Narrative vs. Reality Breakdown:<\/p>\n
Narrative: Hurts doesn\u2019t like going under center or using motion in the offense and doesn\u2019t want either in the Eagles’ offensive scheme.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Reality: The more accurate description is that the Eagles\u2019 quarterback is uncomfortable with both elements \u2014 a discomfort that traces directly back to his college background.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Hurts has spent almost his entire football life as a gun or pistol quarterback. Turning his back to the defense under center has never felt natural to him.<\/p>\n
Last season, Nick Sirianni pushed for more snaps under center to help a struggling rushing attack. Hurts didn\u2019t push back. He also accepted the increased use of motion under Kellen Moore without any public complaint.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Moore\u2019s affinity for motion and \u201ceye candy\u201d stems from his own upbringing \u2014 his father was a high school coach and he played at Boise State, where pre-snap movement was a constant. Just as motion is second nature to Moore, operating from the gun is the constant in Hurts\u2019 world.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Neither preference is inherently right or wrong. However, smart offensive coordinators build the scheme around the quarterback\u2019s strengths rather than forcing square pegs into round holes.\u00a0<\/p>\n
That\u2019s exactly what Moore did in Philadelphia, and that flexibility is a big reason he landed the head coaching job in New Orleans. <\/p>\n
Scheming Things Up![\"Sean](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/01knpx1a4fypx1qjqqje.jpg\" "\\"Sean")
<\/p>\n
Green Bay Packers quarterbacks coach Sean Mannion reviews his practice schedule during practice on Friday, August 1, 2025, at Ray Nitschke Field in Ashwaubenon, Wis. | Tork Mason \/ USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images<\/p>\n
Narrative: Hurts is the one who loves all the hitch routes and four-verts concepts.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Reality: Hurts is not a natural anticipatory or rhythm-timing thrower. Like most modern quarterbacks, Hurts prefers to see his receivers clearly open before letting the ball go.\u00a0<\/p>\n
When you have talented receivers who can win one-on-one matchups, the simplest and most effective way to create that visibility is by running concepts like hitch routes at varying depths.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Four-verts, meanwhile, is a foundational NFL principle. Ironically, no team has historically milked it more successfully than the Green Bay Packers \u2014 from Brett Favre through Aaron Rodgers and now Jordan Love.\u00a0<\/p>\n
When Jason Kelce recently trolled Eagles fans by showing Packers film that began with a hitch route, it highlighted how much fans have been conditioned to hate extremely common, league-wide concepts \u2014 including those likely to show up in new offensive coordinator Sean Mannion\u2019s version of a Kyle Shanahan-inspired attack.<\/p>\n
Narrative: Hurts is universally disliked inside the Jefferson Health Training Complex.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Reality: This one collapses under basic common sense.\u00a0<\/p>\n
By the time OTAs begin, the Eagles will have roughly 90 players, nearly 30 coaches, 35\u201340 people in football operations and scouting, plus dozens of additional support staff.\u00a0<\/p>\n
That\u2019s well over 200 people. Expecting that many individuals to share a single, monolithic opinion about anyone is unrealistic.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Hurts is viewed as aloof by some and genuinely adored by others \u2014 including the most important voice in the building, owner Jeffrey Lurie.\u00a0<\/p>\n
That said, as a leader whose greatest strengths are often intangible, Hurts would benefit from putting more deliberate effort into winning over any remaining skeptics in the building.<\/p>\n
Narrative: The Eagles are sending a message to Hurts by leaking negative stories to the media.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Reality: Media literacy is at an all-time low. ESPN\u2019s recent lengthy piece on the QB was the product of an exhaustive reporting process, as Jeremy Fowler has explained in multiple interviews.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The timing (shortly after the league meetings) was almost certainly strategic from the network\u2019s perspective, but the actual release was out of the reporters\u2019 direct control. If the story hadn\u2019t been thoroughly vetted, it wouldn\u2019t have run when it did.<\/p>\n
Narrative: The Eagles are sending a message to Hurts by refusing to engage in contract extension talks.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Reality: After a disappointing 2025 season when measured against expectations, it\u2019s smart business for Philadelphia to see how Hurts performs in a new scheme before committing further.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Pushing any $50 million-plus extension discussion down the road until 2027 costs the team nothing and keeps maximum flexibility.\u00a0<\/p>\n
If Hurts bounces back and plays at a high level, the Eagles will happily pay him. If he delivers a third straight subpar season as a passer, the team will still have every option available with very little guaranteed money after 2026.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A wave of narratives has flooded Eagles discourse this offseason, many of them painting Jalen Hurts as the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":861391,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2068],"tags":[25,7,6,242,109,2476],"class_list":{"0":"post-861390","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-philadelphia-eagles","8":"tag-eagles","9":"tag-football","10":"tag-nfl","11":"tag-philadelphia","12":"tag-philadelphia-eagles","13":"tag-philadelphiaeagles"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116370552149811272","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/861390","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=861390"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/861390\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/861391"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=861390"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=861390"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=861390"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}