New York Giants Week 6: Philadelphia Eagles Offense Has Some Very Telling Trends

The New York Giants' defense has been hit or miss in 2025 and will look to put it together against a Philadelphia Eagles offense they’re very familiar with.

Personnel

Jalen Hurts is still Jalen Hurts. He’s a risk-averse passer who cares more about winning than his own production as a passer, and he’ll be ridiculed about it by opposing fans as he marches toward Super Bowl appearances.

Hurts has just 889 passing yards through five games, but he has seven passing touchdowns to zero interceptions, with another 182 yards on the ground and four rushing touchdowns.

The most impressive part is that Hurts has run for 20 first downs so far this season, tied for sixth in the NFL and six more than the next highest quarterback.

The passing attack is efficient but not particularly explosive, averaging just 6.4 yards per attempt.

In the running back room, Saquon Barkley started the week on the injury report but has seen an increase in workload in practice and is expected to play on Thursday night at this point.

Philadelphia Eagles running back Saquon Barkley is having one of the worst starters to his career. | Nathan Ray Seebeck-Imagn Images

Barkley’s currently having the least productive season of his career, excluding the 2020 season when he got injured at the start of it. Through the first five games of the season, Barkley has just 4.0 yards per touch and 79 scrimmage yards per game.

The Eagles spend about 90% of their offensive snaps in 11- or 12-personnel formations, but they don’t often rotate players on the field in these formations.

The receivers in the 11-personnel formation are usually A.J. Brown, DeVonta Smith, and Jahan Dotson, with Brown and Smith as the two starters, and Smith moving into the slot when Dotson enters the field.

Brown and Smith have combined for 44 receptions for 466 yards and just two touchdowns so far on the season.

The production hasn’t been there, but they’re still a talented receiving duo that’s visibly frustrated with the lack of a legit passing attack.

In a 12-personnel formation, Dallas Goedert stays on the field, and either Kylen Granson or Grant Calcaterra joins him. Calcaterra left the Broncos game with an oblique injury and will miss the game.

Goedert is the only true threat in the tight end room with 15 catches and four touchdowns, tied with Hurts and Barkley for the most scrimmage touchdowns on the Eagles.

None of the tight ends are particularly good blockers, but when tagged as additions to the offensive line in the run game, they do their part.

On the offensive line, Landon Dickerson will miss Thursday’s game. In that case, the projected Eagles starting offensive line from left to right is Jordan Mailata, Brett Toth in Dickerson’s place, Cam Jurgens, Tyler Steen, and Lane Johnson.

Philadelphia Eagles guard Landon Dickerson will miss the game against the Giants. | Eric Hartline-Imagn Images

Mailata and Johnson are still arguably the best tackle duo in the entire NFL and have been handling business regularly for the Eagles. However, the interior of the offensive line has been a disappointment in both the run and pass games.

Even when healthy, Dickerson was off to a terrible start to the season, and that hasn’t improved for the line without him.

Steen has done a solid job in pass protection, but he’s been a liability in the run game. Toth is a backup guard for a reason, and Jurgens is about as average a center as one can be, although one could argue his IQ makes up for his play.

Scheme

As Dan Orlovsky pointed out, the Eagles have a clear tell: when they come out in the shotgun: they throw the ball almost 80% of the time, whereas when they come out under center, they run the ball nearly 85% of the time.

When the Eagles come out in the pistol, they run the ball about 74% of the time.

This is an egregious trend that, now that it has been pointed out, might change; however, until it does, the Giants should treat every shotgun snap like a pass and every other snap as a run.

Philadelphia Eagles offensive coordinator Kevin Patullo. | Bill Streicher-Imagn Images

The Eagles' offense is pretty boring, simple, vanilla, or whatever adjective you want to use there. There’s almost no play-action passing game, with play-action on just 20.8% of the Eagles’ passing plays, the eighth-lowest rate in the NFL.

Pre-snap, there’s very little movement as well, with the Eagles having a motion rate of just 25% of plays, so they don’t often make defenses adjust there.

In some more unsurprising news, the Eagles either throw the ball very short or take deep shots downfield with very little intermediate passing game in the mix–67.7% of Hurts’ passes are shorter than 10 yards, while 16.5% of them are deep shots.

All of this is to say that the Eagles are incredibly boring offensively yet they still average 25 points per game, almost a double-digit jump over the Giants. Boring, efficient, and effective has been the name of the game.

Overview

The Giants' defense will need to generate an interior pass-rush in this one to impact Hurts, and it would be wise to find ways to get Abdul Carter involved there as well.

I expect Carter to be used as a spy in certain instances, such as on third-and-medium or third-and-long plays, to limit Hurts' mobility.

The tush push is the tush push. I’m convinced at this point that it’s luck if a defense can stop it, but if any team has the nose tackle to stifle it, it’s the Giants with Dexter Lawrence II.

I would hope to see Paulson Adebo shadow AJ Brown, as that’s the one receiver Hurts has consistently shown he’s willing to throw to in coverage. Put a cornerback that could actually compete at the catch point with Brown and try to force some incompletions on a top receiver.

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Personnel

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Overview

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