Latest news with #then-Eagles
USA Today
19-05-2025
- Sport
- USA Today
Eagles represent benchmark games for three legitimate NFL title contenders
For just the second time in their nine-decade-long history, the Philadelphia Eagles enter the pro football season as the reigning and defending Super Bowl champions. This proud organization owns five NFL championships. Three precede the 1966 NFL merger (1948, 1949, 1960). The two most recent have been the most gratifying. The Lombardi Trophy has become one of the largest representations of organizational excellence. Philadelphia's first will always be special because it was... well... the first. The second was the prize won by delivering one of the most dominant (and surprisingly one-sided) wins in the 59-year history of football's biggest game. What will the Birds do for an encore? It won't be long before we know the answer. Three genuine NFL title contenders have, no doubt, circled their games vs. the Eagles. The NFL's 2025-26 schedule has been released. To no one's surprise, the Eagles face a gauntlet. Things will be different this time around. Last year, when the Birds began their playoff push, they adopted the 'Let's Hunt' mantra. This time around, they'll no doubt be the hunted. Philly can expect everyone's best shot on their 18-week, 17-game schedule. Much attention has been paid to the games the Eagles should circle. Here's the curveball. Here are a few games where the opponent has, more than likely, circled the champs' name. Detroit Lions Amon St. Brown didn't pull any punches while hosting then-Eagles star Darius Slay and stating he wanted his squad to face Philly in the 2025 regular-season opener. Ultimately, the schedule makers determined they had a better plan. That honor was given to the Dallas Cowboys rather than the Detroit Lions. Philly and Detroit will enjoy their primetime clash on NBC and Peacock ten weeks later in Week 11. The Lions were the top-seeded playoff team in the NFC last season. They would lose their first game at home. They'll want to make a statement vs. an Eagles team that won a Super Bowl that the Lions thought they would conquer. The next team on this list was responsible for crushing their dreams of championship glory. Washington Commanders In Week 16, the Washington Commanders rallied to beat the Eagles by scoring 22 fourth-quarter points en route to a 36-33 final score. That's okay. Philly wouldn't lose again. A little over one month later, the Commanders were on the wrong side of a 55-23 final score in the NFC Championship Game. Washington no doubt sees last season as a failure because they didn't accomplish their goal of winning the Super Bowl. This time, they won't cross paths with the champs until the last three weeks of the regular season (Weeks 16 and 18). Those games could determine an NFC East champion, playoff seeding, and each team's readiness for a serious postseason push. Kansas City Chiefs If this one didn't make the cut, the list would have needed to be thrown out. Rather than ushering the Kansas City Chiefs to rare air and an unprecedented three-peat, Philly decided it was their time to be destiny's darling. The NFL won't make us wait long for a grudge match. A game vs. Andy Reid, Patrick Mahomes, Travis Kelce, and company in the second game of the season for both teams follows Philadelphia's regular-season opener. The questions are as follows: Is K.C.'s reign of terror over? How do they even begin to bounce back from the dismantling they were on the wrong side of last February on football's biggest stage? It felt like the torch was passed during Super Bowl 59. Still, even with that being said, no one should expect the Chiefs to lie down and allow the Eagles to run roughshod over them at Arrowhead Stadium.
Yahoo
12-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Taylor Swift Fans Celebrate After Philadelphia Eagles Player Gets Traded
Taylor Swift's fans joked she has superpowers now. Some Swifties are convinced that the 'Blank Space' singer has something to do with the Philadelphia Eagles' recent trade of safety C.J. Gardner-Johnson after he made a series of comments about the pop star and her boyfriend, Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce. More from Spin: Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce Enjoy Rare Date Night — And Fans Can't Stop Talking About It Travis Kelce's Neighbor Just Dropped a Big Claim About His Relationship with Taylor Swift Taylor Swift's Music is the Ultimate Pick-Me-Up for Travis Kelce Some of the 35-year-old songstress' fans took to X (formerly known as Twitter) to share their theories about the trade and her possible involvement. 'tayvoodoo is alive and well,' wrote one fan in reference to a theory that Swift had 'voodoo' powers. A second fan mentioned the comments Gardner-Johnson, 27, made and noted, 'The Eagles probably traded CJ Gardner-Johnson partly because of the Taylor Swift thing. Let's not lie here.' A third fan admitted, 'Didn't know who CJGJ was until he showed his a** during the Super Bowl win and now he's being traded to the Houston Texans karma is Tay's boyfriend.' Gardner-Johnson's comments about Swift and Kelce, 35, came after the Eagles defeated the Chiefs at the 2025 Super Bowl. He made a post on Instagram shortly after the win, where he suggested that Kelce should have stayed with his ex-girlfriend Kayla Nicole. 'Should've stayed w that thick s****,' he wrote on top of an in-game picture of Kelce. The then-Eagles player also wore a sweater to the Eagles' Super Bowl win celebration parade that read, 'Swifties Can LIX My Ba**s.' Gardner-Johnson was traded to the Houston Texans on Tuesday, March 11, with two years remaining in his $27 million contract with the Eagles. To see our running list of the top 100 greatest rock stars of all time, click here.
