's not like they've been playing the best teams in the league week in and week out. Especially over the past few months.

Yeah. The early season wins. The division ended up. You know, everybody thought Cleveland would be decent and Cincinnati would be good again, but they're not. So there's, you know, games there. That sensey defense is so bad. Yeah. So bad.

You watch them every week. It's horrible. Yeah. And, you know, you waited for them to come around. Joe Burroughs should suit. Totally. It's really just ridiculous. I mean, that Eagles game, that was, I think, the easiest the Eagles have moved the ball the entire year.

And it makes sense because their defense sticks. I watch them every week. Yes. I feel like. Yeah. So you're right. But the Steelers, you know, and their losses have been to bad teams pretty much, you know. Lost to Cleveland, although that was a Thursday night game.

Those can be kind of goofy. They are goofy. Yeah. But, you know, so it's really hard to say what the Steelers are going to do. coming into the season, I would not have told you the Steelers were a real good team. But they don't ever seem to be a bad team, you know? No, and it's funny. I think back when I was a little kid, they were a bad team.

You know, like Al Nelson was their quarterback or something, you know. But not since then. No, it's funny, though. I like how Zeeb has framed this, the Eagle Steelers in a lot of different ways, because the Eagles, over the past decade, because obviously when Big Ben was at his best, Okay, they want a couple of Super Bowls, right? They want a couple Super Bowls. They were contenders every year.

They have a couple guys who are crazy people now, who were very good skill positions, players for them back then. But in the last 10 years, they've been right around 500 most of those years. So it's been interesting to see the difference between them and the Eagles, where the Eagles kind of go up. And then they have the one terrible year they crash out.

Very different. You're right. And then they go back up. But the Eagles over that time, frame for whatever reason. And to be fair, the Eagles haven't done this with just one quarterback. So it does feel like organizationally, there is a difference here where they've had higher ceilings in some of these years. You might even argue, I would argue, that they have a higher ceiling right now. Although I really do respect what Tomlin has done with this team. Yeah, yeah, I'm with you,

Les. They have not been bad. Mike Tomlin is a great coach. I am a little bit afraid. Mike Tomlin has a great record when he's an underdog in these games. It just feels like his teams find a way to, it's a muddy the game up. Yeah, the special teams or something. They have a great kicker. Yeah, and obviously the Eagles have a kicker who is, who is struggling right now.

Yeah, that's weird, isn't it? It's going to be fun. It's going to be a fun game. It is. You mentioned Rathelsberger. I kind of compare him to Hertz, not in his style of play or anything like that because Ben was a gigantic guy.

But Rathosberger was never like, one of the top three or four quarterbacks in the league? You don't think? No, there were a lot of great quarterbacks when he was in his prime. He played during the heyday with Breeze and Manning and Aaron Rogers. And you could easily get to five quarterbacks without getting to Ben Rafflesberger, even when he was very, very good. I kind of think Hertz is in that.

Some people think you have to have one of those top three or four quarterbacks to win a Super Bowl. I don't think you do. And Rafflesberger is why I feel that way. You know, I don't think at best he was like a fifth best quarterback in the league, you know? And I think Hertz can be that guy. I'm not sure he is right now, but I think he can be that guy. I don't think he's ever going to be the best quarterback in the league. Oh, sure.

But I do think that this, like, I agree with you. I think that this Eagles team with the talent they have on both sides of the ball right now, of course they can win a Super Bowl. I mean, like the idea that you can't win a Super Bowl with Jalen Hur. Look, he needs to, I think, play a little bit better, but they basically won a Super Bowl, Jalen Hertz, right? They came as close as you possibly could. All he needed was the ballback. And he was tremendous.

I know it was probably the best game of this career, and you can't always count on that. But I don't know. I feel like 2022, to say you can't win a Super Bowl with Jalen Hertz, I think. Well, there was a time like 10 years ago or more in the NFL where it seemed like every Super Bowl was being won by either Brady or Manning or the other Manning. You know, and there wasn't, you couldn't win a Super Bowl with a quarterback who wasn't at least one of the key guys in the league. That era has passed, really. I don't think we're in that sort of situation anymore. I agree with you, Les.

And so there's another stat that has nothing to do with Russell Wilson. The Pittsburgh Steelers have not won in Philadelphia since 1965. Was that during the Al Nelson days? I think it was Bill Nelson. I think Al Nelson was a corner for the Eagles when I was a kid now. And I think about it. Bill Nelson, I think, was the quarterback. I should have looked that up.

Well, Bill Nelson probably walked into Franklin Field and sent the people home unhappy that day. Yeah. Well, Claire, I don't like the Manning brothers. I don't, in fact, I think Eli Manning winning two Super Bowls. When I lived in New York was absolutely frustrating because I didn't think his teams were very good. And the year that they won that the Patriots were unbeaten, that was the most amazing thing. I covered that game. That was the helmet catch game.

You say amazing. I say terrible. But I agree with you. But I remember talking to, you know, I had a lot of time back then, the Daily News, you know, had late deadlines. And I ended up with David Tyree like after everybody left. And I said, you know, you're going to be like going to banquets 30 years from now. You're going to be the guy that he caught the ball.

