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USA Today
24-05-2025
- Sport
- USA Today
A stacked Eagles roster didn't prevent the NFC East from a poor divisional ranking
A stacked Eagles roster didn't prevent the NFC East from a poor divisional ranking The Eagles are again expected to be contenders, but that wasn't enough to help the NFC East move the meter in a recent ranking of divisions in the NFL Another banner will be hung on opening night. The Philadelphia Eagles will celebrate last February's Super Bowl win. They do so by hosting one of their fiercest rivals, the hated Dallas Cowboys. These two renew their feud twice per season and throw darts at one another. Those clashes have often determined who will wear the NFC East's crown. That changed this past NFL season. Dallas took a backseat and missed the playoffs as rookie QB Jayden Daniels helped the Washington Commanders become a contender in the National Football Conference. Philadelphia won the division and another Lombardi Trophy. Their last defeat was a Week 16 collapse vs. those same Commanders. Revenge was sweet as the Birds throttled Washington during a 55-23 win in the NFC Championship Game. The 2025-26 pro football season should deliver fireworks. The Birds are expected to contend, and Washington is expected to be their biggest obstacle in reaching divisional superiority. We'll see what happens with Dallas and the New York Giants. The NFC East figures to be an interesting watch, but it received a low ranking in a recent take on all eight NFL divisions. The Eagles' brilliance isn't enough to elevate the NFC East in an NFL divisional ranking. The adrenaline is flowing as we approach May's end and Eagles OTAs. Every platform is dishing out tons of content as fans, players, coaches, and the media prepare for another NFL season. Pro Football Focus offered an interesting take. They ranked all eight of pro football's divisions as we inch toward the 2025-26 season. Overall strength and cumulative over/under win totals were the significant factors in the list. The NFC East landed fifth, finishing behind the NFC North, AFC West, NFC West, and AFC North. Philly and company land ahead of the NFC South, AFC East, and AFC South. Trevor Sikkema is the author of this one. He mentioned his reasoning for making that determination. "The NFC East sent both representatives to the NFC championship game last January, but those two teams — the Eagles and Commanders — are carrying most of the weight for the division as a whole... The Cowboys were derailed by injuries at quarterback last season, and while the arrival of Brian Schottenheimer as head coach brings some uncertainty, they still have the talent to be competitive... As for the Giants, their quarterback situation remains unresolved, with three players currently in contention for the starting role. The offensive line hasn't seen meaningful improvement, which raises concerns regardless of who starts under center." Let's make long stories short. Expect the Birds and Commanders to excel. Expect another mediocre season from Dallas and next to nothing from the Giants. This season, Birds fans and the division's three other teams will give fans unprecedented access. They'll be featured on Hard Knocks: In-Season With the NFC East. If HBO's behind-the-scenes documentary on the AFC North is any indication, Eagles fans and the fans of their rivals are in for a thrill ride all season.
USA Today
10-05-2025
- Sport
- USA Today
Ranking potential Eagles Week 1 matchups from best to worst
Ranking potential Eagles Week 1 matchups from best to worst Which Eagles potential Week 1 matchup provides the most intrigue? Christmas is coming in the middle of May. The NFL's schedule release airs on the 14th at 8 p.m. EST. We've known who the Philadelphia Eagles will play for a while. Now, we'll learn the dates and kickoff times. Each campaign brings the six expected clashes with the hated rivals. As is always the case, home and road games will be played vs. the other three members of the NFC East. Last time around, Philly won their pair of clashes with the Dallas Cowboys and New York Giants, but a late-season collapse vs. the Washington Commanders prevented them from sweeping the division. That's okay. They wouldn't lose again. Philly again has an opportunity to dominate the National Football Conference. They will also enjoy a rematch with the team they bested to hoist their second Vince Lombardi Trophy. They'll play the members of the NFC North, the AFC West, and the NFC South's winner, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. While the road won't be easy. It will be fun to watch Ranking the Eagles' potential Week 1 matchups from most interesting to potential snoozers. Anticipation for pro football's schedule release is building. Everyone has long known who the Eagles will face in home games. One has to be the Week 1 adversary. We all know that much. The NFL's social media team recently reminded us of the potential opening-night opponents. One potential clash will make Detroit Lions star Amon-Ra St. Brown very happy, as he has already publicly stated that he wants all of the Eagles' smoke in Week 1. We agree with St. Brown. The Eagles' upcoming matchup with the defending NFC North champion Detroit Lions tops our list of most intriguing potential matchups. 