The Cowboys defense isn’t good, and they can’t get out of their own way either.
The Cowboys had the Eagles stopped on fourth-and-1 at the Philadelphia 44 on an aborted snap. Defensive lineman Quinnen Williams was called for offsides, though, giving the Eagles a first down.
It was Williams’ second offsides penalty in the first quarter and the Cowboys’ third.
The Cowboys stopped the Eagles on third-and-7 at the Dallas 9, too, only to have LT Overton called for roughing the passer. The rookie hit Tanner McKee in the facemask.
Dameon Pierce ran it in from the 5 on the next play.
The Eagles lead 14-10, gaining 132 yards and scoring two touchdowns on two drives.
The Eagles have ruled out wide receiver Britain Covey (knee).
Eagles Clips
The Cowboys are leaning on their run game after hearing criticism all week about their pass-happy ways last week. After Javonte Williams scored with 9:19 remaining in the third quarter against the Packers in Week 6, the Cowboys threw on 37 of 38 plays in what turned into a 23-13 loss.
The Cowboys have nine runs and six passes thus far tonight against the Eagles.
They have a 10-7 lead.
After an opening 55-yard field goal from Brandon Aubrey, the Cowboys drove 82 yards in nine plays.
Williams, who has 40 yards on five carries, and Tyler Goodson, who has 21 yards on four carries, led the Cowboys down the field.
But wide receiver CeeDee Lamb scored the touchdown on a 9-yard pass from Dak Prescott.
Prescott is 3-of-6 for 49 yards and a touchdown.
The Cowboys got a 55-yard field goal from Brandon Aubrey to end their first drive. The Eagles did even better.
Despite missing starting quarterback Jalen Hurts and wide receivers DeVonta Smith and Dontayvion Wicks, the Eagles had no problem going right down the field. That’s because Saquon Barkley is back.
The Eagles running back, who is returning from a hamstring injury, caught a dump off from Tanner McKee for a 12-yard gain. Barkley then went 29 yards on the next play, though it appeared he aggravated his hamstring after awkwardly getting around safety Caleb Downs.
With Barkley on the sideline for one play, McKee connected with rookie Makai Lemon for 21 yards.
After an offsides penalty on Cowboys defensive lineman Quinnen Williams, Barkley went around the right side for an easy 8-yard touchdown.
The Eagles lead 7-3 with 10:25 left in the first quarter.
Barkley has 37 yards and a touchdown on two carries and one catch for 12 yards.
The Eagles will have outside linebackers Jonathan Greenard (ankle) and Jalyx Hunt (knee/ankle) tonight. Both are active.
Greenard and Hunt went into today with questionable designations.
Greenard missed Week 5 with his injury and had no designation in Week 6 and played 24 of 79 snaps against the Panthers last week. He has been on the injury report every week this season and missed the first two games with a pectoral injury.
Hunt missed last week’s game with his injury.
Running back Saquon Barkley (hamstring) is also dressed as he returns after missing the past two games.
The Eagles will start Tanner McKee at quarterback, and former Cowboys quarterback Joe Milton will serve as McKee’s backup.
The Eagles’ inactives are outside linebacker Nolan Smith (concussion), wide receiver DeVonta Smith (hamstring), wide receiver Dontayvion Wicks (ankle), quarterback Cole Payton, defensive back Michael Carter II (abdomen) and offensive lineman Jake Majors. Payton will serve as the emergency third quarterback.
The Cowboys’ inactives are offensive tackle Drew Shelton (hamstring), wide receiver KaVontae Turpin (ribs), linebacker Dee Winters (calf), running back Emari Demercado and outside linebacker Tyrus Wheat.
The Eagles added three players to their active roster ahead of Monday night’s game against the Cowboys.
Guard Landon Dickerson was activated from injured reserve along with tight ends Grant Calcaterra and Eli Stowers. Cornerback Jakorian Bennett has also been designated for return, but remains on injured reserve.
Dickerson started the opener at left guard, but has been out with a knee injury for the last five games. Calcaterra has been out the whole year with a back injury and Stowers has missed all six games with a quad injury. Stowers was a second-round pick this year, so Monday is set to be his NFL debut.
The Eagles also elevated running back Elijah Mitchell and linebacker Keyshawn James-Newby from the practice squad on a temporary basis.
The NFL reportedly has no issue with the manner in which the Eagles handled the health of quarterback Jalen Hurts in London. In contrast, the league is not thrilled with the manner in which the team handled the ensuing controversy.
