Jalen Hurts embraces his ‘triple-threat’ uniqueness. Will the Eagles’ franchise QB have to transform his game?

Roughly three months after he earned his master’s degree in human relations from Oklahoma, Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts went back to school. This time, his purpose was to share wisdom rather than to receive it.

With training camp in the books, Hurts spoke on a panel at Northeast High as part of an event hosted by the Eagles, Operation Warm, and the Women’s Sports Foundation that distributed sports bras to the female student-athletes in attendance. Under bright gymnasium lights, Hurts commanded the room as he would a huddle, discussing the importance of resilience in the face of any given obstacle.

“The common theme is staying true to yourself,” the 25-year-old Hurts told the students. “Staying true to the things that you believe in and to be able to persevere, have that resilient approach to the things that you’re doing.”

The message resonated because of its sincerity. On the field, the 2022 MVP runner-up Hurts has embraced his own style of play he refers to as “rare.” Every quarterback gets the job done in different ways, and for Hurts, it’s all about leveraging his identity as a “triple threat” that he defines through his football IQ, passing prowess, and running ability.

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That blend of talent helped Hurts thrive in the Eagles offense last year and finish his second full season as a starter with a 14-1 record, tying a franchise high with 35 total touchdowns (22 passing, 13 rushing) while tossing just six interceptions. In April after he led the Eagles to Super Bowl LVII, the team rewarded Hurts with a five-year, $255 million contract extension ($180 million guaranteed) that made him the highest-paid player in NFL history at the time.

Will an increased investment make the Eagles wary of calling designed runs for their franchise quarterback? According to Pro Football Focus, Hurts ranked third in the league among quarterbacks last season with 53 designed rushing attempts, picking up 411 yards on those carries (third in the league). But he sprained his right shoulder on Dec. 18 against the Chicago Bears on a zone-read keeper, leaving him sidelined for two games.

Experts at the position warn against taking drastic measures that would dull the sparkle of the Eagles’ gem.

“Any dual-threat quarterback in the league, limiting his mobility, you take some fun out of the game,” former Eagles quarterback Michael Vick said. “You take a little life out of the game for him. I don’t think he deserves that.”

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Former NFL head coach Steve Mariucci is well-acquainted with the dual-threat quarterback, having coached Pro Football Hall of Famer Steve Young at the end of his career with the San Francisco 49ers, from 1997-99.

Young, along with Eagles Hall of Famer Randall Cunningham, was one of the most notable quarterbacks with great rushing and passing talents who played during the 1980s and ‘90s. To this day, Young boasts the 12th-best all-time passer rating among active and retired quarterbacks (96.8) and the second-most rushing touchdowns (43).

But by the time Mariucci began coaching Young, the quarterback was 36 years old. Mariucci was less inclined to call designed runs as a means of preservation. Therein lies the difference for Mariucci.

“Jalen is not there yet,” said Mariucci, who is now an NFL Network analyst. “Jalen is still very athletic and very young and very healthy. That’s one of the reasons he got paid so much, because he’s so dynamic.”

Mariucci added that if a coach puts limitations on what makes a quarterback special, then he takes away part of the player’s greatness and playmaking ability. Instead, Mariucci underscored the importance of drilling when to run out of bounds or when to slide in practice to simulate in-game scenarios.

“Some quarterbacks in this league don’t slide very well, or soon enough, or when you get out of the pocket, just simply throw the ball over to the cheerleaders,” Mariucci said. “Those things have to be practiced. And for the most part, Jalen is pretty good at it.”

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During training camp, coach Nick Sirianni echoed a similar sentiment as Mariucci did, noting that it would have been irresponsible of him to not prepare Hurts to protect himself when he became the starter going into the 2021 season. He said the team is having the same conversations about minimizing injury risk now as it did back then.

“We like to look at our process in everything that we do, not just be reactionary to, well, Jalen is making a lot of money now,” Sirianni said in July. “Sure, you know that, but we feel like we’ve been doing that the past two years of protecting him and him knowing how to protect himself so he is able to play the majority of the season.”

Vick, whose electric play on the ground revolutionized the position in the 2000s and early 2010s, does not buy into the notion that running the ball, on designed plays or otherwise, makes quarterbacks more prone to injury. He pointed to anecdotal evidence — Cunningham and Tom Brady both tore their ACLs while standing in the pocket. 49ers quarterback Brock Purdy, a dual-threat quarterback himself, suffered an elbow injury after dropping back last season.

Data, albeit somewhat dated, back up Vick’s assertion, too. According to a 2021 study published in The Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research that analyzed NFL injuries from 2013 to 2016, passing plays correlated to more injuries among quarterbacks (84 injuries) than running plays did (10 injuries). The study did not delve into more specific categories beyond the general run or pass.