1. Eagles vs. Lions As the 2024-25 NFL season unfolded, this was the matchup we thought we'd see in the NFC Championship Game. Fast-forward to the present, and the Eagles are the defending champions while the Lions seek a coup d'état. Detroit has a lot of star power and exciting players. It would also be nice to see what their offense looks like now that Ben Johnson is no longer the Lions' offensive coordinator. 2. Eagles vs. Los Angeles Rams Every title run has that game that could have changed everything. Last January, that game came in the Divisional Round as it took everything the Birds had to put the Los Angeles Rams away. L.A. will be in the conversation again. Now, they've added Davante Adams. This one has it all. An East Coast-West Coast battle... Two great head coaches... Budding stars and well-known veterans... 3. Eagles vs. Commanders Don't look now, but the Washington Commanders are now the Eagles' top threat in the NFC East. If you want excitement, every potential matchup will do it for you, but if you want ratings, which we're sure the NFL does, an NFC Championship Game rematch is the way to go. 4. Eagles vs. Cowboys Eagles vs. Cowboys... Need we say more? Everyone good here? Okay, let's move on. 5. Eagles vs. Giants Though this rivalry has been one-sided as of late, Eagles vs. Giants still means something. The 'former Giants playing on Philly's roster' angle never loses steam. See Saquon Barkley, Azeez Ojulari, and Adoree' Jackson for evidence. This one, however, might be over by halftime. Something more riveting might be the play for the first game of the NFL season. 6. Eagles vs. Las Vegas Raiders There isn't a more loyal fan base in the NFL than that belonging to the Eagles, but Raiders fans are pretty doggone loyal, too. They've followed the Silver and Black from Oakland to Los Angeles, back to Oakland, and now to Las Vegas. And, even though they'd never be able to take over Lincoln Financial Field, they'd certainly follow their team to Philadelphia for a game. 7. Eagles vs. Chicago Bears The Chicago Bears may be a team on the rise. Ben Johnson may be the elixir for all that ails his new team on offense, but nothing about this game says 'primetime'. Nothing about this says 'bright lights' or 'action'. 8. Eagles vs. Denver Broncos The Denver Broncos made the postseason last January and feature young stars like quarterback Bo Nix. They are also home to the reigning NFL Defensive Player of the Year, Patrick Surtain, and head coach Sean Payton. Still, there isn't a real rivalry between these two teams, and unless they meet in a Super Bowl, they'll likely only play once every four seasons. That being said, we'd place this one in the 'primetime' category but beg the NFL to give us another, more enticing matchup for their Week 1 opening night game.
The Independent
18-02-2025
- Business
- The Independent
Sunday afternoon NFL games could soon be heading to Netflix in potential seismic shift in sports TV viewing
Netflix is interested in bidding on the NFL 's Sunday afternoon games in a hail mary move that could disrupt cable TV, according to a report. Bela Bajaria, chief content officer of Netflix, told the Puck in a podcast interview that the streaming giant will bid on Sunday afternoon games. CBS and Fox are currently the homes of Sunday afternoon football games. NBC hosts Sunday night games, Amazon hosts Thursday night games, and ABC/ESPN hosts Monday night games. These current broadcast deals are up in 2033, but the NFL can end the deal four years early in 2029, making Netflix a potential player, according to NBC Sports. Fox and CBS have been hanging onto their slices of football coverage since the 1990s. Fox acquired the National Football Conference package from CBS in 1994, while CBS acquired the American Football Conference package from NBC in 1998, NBC Sports reported. Netflix boasts a global audience, which could give the NFL a chance to expand its reach. The streaming service hosted the NFL's Christmas Day games, drawing 65 million viewers from 218 countries, the company said based on Nielsen data. This could be a major touchdown for the streaming service, as the NFL made up 72 of the top 100 most-watched broadcasts of 2024, Sportico reported. Even the contentious election coverage didn't really make a dent. The top two broadcasts were the Super Bowl, which welcomed 123 million viewers, followed by the second presidential debate, which welcomed 67 million. 2024 Nielsen data obtained by Variety perhaps illustrates the magnitude of the draw of airing football coverage. CBS, which hosted last year's Super Bowl, topped the charts as the most-watched network of 2024. NBC, ABC and Fox trailed.