Marcus Hayes of the Philadelphia Inquirer, citing an unnamed “longtime source well-connected to the NFL offices,” reports that the powers-that-be are “furious” with the team for its messaging regarding the situation.
To date, only coach Nick Sirianni has been made available to answer the obvious follow-up questions raised by a pair of statements issued by the team. Sirianni didn’t have much to say, regardless of whether he did (or didn’t) know more about the matter than he shared.
G.M. Howie Roseman, who runs the entire football operation, has not addressed the issue. The doctors who evaluated Hurts have not been made available.
Through it all, the team has hidden behind “patient privacy” — even after the statements shared specific details about the “superficial” blood clot that became a deep vein thrombosis and multiple blood clots in his lungs. The medical privacy rights of Jalen Hurts have already been compromised, if not expressly waived. Specific questions about how the initial condition arose, when it was diagnosed, how it was treated, and whether the complications flowed from those decisions are irrelevant at this point to the issue of privacy.
Of course, the NFL didn’t help the situation via the dismissive comments made by multiple executives last week, including chief medical officer Allen Sills. His insistence that Hurts had “very conservative” care doesn’t mesh on the surface with the decision to let him fly to London, to play in London, and to fly home from London.
On Sunday, the NFL and NFL Players Association jointly announced that they are “working together” on the Hurts case. It’s unclear what that means, especially since the NFLPA has not yet officially invoked its unilateral right to demand an investigation under Article 39, Section 5(f) of the Collective Bargaining Agreement.
The union can’t afford the perception of complicity in a possible coverup. Any investigation, in whatever form it takes, must seek real answers to hard questions and provide them to the public.
It’s impossible for the NFL to, on one hand, welcome public attention, engagement, and stadium funding while, on the other, say “none of your damn business” when the public has natural curiosity about the things that happen to NFL players. Last week, the Eagles failed to satisfy the widespread interest in Hurts’s case. Moving forward, any effort to investigate what happened must include a commitment to true and complete transparency.
Through it all, the Eagles play a home game tonight against the Cowboys. It will be interesting to see whether and to what extent ESPN’s wall-to-wall coverage of the game advances the lingering Hurts story.
As another full Sunday of football approaches, there’s a new development in the situation regarding Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts, who is likely out for the rest of the year after a “superficial” blood clot became a deep vein thrombosis and blood clots in each lung.
“The NFL and NFL Players Association are working together to review the matter,” the league and the union said in a joint statement.
This implies that the NFLPA, as mentioned earlier today, has not yet officially exercised its unilateral right to conduct an investigation under Article 39, Section 5(f) of the Collective Bargaining Agreement. Still, some sort of an investigation is inevitable.
And while it’s always good for management and labor to work through potential rough spots together, the NFLPA risks the perception of complicity with the NFL’s apparent effort (as punctuated by a quick endorsement of the care provided to Hurts and a strident dismissal of any scrutiny of the matter by chief medical officer Allen Sills) to brush the situation under the rug.
There are too many unanswered questions, too many possible explanations that point to someone making a serious mistake in diagnosing the initial blood clot in Hurts’s leg promptly, in allowing him to fly to London with a blood clot in his leg, in allowing him to play two Sundays ago with a blood clot in his leg, and in allowing him to fly back from London with a blood clot in his leg.
Many want answers. Many want the truth. The overriding question is whether the NFL can ultimately handle the truth.
As the NFL hopes to turn the page on the Jalen Hurts conversation, thanks to a full day of football starting with yet another pregame-show-killing 9:30 a.m. ET game, there will be further developments that will result in further scrutiny of the situation.
The most immediate development will be the “full investigation” that the NFL Players Association has referenced, but not formally launched.
Consider the precise terms of the statement the NFLPA issued on Tuesday: “The NFLPA is not aware of any NFL investigation into the medical care provided to Jalen Hurts,” the union said. “In fact, the league previously informed the union that it did not plan to review the care he received. Before conclusions are drawn about how this situation was handled, there must be a full investigation into what occurred. Determining the facts is essential to ensuring players receive the highest level of care and protection going forward.”
Although the NFLPA has the power under Article 39, Section 5(f) of the Collective Bargaining Agreement to activate an investigation, a statement reacting to the league’s knee-jerk endorsement of the medical care provided to Hurts by pointing out that a “full investigation” is needed before any conclusions can be reached is very different from an official activation of the investigation contemplated by the CBA. There’s no current reason to believe there won’t be a full investigation, whatever the process. But an investigation hasn’t started, at least not yet.