“It can happen in the pocket; it can happen outside of the pocket,” said Vick, now an analyst at Fox Sports. “If something’s going to happen to your quarterback, you want it to happen while he’s going full speed in the pocket or out of the pocket.”

Vick recalled the pressure he faced to change his game as a Black quarterback in the league, a group that has historically been stereotyped as “dual-threat” as a means of diminishing intelligence, passing talent, and overall ability to play the position. Hurts, who grew up admiring Vick, has described his game as “triple-threat.”

“I think for a long time, people told guys like me that they couldn’t process and they couldn’t have that approach to the game and have the fundamental and mental awareness to execute and play the position at a high level,” Hurts said. “I just try and challenge myself and stretch myself out in all three areas of my game.”

Hurts, according to Vick, no longer has to “fight that fight” of proving that his style of play is legitimate.

“I think guys like myself and Donovan [McNabb], we fought that battle and we won,” Vick said. “Not winning in terms of we proved people wrong, we just kind of proved that the style of our play can win games. You get that now, I don’t think he has to ... it’s not even a narrative.

“I just saw [Hurts] did a lot of things right and he’s going to continue to stay comfortable and be comfortable and work hard at it. And that’s what gets you over the hump, Year 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, is hard work.”

Pro Football Hall of Fame quarterback Kurt Warner understands the pressure associated with lofty external expectations coming off a strong season, a scenario similar to the one that faces Hurts.

Warner joined the St. Louis Rams in 1998 after going undrafted, spending time on the Packers practice squad in 1994, and then playing in the Arena Football League. In 1999, Warner was named the starter, leading the Rams to a Super Bowl victory and earning Super Bowl and regular-season MVP accolades.

But even after he reached the pinnacle, Warner recalled facing the “show me you can do it again” demands that saddle every young quarterback.

“At that position in the NFL, outside of a few players or until you get established like a Brady or a [Patrick] Mahomes or whatever that is, there’s always questions,” Warner said. “Because we want to continually see the evolution and see a player as being as complete as they can possibly be.”

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For Warner, who now serves as an analyst for NFL Network, the question surrounding Hurts coming off his MVP runner-up season isn’t, “Where does he have to get better?” Rather, Warner is curious to see if Hurts and the Eagles can run their offense the same way they did last year and have an equal amount of success.

Last season, Hurts’ multifaceted talent and the Eagles’ RPO-heavy offensive scheme created a perfect storm that led to their scoring success. On an individual level, Warner was impressed with Hurts’ improved passing technique, his consistent ability to be a run threat, and his understanding of where to have his eyes when defenses present him with different looks.

Hurts completed 66.5% of his pass attempts, roughly a 5% increase over the previous season. He connected on his deep balls, too, recording a 113.83 passer rating on passes at least 20 yards beyond the line of scrimmage (league average was 79.0), according to NFL Next Gen Stats.

Additionally, the Eagles found a way to play to Hurts’ strengths by living and thriving in the RPO game. According to Sports Info Solutions, Hurts led the league with 67 RPO passing attempts in the regular season, racking up 434 yards (second in the league) and scoring four touchdowns. Then-Eagles running back Miles Sanders had 77 RPO rushing attempts, collecting 368 yards (the league high) and three touchdowns.

“Can they do what they did last year?” Warner asked. “Can they have that same sort of success, and the beauty of the simplicity of their offense, because normally what happens in the NFL is teams catch up to you, and defenses catch up to you, and they force you to have to do things differently.”

The prospect of replicating that success comes down to factors both within and outside of the Eagles’ control. Hurts can control his consistency, a quality that Vick looks for in every quarterback early in his career. The Eagles can control their adjustments to defenses that try to take away their strengths.

But the Eagles’ injury luck can’t be predicted. Last season, the Eagles had all 22 of their Week 1 starters available for the Super Bowl. A robust offense starts up front, and the health of the offensive line parlayed into prosperity on the ground and through the air, especially in the RPO game, in 2022.

“If a defense catches up, and if maybe they have some injuries or their offensive line isn’t as good or whatever that is, that forces them to have to play more drop-back football and force games into the right arm of Jalen,” Warner said. “That to me remains, based on what I’ve seen over the last couple of years, the one question I will have for Jalen moving forward. That’s not me saying, ‘He can’t do it, I don’t think he can do it, so he’s got to show me.’ That simply is, that’s the progression.”

For now, Hurts is focused on controlling what he can, preparing to adapt to the unknown by turning his self-described “weaknesses into strengths” through a disciplined, persistent work ethic. Asked directly if he anticipates his passing ability becoming more of a focus of his game over time, Hurts said he didn’t know what the future would bring.

“But I know that I am embracing the uniqueness of my game,” Hurts added. “Just being a triple threat out there.”

At the same time, he’s staying true to himself off the field, not fixating on outside commentary going into his third year as a starter.

“I’ve never really reported to the opinions of others, the expectation of others, or the standards of others,” Hurts said. “So I won’t start now.”