Randall Cunningham’s daughter models herself after him. Together, they’re still chasing Olympic glory.

SAINT-DENIS, France — Like an obsessive Eagles fan who likes to fire up YouTube to take the occasional stroll down memory lane, Vashti Cunningham has watched the old videos. She has studied the old videos. She has even tried to use the old videos to figure out what kind of quarterback and person her father was and is — and what kind of athlete and person she can be. The duck-and-dash-and-heave to Fred Barnett out of the Rich Stadium end zone against the Buffalo Bills … the miraculous Monday night escape from Carl Banks … that goal-line leap over Green Bay Packers cornerback Mark Lee in 1990, the one when he looked like the high jumper he’d been in high school …

Yeah, Vashti knows that last one well. The connection is obvious and inescapable — the daughter of the Ultimate Weapon competing Sunday here at Stade de France on sports’ biggest stage, carrying herself afterward as if she had studied his postgame press conferences, too. Randall Cunningham could get philosophical and sometimes kind of spacey whenever he spoke publicly during his 11 years with the Eagles. Sure enough, there were strains of her dad in her words about her fifth-place finish in the women’s high jump, about his role in coaching her, about what it was like for him to play in the pressure cooker that is Philadelphia.

“He’s told me all about it,” she said. “He told me when the fans loved him, and he has told me about when the fans instantly hated him. I’ve experienced that as well. I’ve experienced people telling me I need to find a new coach. I’ve experienced people telling me I don’t have it anymore. That stuff doesn’t reach me. It’s down here, and I’m up here. As long as the people at home on their couch feel like they’re doing something, typing it up, good for me. But for a person like me, it doesn’t get to me.”

It’s a funny thing about the Olympics: In a two-week sporting event, the biggest in the world, an event in which countries are quite literally pitted against each other, there’s less tribal frustration and angry criticism of athletes than there is during any average day of any regular season of any major pro sport. Vashti has now competed in the last three Olympics and hasn’t medaled in any of them. She missed an early jump at 1.91 meters (6 feet, 3¼ inches), a height that she usually clears without any trouble — her personal best is 2.02 — and missed all three of her attempts at 1.98. A bulging disk in her back, an injury she’s been managing for three to four months, flared up Sunday. But if she were an NFL player, like her dad was, she’d be given no grace for playing through pain, and the hot-take parallels would be drawn immediately.

First Randall went three straight years without winning a playoff game. Now his kid goes three straight Olympics without a medal.

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“This has just been a different season for me than any season I’ve ever had,” she said, “and I’m learning to just roll with it and know that the battle I’m facing is not medals, but it’s different. It’s spiritual, and I ultimately feel like I won the battle today.”

No, that perspective wouldn’t go over well with much of Philly’s fan base, and it didn’t back in the day when her dad was the one offering it or something like it. But the Olympics just aren’t the same thing, and besides, Vashti will likely have another shot. Just 26, she said Sunday that she plans to compete at the 2028 Summer Games in Los Angeles, which would give her and Randall time to hone and refine what she admits is an unorthodox approach to training.

Instead of having her jump, jump, and jump some more during practices, Randall — who himself cleared 6 feet, 9 inches in the high jump more than 40 years ago at Santa Barbara High School — has her cut down her workouts ahead of competitions. Better, he believes, for her to work on her form and technique. More peace of mind for a father who suffered devastating injuries himself over his 16 years in the NFL, who saw so many of his teammates’ careers cut short.

“I wish I would jump a little bit more, but I also trust that he really, really wants what’s best for me,” she said. “He’s not trying to get a cut or a percentage. He wants me to have longevity. I’ve been doing this for nine years and have had no serious injuries. I’ve been in three Olympic finals. I’ve been at every world championship since I turned professional, and it’s not the end. A lot of the people I was on the team with in Rio, I can’t even name the people who are here right now. Or Tokyo — a lot of them are not here. It takes a lot of hard work and focus to stay consistent, and the thing he has put into me is consistency.

“I’m a reflection of him.”

She considers that truth to be no burden at all. She relishes it. She gets a charge out of those clips of her dad at his most spectacular — throwing the ball farther and running faster than just about any quarterback did then or has since. If you want to compare her to a Philly Baby Boomer or GenXer who can’t let go of those late 1980s/early 1990s Eagles teams, those clubs that were so much fun and so damn unfulfilling, feel free. She wouldn’t mind. You’re the dude wearing a No. 12 throwback jersey to Lincoln Financial Field every Sunday in the fall? Vashti Cunningham would be right there with you.

“I think he’s the coolest athlete I’ve ever seen,” she said. “He’s a dog: on the field, when he’s coaching, in the most respectful way. I mean, he’s not a literal dog. But he has it, and it’s just who he is. And if I can present that as well, I would feel really happy that people see me like him.”

He was here Sunday night, chatting with and counseling Vashti between her jumps, and for a few seconds, his face flashed across one of the stadium’s giant videoboards. Randall Cunningham is 61, and in that instant, he didn’t look like at all the superstar quarterback he was in those videos from long ago. He looked like the person he is now: a father and a coach, wanting the best for his daughter, the two of them now having to wait another four years for another chance at it.