Looming over any investigation conducted or initiated by the NFLPA is the possibility of the ultimate external investigation: Litigation. Although the CBA limits the ability of the player to sue the team and/or the league in court, the doctors are fair game. Three years ago, for example, former Eagles safety Chris Maragos won a $43.5 million verdict in a malpractice case against Dr. James Bradley and Rothman Orthopaedics Associates for surgery to correct a meniscus tear and the ensuing rehab of the injury. (The award was later upheld on appeal.)
More recently, former Browns receiver David Bell has sued Dr. William Meyers and others for core muscle repair that allegedly resulted in a career-ending injury to Bell’s femoral artery.
“We undertook a year-long investigation into this matter in which a number of truly world-leading surgeons and radiologists examined the matter, with many of them doing so on a no-fee basis. The findings were nothing short of astonishing and give us a high degree of confidence we can prove that hundreds of millions of dollars going to Dr. Bill Meyers, Dr. Adam Zoga, Jefferson, and the Vincera Institute to perform these surgeries, were prioritized over the basic medical principle of First Do No Harm, as we have alleged in the Complaint,” Bell’s lead attorney, Brad Sohn, said in a press release.
Hurts has a potential lawsuit against the doctors who provided his care, independent of any more limited rights against the Eagles or the league. While it could get complicated — especially if Hurts may have to file a lawsuit in the U.S. and in England — a “superficial” blood clot in his leg resulting from being cleated during the Week 4 game against the Rams became a deep vein thrombosis and blood clots in each lung.
It’s fair for Hurts to ask whether the medical care Hurts received caused or contributed to the progression of the situation into something both serious and life-threatening. And the eventual impact of the situation on his career is currently unknown.
The only prudent approach would be to investigate all aspects of the situation from the moment Hurts suffered the initial injury until the point at which the “bilateral pulmonary emboli” were diagnosed. Even if the Eagles and Hurts continue to be on the same page, Hurts can still pursue his rights against the various doctors who may have handled the situation in a way that fell short of the requisite standard of care.
However it plays out, this one is far from over. One way or another, the answers that the Eagles and the league won’t provide to the public need to be pursued through one or more investigative processes. And litigation is the best way for Hurts to get any compensation he may be owed for an outcome that may have been fully avoidable.
The Cowboys will have wide receiver George Pickens (shoulder) and cornerback Joey Porter Jr. (ankle) for Monday night’s game against the Eagles. Both were full participants in Saturday’s practice and neither has an injury designation.
The Cowboys ruled out offensive tackle Drew Shelton (hamstring), wide receiver KaVontae Turpin (ribs) and linebacker Dee Winters (calf).
They list outside linebacker Marist Liufau (forearm) and safety P.J. Locke (foot) as questionable. Both players are in their 21-day return-to-practice window, and the Cowboys would have to make roster moves Sunday to get the back on the 53-player roster.
The Eagles ruled out four players, including wide receiver DeVonta Smith (hamstring) and linebacker Nolan Smith (concussion). They list seven players as questionable, including running back Saquon Barkley (hamstring) and outside linebacker Jonathan Greenard (ankle).
The Eagles have left the door open for running back Saquon Barkley to play on Monday night, but they will be down two wideouts against the Cowboys.
Barkley is listed as questionable to play after moving up to full practice participation on Saturday. Barkley has missed the last two games with a hamstring injury and his presence would be welcomed on an offense that’s low on wide receivers
DeVonta Smith (hamstring) and Dontayvion Wicks (ankle) were both ruled out on the team’s final injury report of Week 7. Makai Lemon, Darius Cooper, Hollywood Brown, Elijah Moore, and Britain Covey are the available wideouts on the 53-man roster.
Defensive back Michael Carter (abdomen) and linebacker Nolan Smith (concussion) have also been ruled out for Philadelphia. Cornerback Jakorian Bennett (knee), tight end Grant Calcaterra (back), guard Landon Dickerson (knee, pectoral), linebacker Jalyx Hunt (knee, ankle), and tight end Eli Stowers (quad) join Barkley with questionable designations.
Bennett, Calcaterra, Dickerson, and Stowers are all on injured reserve, so the Eagles will need to make roster moves to get all or some of them on the roster for Monday night.