USA Today
05-02-2025
- Politics
- USA Today
The Philadelphia Eagles upset Trump in 2018. A petulant president can't let it go.
The Philadelphia Eagles upset Trump in 2018. A petulant president can't let it go. | Opinion Trump is planning to attend Super Bowl LIX Sunday in New Orleans. And, yes, there will be booing for him from some Eagles fans. Bet on it. Show Caption Hide Caption Who has the better roster: Philadelphia Eagles or Kansas City Chiefs? As these two teams get ready to square up in Super Bowl LIX, USAT's Lorenzo Reyes and Tyler Dragon discuss which team is stronger. Sports Seriously President Donald Trump lives most comfortably in a chaotic state of swirling controversy. And squabbles with even the lowest stakes can properly contextualize just how petty and petulant he can be. Trump still seems to have beef with my hometown football team, the Philadelphia Eagles, who trounced the Washington Commanders in the National Football Conference championship game, securing a spot in Sunday's Super Bowl LIX. Eagles fans, who gleefully sing "no one likes us, we don't care," know Trump is still peeved about the team's Super Bowl run and snub seven years ago. And, no, we still don't care. The Eagles will face the Kansas City Chiefs, who won their Super Bowl trip by edging out the Buffalo Bills in the American Football Conference championship game. Trump was swift to congratulate the Chiefs on the victory Jan. 26, using a post on his website Truth Social that characteristically made the game all about himself. As for the Eagles, Trump was uncharacteristically quiet about their win earlier that day. The likely reason for that is obvious. He can't let any slight, real or perceived, ever be ignored or forgotten. If Trump is breathing, then he's seething about something. Do you remember when Eagles players snubbed Trump? He remembers. Trump's bilious bluster has always been thin cover for the clear fact that he is one of the most insecure men ever to hold the presidency. Emotionally stable people don't store sore feelings like gold in a safe deposit box. Snubbing the Eagles shows Trump still has an emotional owie that has been festering for seven years. The Eagles defeated the New England Patriots in Super Bowl LII in February 2018 and then received a customary invitation to the White House. Several players who had been vocal about social justice issues or sympathetic to them decided to skip that visit. Opinion: Chaos, lawsuits are the point. Trump expects Supreme Court to give him a free pass. Trump had been a frequent critic of any professional athletes who knelt or remained in the locker room during the national anthem before games as a way to draw attention to those concerns. That's why those athletes didn't want to hang out. But Trump can't roll with that or any affront. Faced with players sitting out his party, the president canceled it for the entire team with a whiny statement that said he would instead have "a different type of ceremony" for Eagles fans at the White House. With Trump, reality is always stranger than fiction Trump controversies are always one stumble away from transmogrifying into farce. Many of the Eagles "fans" he gathered at the White House were really just low-level staffers or interns ineptly cosplaying Philadelphians after being instructed to show up. As for Trump's allegiance to patriotic ballads, he was caught on video clearly flubbing the words in a botched attempt to sing along to "God Bless America" during the event. As with all things Trump, you can't make it up. Reality is always weirder than fiction. Opinion: Trump blames DEI after tragic plane collision in DC. This is our president. Still, we should be thankful that some of Trump's toddler-like tantrums are so low-stakes. This one doesn't really matter much, given his current fixation on demolishing the government as an improbable approach to saving it. Nonetheless, it is a continuing lesson about how Trump operates, how easily his ego is bruised and how he can never be the bigger man, the confident leader who knows how to let the small stuff go. Trump shouldn't knock the Eagles fans who voted for him Here's what I know about my hometown of Philadelphia and the team I have cheered for my whole life: Eagles fans come from all over Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware and other states. Given that regional diversity, it's safe to say that the fan base is chock full of Trump supporters. The president has support within Philadelphia, too, despite Democratic voters outnumbering Republicans 7 to 1. The vote tallies – which were fair and accurate every time he ran for president, despite his lies – showed that support for Trump grew here from 2016 to 2020 to 2024. Trump's congratulations to the Kansas City Chiefs included a shout-out to the team's fans "that voted for me (MAGA!) in record numbers." That's why he