And he said, yeah, yeah, you know. And that's probably whatever he is now, that's probably what he's doing. Okay. I have one more question for you before we go. And I think to preface this, first off, I'd like to say, everybody, thank you for watching on TV. If you want to catch the rest of the show, come join us at all phly.com. Appreciate it. So, Les, the one thing I did want to get your take on, just because you were in that Eagles locker room for a while.

And you saw a bunch of teams with high expectations, low expectations, happy locker rooms, sad locker rooms. we are going to preface this by saying, I think this AJ Brown, Jalen Hurts situation is much different from it. But since we are almost 20 years removed from it at this point, what are your memories of that 2000? I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Les. What are your memories of that 2005 season

in terms of just covering the T.O. Mellow Drama every single day, how it affected the locker room, just the band vibes. It was poison. They had a good enough team. You know, they should have been back in contention in 2005.

Now, they got some injuries in addition to T.O. blowing up. They had a bunch of injuries. McNabb eventually got hurt. But Tio just blew the whole thing up in the spring. He started in the spring. He was angry about his contract. He had been there one year and wanted his contract redone because of everything. Probably they should have done it.

But at that time, Joe Banner was the team president. just didn't do stuff like that. You know, Joe wanted to win contract negotiations. Sure. He was less concerned about whether the player felt love and, you know, so they didn't do it. And he's, and T.O.'s response to that was to go after McNabb, thinking this is, this will, if I do this, this will make them give me a contract. And it was so cynical and so destructive on his part, because if you remember back then, T.O. coming into that spring was a god here. Yeah. I mean, everybody loved T.O.

He was the guy, yeah. Played her. It was. Played great. And he just didn't care. He really didn't care. All he wanted was more money, you know. And we went to training camp and he told the offensive coordinator, Brad Childress,

not to speak to him unless spoken to. That's right. You know, sit-ups in the driveway and all the stuff he did. ripping McNabb on a show and then being told to apologize, having his agent write the apology out for him, skipping over parts of it when he read it out loud, and then leaving it in his stall where we could all see to make sure we knew that he hadn't read the parts

that were directed mainly at McNabb. I have no use for the guy. I really don't. I, most dominant athlete I've ever covered, maybe. Oh, he's unbelievable. But as a person, no. And I knew McNabb was complicated and not the greatest guy in the world himself, but still, that was ridiculous.

So I have a subscription to newspapers.com. And in trying to think of some content for PHOI, recently I looked up the sit-ups day when he drove back from, I guess it was from Lehigh all the way to Jersey. Yes, to Moorsetown. I wonder if he, I guess he took the Northeast extension on the way back. That's a nice little. Well, you know a funny story about that real quick?

I was covering for the Daily News. Bob Brookover was covering for the Inquirer. Bob decided to go home that day. Bob lived in Jersey near Moorsetown. Bob had decided to go home and he was feeling guilty. He was afraid he might miss something at camp. Lucky Bob. And then he hears on the radio that T.

this drives over there, he gets, you know, the first person, you know, a view of T.O. doing this. I am at Lehigh being a good boy doing my job. Well, so in your story, though, because they have the Philadelphia Daily News archives in there, and I read your story, that incident with Brad Childress where he walks up to him and says, don't talk to me. Like, I think Brad greeted him. Brad said, hey, how you doing? You know, how was your summer, that type of thing?

Don't talk to me. So anyway, I think that will illustrate that, yes, we understand whatever is going on right now. If there is anything going on right now. It is not even in the same stratosphere as that. It's funny that AJ on his Instagram profile, he made his profile picture, the Joker, Heath Ledger. As much as AJ seems to enjoy these media circuses that follow him a little bit. bit seems to get some enjoyment. Terrell Owens was the real Joker. Like he would he lit that building on fire. He was before social media. Yeah. You think if T.O. was in his prime during the social media era,

what would, because he flamed every quarterback. He implied that Jeff Garcia was gay in San Francisco. Not good. You know, he wasn't that happy with Romo and Dallas. I mean, everywhere he went, he was just like Johnny Appleseed of, of discord and dissension. Yes, he was. was. Okay. Les, we appreciate that. You will be writing for us still at all pHOI. Absolutely. You'll have some takes on this Steelers game when it happens. I appreciate this was fun, man. It's great to be here, yes. A lot of fun. I'd like to thank everybody in the chat. Julie, are there any super chats? Did CDP chime in the day or no? Okay, well, he's saving his money for the rest of the week. That's fine. He is. Anyway, CDP and everybody else, we appreciate you. joining us and we made it through the show.

We have, so I believe the next two shows are we have Bozac and Fran tomorrow. They'll play a little swooper. They'll preview the game. And then usually we have day niz in on Friday to educate us all. So for Julia, for less, everybody, I'd like to thank you for joining us. I'm sorry, I'm stumbling over everything right now. Enjoy your day, everybody. We'll see you tomorrow.

like the mayor.