Tim McManus and Jeremy Fowler teamed up on an ESPN story Wednesday morning that sheds some light on the disconnect between Jalen Hurts and Nick Sirianni during the failed 2023 season.

Included in that article was a passage about Hurts ringing ex-Giants defensive coordinator Wink Martindale to pick his brain about the Eagles’ offense and game planning against it.

The subject was broached at training camp a few hours after the story came out, and it resulted in a curious Hurts wondering why any of that is relevant right now:

First things first, this is a joke of a clip that’s being circulated all over social. It cuts off McManus when he’s just about to answer. So in the interest of context and the media accountability that everyone desires, here’s the full exchange:

Martin Frank: What was the key piece of advice that you can take into this season – 

Hurts: I’m curious to see where this is coming from randomly. This Wink stuff. 

John McMullen: There was a report from ESPN this morning that said you contacted him.

Frank: Before the Bucs game. 

Hurts: Something so long ago, why is that relevant now?

McMullen: I didn’t write it.

(laughing followed by several people talking at once)

Hurts: Who wrote it? 

Tim McManus: I wrote it. 

Hurts: Yeah? Why is that relevant now?

McManus: Why is it relevant?

Hurts: Yeah.

McManus: Just trying to give proper context on what happened last season so they have a better understanding of where we are now. 

Hurts: Okay. Well I think for certain things, I appreciate what you guys do and everything you guys bring, the attention and sometimes you understand, sometimes I think people are only able to know what they understand. Sometimes people don’t know what they don’t know. But in that regard, I think where we are is you have reports and you have rumors and then you have reality. We’re in reality right now. Got different people doing different things and different responsibilities in that natural nature but ultimately we just attacking it day by day. This team is putting the best foot forward in effort and intensity and it’s really being a team and being together. That’s been my message this training camp and offseason. It’s been a good journey so far. I think my natural nature is to – I didn’t know about (this report), but my natural nature is to block out the external factors because I think there becomes a point where sometimes you question so much and the negativity becomes redundant. This team is one of those teams that’s going to do that, especially with the things we’ve been able to experience. It’s a proper development. A time of development and there’s something we learned from it. 

Hurts serves up a word salad there, but this didn’t seem contentious or confrontational. He talks about blocking out the negativity but says “I appreciate what you guys do and everything you guys bring.” He didn’t exactly excoriate the assembled scribes.


Nevertheless, a lot of fans seem to enjoy these exchanges because they view it as players calling bullshit on reporters. They think the media sucks and only exists to stir shit up, so naturally they’re gonna side with former over the latter. And since Jalen Hurts comes from the Nick Saban school of media = rat poison, these types of things happen every so often with him.

Which brings us to Jalen’s question – is this relevant?

If you’re like me, you’ve probably turned the page on the 2023 Eagles season. Slammed the book shut and put it in the far corner of the library, never to be opened again. Title: “Eagles 2023 season: I wish this was apocryphal, but it’s not.” But there are plenty of fans out there who are not like you and I. They still want to know what exactly happened, and why the season went to shit, and for those fans this was good deep dive that provided some new things we weren’t previously aware of. In that sense, T Mac and Jeremy Fowler did an admirable job.

What’s corny is when the fanboy accounts go overboard with the “Hurts really shut down the media” takes whenever an exchange like this happens. In the tweet above, “Symone” has a picture of herself and Jalen Hurts as her header image, so guess who’s side she’s on! It’s good to have the players’ backs, but the dick riding is a little bit much and the people doing it for cheap engagement know who they are.

In actuality, this was a straightforward exchange. No real combativeness. You want a contentious exchange, go watch Mike Gundy look directly at a woman for 3 minutes and out call out the “garbage” story she wrote while screaming that he is a man who is 40 years old. That’s a fight with the media.