cares. Arrowhead Stadium is in Kansas City, Missouri, where Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris won more than 76% of the vote in November's presidential election. Kansas City is in Jackson County, which Trump won with 51% of the vote. In other words, politics has nothing to do with the Super Bowl. Politics shouldn't have anything to do with this or any Super Bowl, even though Trump is planning to attend the game. And, yes, there will be booing for him from some Eagles fans. Bet on it. As an Eagles fan, I know that what matters Sunday will happen on a field in New Orleans, 360 feet long and 160 feet wide. The game, a rematch of Super Bowl LVII two years ago narrowly won by the Chiefs, and the result will have nothing to do with Trump, no matter how badly he seeks to be the center of attention. Go Birds! Follow USA TODAY columnist Chris Brennan on X, formerly known as Twitter: @ByChrisBrennan
Vox
29-01-2025
- Sport
- Vox
The Doomsday Clock is running out of time
On Sunday afternoon, I went to the National Football Conference championship game at Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia. At one point early in the fourth quarter, the Philadelphia Eagles were on the 1-yard line of the opposing Washington Commanders, ready to run their unstoppable Brotherly Shove play for a score. (Trust me — this has something to do with Future Perfect.) Knowing they would almost certainly give up a touchdown, the outmatched Commanders decided to do something a little different. First, a Commanders defender purposefully jumped over the line early, leading to a penalty for encroachment. Then they did it again — same thing. And again — same thing. They seemingly had every intention to keep jumping the line, over and over. And each time, the referees moved the ball half the distance to the goal line, as happens when defensive penalties occur close to the end zone. Anyone familiar with the principle of infinite divisibility in geometry can see the problem here. A line segment — like the distance here between the line of scrimmage and the end zone — can be infinitely divided, over and over. Which means that theoretically, the Commanders could have kept encroaching, and the Eagles could have kept advancing half the distance to the goal line without ever getting there, until the end of time. Fortunately for the players, coaches and nearly 70,000 fans in attendance, the referees found a way out of this particular paradox by invoking a little-known NFL rule that allows the offense team to be automatically awarded a touchdown if the defense keeps purposefully committing penalties to stop them. That was finally enough to get the Commanders to cut it out. All of which brings us to a subject we've written about a few times here at Future Perfect: the Doomsday Clock. (See, I told you we'd get there.) Created and run by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, which itself was founded by many former Manhattan Project physicists who had become alarmed by the threat of nuclear weapons, the Doomsday Clock is meant to be a symbolic representation of how close humanity is to existential destruction. Each year, a group of experts in everything from nuclear science to climate change to cybersecurity sets the hands of the clock. The closer it is to midnight, the closer humanity supposedly is to extinction. In 2023, the Bulletin made some news when it moved the hands of the clock up 10 seconds, to 90 seconds until midnight — the closest it had ever been since it was launched in 1947. While that meant humanity was supposedly closer to annihilation than it had been in such famously dangerous times as 1964 (not long after the Cuban Missile Crisis, when it was set to 12 minutes to midnight) or 1984 (shortly after one of the closest nuclear calls in Cold War history, when it was 3 minutes to midnight), this was the first setting after Russia invaded Ukraine and raised nuclear fears to a height they hadn't reached in decades. Last year, citing everything from Ukraine to Gaza to climate change to growth in AI, the board kept the clock at 90 seconds to midnight. And then yesterday morning, the board revealed the clock's new setting. Set your doomsday time to… drumroll please: 89 seconds to midnight, one second closer. The board listed a slew of factors: continued nuclear risk around Ukraine and the disintegration of nuclear arms control; the growing impacts of climate change after what is likely the hottest year on record; the threat of new diseases like bird flu; AI progress, and especially, potential military applications; and disinformation and cyber insecurity. If those sound familiar, well, they're pretty much the same factors as the year before, and the year before that, something board chair Daniel Holz acknowledged at Tuesday's event, saying these factors 'were not new in 2024. But we have seen insufficient