Hey Eagles, start Gardner Minshew against the Saints. Sit Jalen Hurts. This isn’t that hard
There's little reason to risk playing Hurts, despite his obvious desire to suit up. Besides, if the Eagles can't beat the Saints, they aren't the team we thought they were.
Of course Jalen Hurts should sit out the Eagles’ game Sunday against the Saints. Of course he should. Of course Gardner Minshew should start. Of course he should. This is not a hard call, despite Nick Sirianni’s public hemming and hawing and soft-shoeing over the last few days. It’s the safe play for this week. It’s the smart play for the postseason and the Eagles’ Super Bowl chances.
Hurts, arguably the NFL’s most valuable player this season, has a shoulder sprain. It is, by all reports and indications, not a particularly severe shoulder sprain. He practiced Thursday, officially in a “limited” fashion, and was listed as “doubtful” for the game after he took part in the team’s pre-practice calisthenics and stretching Friday. Could he play Sunday if the Eagles needed him to play? He probably could. But need can be a loaded word.
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If they win one of their final two games, the Eagles clinch the No. 1 seed in the NFC and home-field advantage throughout the playoff bracket. That would be a big get, and it must be tempting for them to treat Sunday’s game as a go-all-in game. Start Hurts. Beat the Saints. Take care of business. Render the following week’s game, at Lincoln Financial Field against the Giants, meaningless. It’s an understandable way to look at the situation. It’s just not the prudent way to look at it.
When do the Eagles really need Hurts? They need him for the postseason. They need him fully healthy — or as close to fully healthy as he can be after an 18-week regular season — when the games matter most. They do not need him against the Saints, especially considering that Lane Johnson, the best lineman on the league’s best offensive line, will miss the game, too, because of an abdominal tear. The risk to Hurts, compared to the potential reward, isn’t worth it, but Sirianni is clearly dealing with a quarterback who is itching to play.
“It’s just always going to go back to what the doctors are saying, what Jalen is saying, and where we think he is at that time,” Sirianni said Friday. “I don’t think it’s a, ‘Hey, I have to see him throw it 57 yards on the left-hand side.’ It’s not ever going to be anything like that. It’s just going to always be about the information I get from Jalen and knowing how badly he wants to play. I have to listen to the doctors as well. So, it’s both, and then obviously we have to make a decision that’s best for Jalen.”
Sirianni isn’t in the easiest of spots here, at least when it comes to explaining how the Eagles are approaching this decision. He has a stock narrative that he has come to rely on: Jalen heals faster than anyone else. On its face, it’s a silly thing to say. If Hurts really did heal faster than other pro athletes, he would have played last week against the Cowboys, and Sirianni wouldn’t have to answer any questions about Hurts’ status Sunday. It would be taken for granted that he’d be in the lineup. Hurts thinks of himself as a different breed of quarterback, though, on a plane above his peers, and Sirianni can accommodate him, and avoids annoying or offending him, by framing him as a real-life version of Wolverine or the T-1000.
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Those words of praise for Hurts to hear are one thing, but the team’s actions will be another, and it’s difficult to see Sirianni, Jeffrey Lurie, and Howie Roseman taking the chance that Hurts injures himself further against an inferior opponent. There’s no reason to complicate matters beyond the basic complication that the Eagles already face. They are 13-2. They have, in Minshew, a No. 2 quarterback who is capable enough to start for several other teams in the league and who, though a bit scattered and frenetic in the team’s Christmas Eve loss to the Cowboys, threw for 355 yards and two touchdowns and helped the Eagles’ offense put up 27 points. Yes, he threw two interceptions and fumbled twice, but he ought to be sharper Sunday just from getting that game under his belt.
“Got to take care of the ball,” he said. “That’s what beat us.”
Circumstances such as these are exactly why the Eagles have, in their recent history, placed such a high value on the backup quarterback position, and that philosophy has served them well: Nick Foles, Jeff Garcia, and on. What’s the point of that philosophy if they’re not going to follow it? The Saints are not the Cowboys. Or the 49ers. Or the Vikings. They are not among the top teams in the conference. The Saints are 6-9. The Eagles should beat them with Minshew and without Hurts. If they can’t, then they aren’t the team most of us thought they were anyway.