Yahoo
05-02-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
As Chiefs chase 3-peat, Eagles boasting a different trifecta thanks to GM Howie Roseman
NEW ORLEANS — The Philadelphia Eagles are not chasing a three-peat. They didn't make the Super Bowl last year and they lost to the Kansas City Chiefs the year before. Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts has not hoisted a Lombardi Trophy and head coach Nick Sirianni has yet to celebrate with the confetti he most wants. But the Eagles are, more quietly than the perennially-last-ones-standing Chiefs, creating their own dynasty. Because for the third time in eight years, they are representing the NFC on the biggest stage. The common denominator in Philadelphia: general manager Howie Roseman. Roseman has constructed three separate Super Bowl-appearing rosters with a rotating cast at head coach, quarterback, edge rusher and beyond. The carousel isn't a goal. But in a league strapped by salary-cap restrictions and textured by aging players with a small window at their peak, the ability to pivot and transform rosters extends a franchise's championship window. Roseman has pivoted and innovated fearlessly — because his greatest 'fear' already materialized. Fifteen years into Roseman's Eagles stint and five into his general manager tenure, then-Eagles head coach Chip Kelly reassigned Roseman away from personnel responsibilities. He took it as a firing. As he outlasted Kelly and reclaimed his post, he found clarity. 'When I came back, I was already kind of fired once, so I wasn't really worried about losing my job anymore,' Roseman said Monday night at Super Bowl media night. 'That gives you kind of a freedom to do things that you think are right without worrying about the ramifications or just trying to win 10 games and make the playoffs and everyone gets another year on their contract. 'You have to really trust your instincts, go in the direction of that and be kind of obsessive about it.' During Roseman's year away from football operations, he studied success. He visited basketball general managers and baseball general managers; soccer general managers and Fortune 500 CEOs, he said. He considered: What made each of them successful, and what common threads crossed league and industry boundaries? 'Conviction about the things that you believe in,' Roseman said. 'All the people I spent time with who have won championships or built championship teams, they were very confident in the way they were going about it. And they didn't deviate because someone said something different or it didn't sound right.' Decisions can be collaborative without bleeding into groupthink. Roseman leans on his front office, coaching staff, players and team owner Jeffrey Lurie as he forges a path from Super Bowl contender to Super Bowl contender. Ultimately, he's been the key decision-maker who drafted Hurts in the second round despite Carson Wentz's starter role at the time. He was the one who didn't consider a second-round pick on center Cam Jurgens wasteful just because All-Pro Jason Kelce would start through his career's end. Philadelphia's offensive line managed to continue its dominance in its first post-Kelce year this season. Roseman took a chance on a career special teamer who became All-Pro linebacker Zack Baun, and he didn't shy away from drafting a bundle of Georgia defenders when the draft board signaled its wisdom. And Roseman didn't let league trends on running backs deter him from chasing what he believed was a generational talent in free agency. Saquon Barkley's debut Philadelphia regular season surpassed the elite 2,000-yard threshold. In the postseason, he has averaged 135 yards from scrimmage per game while collecting five touchdowns in three contests. 'Special player,' Roseman said of Barkley. 'Sometimes the pendulum swings too much and it felt like it was swinging too much [where] skill guys and receivers and even tight end market was starting to come up and it just didn't make sense that there was also great players at other positions who weren't getting paid. "Once free agency opened, we were really aggressive with him. It wasn't like we were dating other people. We were trying to get him from the minute the clock struck 12.' The decision won't take Philadelphia to a chance at three-peating Sunday as the Chiefs could. But the trifecta of Roseman Super Bowl squads in the decade since his reassignment will tell their own story. It's a story he thought then he would not get the chance to tell. 'That whole year I wasn't planning to come back with the Philadelphia Eagles, I was thinking that I was going to have to reinvent myself somewhere else,' Roseman said. 'And I think that for me that's always there, you know, I'm always trying to prove myself. I'm always trying to compete. I know that it doesn't matter what I did last year or last week, that we've got to put together a team every year and compete with the best in the world. And I think that's what drives me: knowing how quickly in this business you go from being really successful to getting your ass kicked. 'I wanted to do differently if I ever got a shot again.'