progress in addressing the key challenges, and in many cases this is leading to increasingly negative and worrisome effects.' Still, everything about Tuesday's announcement underscored an essential problem with the Doomsday Clock. It's running out of time — perhaps metaphorically, as it's meant to, in the case of humanity's survival, but quite literally, in the sense that a clock only has so many hours, minutes, and seconds. And that problem is something the entire field of existential risk suffers from. Just like those referees in Philadelphia, there are only so many times you can issue a warning before it starts to feel meaningless, especially as we seem to get closer and closer to annihilation without, quite, getting there. In a way, the Doomsday Clock is a victim of its own success as an unparalleled symbol of 20th-century, Cold War nuclear fear. So compelling was the idea of the hands of a clock, inching toward the midnight moment when the missiles would launch, that the classic 1980s Watchmen graphic novel used it as an unforgettable central motif. Like James Bond movies and Rambo films, though, the Doomsday Clock suffered after the end of the Cold War and the apparent removal of its reason for being: nuclear war. With that threat seemingly behind us, the clock branched out into new threats like climate change and infectious disease, and later very 2010-era worries like disinformation and democratic backsliding. Sign up here to explore the big, complicated problems the world faces and the most efficient ways to solve them. Sent twice a week. The problem, as we've written before, is that non-nuclear existential risks simply don't fit well into the metaphor of a clock. A nuclear war is largely a binary risk — the missiles fire, and the clock strikes 12, or they don't. And there's an entire field of geopolitics and diplomacy dedicated to gauging just where the world is on nuclear risk. It is about as measurable and knowable as existential risks get, which is why the Doomsday Clock was so iconic. But other, newer existential risks don't work that way — assuming they even are, indeed, true existential risks. Climate change is not a binary but a cumulative, ongoing risk, less sudden fatal heart attack than lifelong case of planetary diabetes. If climate risk were a clock, it'd be hard to know what time it is, or even whether the clock would ever truly strike midnight. Other risks are even more difficult to track. Artificial intelligence just experienced one of the most eventful weeks in its young history, as China's DeepSeek showed that advanced models might be cheaper and harder to stifle than the industry had thought, even as America's big AI players lined up for an unprecedented $500 billion buildup. Is AI even an existential risk? Maybe — though no one can tell you with any certainty how precisely it might unfold, or how close we really are. And AI, unlike nuclear weapons, has benefits for science and society we can't just put aside. When it comes to infectious disease, as worrying as the recent outbreaks of bird flu have been, we have no certainty that this will indeed be the next pandemic — or how severe it would be should that happen. A new virus will come for us, but chances are we'll be surprised by what it is, just as we were surprised by Covid. And the odds that such a virus would actually threaten us with extinction seem very low. We live in a world that is right now awash in fear, even if those fears are often overstated and out of step with reality. I worry that as the Doomsday Clock waters down its original focus on nuclear war — something that really is getting worse — and makes these minute changes year to year, it will end up burning out the very audience it is meant to galvanize. You can only say the world is close to ending so many times, only elevate so many risks to the status of existential ones, before people begin to tune you out. A postscript to that story about the Eagles game: Once the referees had made their final warning, the Eagles were able to run their Brotherly Shove, and push quarterback Jalen Hurts into the end zone for a touchdown, en route to a dominating 55-23 victory. (Go Birds!) You can have all the warnings in the world — but that doesn't mean you can stop the inevitable from happening. You've read 1 article in the last month Here at Vox, we're unwavering in our commitment to covering the issues that matter most to you — threats to democracy, immigration, reproductive rights, the environment, and the rising polarization across this country. Our mission is to provide clear, accessible journalism that empowers you to stay informed and engaged in shaping our world. By becoming a Vox Member, you directly strengthen our ability to deliver in-depth, independent reporting that drives meaningful change. We rely on readers like you — join us. Swati Sharma Vox Editor-in-Chief
