Jalen Hurts is Maturing Quickly

Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts is playing the best football of his young career and is one of the main reasons why Philly is off to a 7-0 start. Against the Steelers in Week 8, it was easy to see how Hurts’ improved ability to read the field, as well as some great play designs, are the key factors driving his year-3 jump.

Let’s start with this 1st-down play in the 2nd quarter. The Eagles were in a 2x2 formation and the Steelers would rotate down into a Cover-3 zone:

How do you win against zone coverage? Target one area of the field or one defender with multiple routes. And find ways to do so from formations that don’t give away where or how those routes are going to attack.

Here, the Eagles would finish with 4 routes targeting one side of the field after starting in a 2x2 set:

This was a “Sail” concept. The go-route on the outside would hold the deep-third corner, and the flat route coming out of the backfield would hold the flat defender. That left tight end Dallas Goedert running his corner/out-route into the vacated zone:

The additional wrinkle here was that 4th receiver running a shallow crosser from the other side of the field. That route held the middle-hook defender and kept him from carrying or locking on to Goedert: