Drama was brewing with the Philadelphia Eagles this week, despite the team sitting 11-2 on the season and in the midst of a nine-game win streak.
After the Eagles squeaked past the three-win Carolina Panthers 22-16 last Sunday, star receiver AJ Brown told reporters that “passing” was the reason the offense wasn’t clicking as expected.
Defensive end Brandon Graham then added fuel to the fire when saying that Brown and quarterback Jalen Hurts aren’t as close as they have been in the past.
“They were friends before this, but things have changed, and I understand that because life happens,” Graham said, before attempting to reframe his position with an apology to both players for “assuming that it was something it wasn’t.”
Brown, coming off consecutive 1,000-yard receiving seasons, but held to only 109 yards over they last two games, isn’t necessarily wrong in his assessment of the recent stagnation of the passing game.
Hurts, who signed a contract extension ahead of the 2023 season that was worth $179.3 million guaranteed , has thrown for fewer than 200 yards in three-straight games.
But Sky Sports’ Pheobe Schecter, speaking on the latest Inside The Huddle Podcast, called for Brown and the Eagles to be more “selfless” in their pursuit of a Super Bowl and avoid the same sort of meltdown suffered last season when losing six of their last seven into the playoffs.
“AJ Brown coming out and saying it’s the passing that’s the issue, you’re fully looking at your quarterback and throwing him under the bus,” Schecter said of the three-time Pro Bowler’s comments.
“And then Brandon Graham coming in and talking to the fact they’re not getting on to the same level – only to then retract his statement.
“This is what we saw from the Eagles at the end of last year, but things were going badly for them at that point… they were losing. This is not what you do when you’re a winning team.
“I get that receivers want to be touching the ball as much as possible but if you’re going to be a team that are going to make the Super Bowl, there cannot be an ‘I’ in team in that situation. You have got to be selfless.
“Last year, I get it was a different story: he was getting a lot of touches, as he was when he was with the [Tennessee] Titans – he was their only weapon, basically.
“But surely, if you’re winning, that’s good for everybody.”
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Philadelphia Eagles running back Saquon Barkley’s best plays so far from the 2024 NFL season.
Also contributing to Brown’s frustrations perhaps is the addition of star running back Saquon Barkley in the offseason.
The former New York Giants back leads the NFL in rushing with 1,623 yards, 216 yards ahead of the Baltimore Ravens’ Derrick Henry, and is on pace to break Eric Dickerson’s 40-year single-season rushing record (2,105 in 1984) – needing 483 more yards over the final four games of the season.
Barkley will continue his record-breaking bid when the Eagles go in pursuit of a 10th-straight win as they host the similarly in-form 10-3 Pittsburgh Steelers on Sunday.
Watch another triple-header of live NFL action this Sunday on Sky Sports, starting with Miami Dolphins at Houston Texans from 6pm.