Eagles Jalen Hurts Has Interesting Response To Innocuous Question About Nick Sirianni

The quarterback once again doesn't seem to give his head coach a vote of confidence.

Eagles QB Jalen Hurts during team's early-June minicamp / John McMullen/Eagles SI

PHILADELPHA – Jalen Hurts was asked a rather innocuous question about the “new” Nick on the final day of the team’s minicamp.

The Eagles quarterback is never easy to read in public settings when reporters try to shout each other down to fire a question.

For instance, leading up to the innocuous query his coach Sirianni, Hurts was asked if he has plans for his time away from football during the several weeks after spring wrapped on June 6 and the start of training camp at the end of July.

“I do,” he responded.

The follow-up was obvious enough: What do you do?

Hurts said: Not football stuff.”

That was the end of that.

Jalen Hurts meets the media on the final day of the Philadelphia Eagles minicamp on June 6, 2024. / By Ed Kracz/Eagles SI

When it comes to his head coach, it never seems Hurts is ready to come to his defense. Or maybe it’s just a misread.

Whatever it is, Sirianni is a palyer's coach and is always willing to fall on his sword for hs players. Evidene of that was last year in Seattle when Hurts and A.J. Brown went off script and tried for a deep completion on a pivotal fourth-down play late in what became a loss to the Seahawks.

Sirianni infamously said something about a deep shot like that perhaps drawqing a pass interference call. It sounded ridiculous at the time, and it turned out it was jut the coachi covering for his playes in the heat of the moment.

What to make of this latest exchange with Hurts, though.

On Thursday, he was asked what he noticed about Sirianni being open-minded enough to change the offense by turning it over to Kellen Moore, the new offensive coordinator.

Hurts said: “Umm…”

There was a long pause. Then a little chuckle, before Hurts began again.

“I mean, that’s a great question, I don’t know that I know the answer to it,” he said.

The follow-up about what he sees from him so far in doing that? It was basically a repackaging of the previous question by the same reporter.

Hurts tried again.

“I think he’s just been great in…umm…,” he offered before another long pause.

“The messages he’s delivering to the team. He’s trying to be very intentional what he’s saying…(another pause)… yeah.”

Perhaps that wouldn’t be nothing more than a blip on the screen when it comes to the QB-coach relationship – and maybe that’s all this is – but remember when the season ended in the wild-card playoff game in Tampa. It was yet another disaster in a string of sour games to close the year.

Hurts was asked three times about Sirianni’s future.

Asked if he wanted the Eagles coach back, the quarterback said, “I didn’t know he was going anywhere.”

Informed that there was plenty of speculation that Sirianni’s job was in jeopardy, Hurts replied: “I didn’t know that.”

Finally, he was asked if he had confidence in him to fix the Eagles’ late-season free-fall heading into 2024, Hurts said, “I have a ton of confidence in everyone in this building.”

Moment after Hurts’ news conference ended on Thursday, Sirianni took to the podium and descried his role of being available in every one of the teams’ position group meetings and not spending every waking minute of his coaching day with Hurts and the offense. He called it a 30,000-foot view.

Hurts’ view is right in front of him, but he doesn’t seem like he can see what his new coach is doing.

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