The Eagles aren’t doing Jalen Hurts any favors.

They run these gadgety goal line plays with no passing option, bringing their 2nd round draft pick into the game, cold, to try to convert two-point attempts at critical junctures.

Doug Pederson has called a few of these in recent weeks, and he did so again Sunday night following the fumble recovery and touchdown that put the Eagles up 21-9 in the fourth quarter.

This was the call:

If Jason Peters or Richard Rodgers can hold their blocks about a second longer, maybe Hurts finds the pylon, but this is a run all the way. There’s no passing option. The receivers are not running routes and the linemen are run blocking.

Does that matter? Is it just an execution problem?

Maybe, but there’s a flaw in the design. The problem is that Doug is putting his team in difficult spots schematically, because on these runs the opposing defense is just bringing more tacklers than blockers. That means Hurts is running laterally on plays where a free linebacker or defensive end is chasing him down.

On this particular play, Dallas is just manned-up on three receivers, so they have eight guys in the box. The Eagles are running a modified pistol here with a tight end, Rodgers, lined up as a blocker to Hurts’ right. As a result, they’ve only got seven guys to block eight defenders, so Hurts either has to hit the pylon quickly or make a guy miss in open space:

In an ideal world, you could audible to something for Fulgham down there at the bottom of your screen, because you’d trust him to win that 1v1 more often than not.

But with no passing options on these plays, defenses are just teeing off on Hurts, because they’ve seen the film and they know it’s a run all the way, and then they’re in positive situations where they’re going 8v7 or 7v6, which results in the Eagles getting stuffed on the goal line.

Doug has to just keep Carson Wentz in the game or allow Hurts to throw. Open up the playbook and let him do his thing. Hurts threw for 3,800 yards last year and the Oklahoma film is RIFE with short-yardage successful passing, so the head coach needs to trust the player and put him in better positions to succeed.