Philadelphia Eagles: The Jalen Hurts experiment needs to end

The Philadelphia Eagles failing to admit selecting Jalen Hurts in the second-round was a disaster is making a bad situation even worse.

When the Philadelphia Eagles selected Jalen Hurts in the second-round (53rd overall) of the 2020 NFL Draft, a lot of eyebrows were raised around the National Football League. Not only did the Birds’ commit to paying their franchise quarterback Carson Wentz upwards of $150 million dollars over six years back in June of 2019; but he had also just carried the team on his back with four straight victories to end the 2019 season, in turn clinching the NFC East title.

At the time of the selection, there were some people who thought it was a good move; seeing as Wentz has had a tough time with staying healthy. The narrative that was created was that Hurts would come in, learn under Wentz, and if things didn’t work out with number 11, the replacement was already in house.

There were also some people who saw the opportunity to use Hurts in a gadget role, essentially adding another layer to the offense for the Philadelphia Eagles. Going off of that thought, you had people (myself included) who wondered, “why the heck would you waste a premium draft pick on a backup QB/gadget player, when you have so many other holes on your roster?” Unfortunately, it is the latter that appears to be ringing true.

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Let’s not even look to far into the fact that the Philadelphia Eagles left some fantastic young players on the board with their selection of Hurts. Those players including CB Kristian Fulton out of LSU as well as S Jeremy Chinn out of Southern Illinois; both of whom would be key contributors on this roster. With that said, Hurts is in Philadelphia (unfortunately), and it appears the Birds are trying to make the most of the situation.

I do want to make it clear, the disdain I feel is in no way directed towards Hurts himself. He did not have the choice of coming to the Philadelphia Eagles, he was sort of just thrown into the fire. Where my disdain stands, however, is towards Doug Pederson essentially forcing the issue. We have seen it now for weeks, over and over Dougie P trying to fit Hurts into the scheme of the offense; yet, to no avail. It is almost predictable what is going to happen when number 2 comes trotting onto the field.

While many people believe Hurts should take over for Wentz due to the fact the Philadelphia Eagles find themselves 2-4-1 after seven games, I feel it is fair to question why? Why do we need to see MORE of Jalen Hurts? Why are we trying to force this situation to work? Essentially doubling down on an absolutely abysmal decision to waste a second-round draft pick on a player that was not needed here in Philadelphia? When the rookie signal caller comes into the huddle, all it is doing is throwing off the rhythm of an already bad offense.

Couldn’t you argue it is causing more harm than good? I sure think so.

So far in his brief Philadelphia Eagles career, we have seen Jalen Hurts run the football nine times for 51 yards, catch one ball for 3 yards, complete one pass for 18 yards, all the while fumbling the ball twice. Not to mention the incredibly poor usage during failed two point conversion attempts.

I can’t reiterate this enough, what exactly is the point? What are we trying to accomplish in this situation? My good friend and co-worker David Esser made a good point of this in one of his recent articles, no team has ever been successful using a two quarterback system. So why do the Birds think they will be? It is just another classic example of Howie Roseman trying to be the smartest person in the room; doubling down on a bad decision to save face, when in fact it is just making the situation worse.

Unfortunately, it does not appear that this experiment has any end in sight. As this 2020 season continues to progress, I fully expect Doug Pederson and the Philadelphia Eagles to continue to try to force this situation to work; even with how bad it looks. I guess the silver lining is maybe they can make Hurts look good enough to where some team will come along in the offseason looking to trade a high draft pick for him? I’m not sure.

What I do know is the return from this pick so far has been awful, and the fact that the Philadelphia Eagles can’t see this, or at least don’t want to admit this, is making it even worse.