Eagles lean further into ‘Brotherly Shove’ against Rams as dissenting opinions pile up

INGLEWOOD, Calif. — For about a year, Sua Opeta watched as the quarterback sneak steadily became a larger part of the Eagles’ identity.

The reserve offensive lineman had done it in spot duty, but starting in place of Cam Jurgens for the Eagles’ 23-14 win over the Los Angeles Rams gave Opeta a chance to truly see what all the fuss is about.

“Being out there, I feel how strong we are, like, pushing against the defense,” Opeta said. “It’s like, ‘Yeah, I get why we run it all the time now.’”

The Eagles ran the sneak — coined the “Tush Push” or “Brotherly Shove” — six times Sunday against the Rams and converted on four of them, including a pivotal touchdown at the end of the first half that changed the complexion of the game. The two failed conversions came late in the fourth quarter with 3 yards to go and the game all but decided.

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After the game, Rams defensive end Jonah Williams conceded to Opeta, his former college teammate, how demoralizing it can be when the Eagles line up the infamous formation with players behind Jalen Hurts, slung low and ready to move the pile.

“He was like, ‘Man, that QB sneak, I’ve never lined up against anything like that before where it’s like, I don’t know what to do,’” Opeta said. “... They know it’s coming. I think it’s a really cool football play because it’s man-on-man, just who is tougher. Who is going to stop us from moving them, that type of stuff.”

Not everyone agrees with Opeta. On Sunday morning, ESPN reported that “the controversial play has the attention of the [NFL] competition committee” and that the health of players on push sneaks will be scrutinized by the league and the NFL Players Association.

That attention didn’t deter the Eagles, though. Arguably the biggest play of the game came when they faced a goal-line opportunity with two seconds left in the first half, trailing by four points. Everyone on the Eagles sideline knew what coach Nick Sirianni would call. Everyone on the Rams sideline may have as well.

The Eagles were going to run that play.

“The play that nobody likes that we run,” Sirianni said after the game.

The result was almost as predictable as the call itself. Hurts steamrolled into the end zone with Dallas Goedert and Kenneth Gainwell giving him a shove, giving the Eagles a 17-14 lead going into halftime. The score was set up by wide receiver A.J. Brown, who had a 38-yard catch and drew two penalties, including a pass-interference call in the end zone that put the Eagles on the 1-yard line.

“I’m not going to lie, as soon as it was pass interference, I think everybody in the stadium knew it was happening,” Eagles center Jason Kelce said. “You’re getting the ball at the 1, the prevalence that they’re going to keep you out for a yard is so low. So I think we all knew it was coming, we wanted to run the Tush Push or the Brotherly Shove, because I prefer it.”

The touchdown turned out to be the pivotal point of the game. It set up a second half in which the Eagles dominated the time of possession and gave the defense a chance to sort out issues in the secondary and keep the Rams off the board.

The decision to go for the touchdown as time expired in the half was a no-brainer, Sirianni said, in part because of how unstoppable the Eagles have become with the sneak play in key situations.

Six sneaks in a game is nothing new for the Eagles, who have run more than 50 of them since the start of last season, according to ESPN.

The competition committee’s attention is the latest chapter in the controversy surrounding the play, which started in the offseason with some around the NFL arguing it isn’t a football play and that the risk of injury is too great. It’s worth noting that the New York Giants had two players suffer injuries trying to run a sneak last Monday night against the Seattle Seahawks.

Even with the strife, the Eagles have leaned so far into the play that it has become a big part of their identity. The Saturday before the game, Sirianni showed the team clips of the team running the sneak play throughout the last three seasons to illustrate the evolution of how the offense runs the play.

“It’s a great example of what we want to be as a team,” Sirianni said. “If we stayed the same in our quarterback sneaks from 2021 till now, then defenses would have caught up to it. But we’ve grown in the areas, and we’ve grown in our fundamentals and our players — Jalen, I don’t know if he squats any more than 600 [pounds] now, I don’t think he puts 600 on the bar anymore and actually does it, but he’s grown in the weight room.”

In the pregame meeting, Sirianni showed the players other teams who have tried to adopt the Eagles’ signature play with mixed results.

“Then we watched the rest of the league,” he said. “And, quite frankly, they can’t do it like we can.”

The amount of fodder for Sirianni is growing this season. Several teams, including the Chicago Bears Indianapolis Colts, New England Patriots, Los Angeles Chargers, and Giants have called the play the last few weeks and it hasn’t been automatic.

Both Hurts and Jordan Mailata alluded to other team’s struggles as a reason not to ban the play.

“Not to pour more water into that jug,” Hurts said, “but you know it’s something that we’ve been able to do at a high level. It’s clear that it doesn’t work for everybody else.”

Said Mailata: “If half the teams were doing it at a higher successful rate, then the committee should look at it. I will agree with that, because [then] everyone’s picking up on the technique now, maybe they should look at it. Until then, it’s pretty [bleeping] simple.”

Any changes wouldn’t come until the offseason, which Sirianni pointed out. The play survived the competition committee’s meetings in March and will likely be tabled again.

“We’ll play by the rules of what we say to do,” Sirianni said. “It’s a good play for us. You know, the competition committee can look at it.”

“Until then, people have to stop it.”