(Editor’s note: This is excerpted from Mike Sando’s Pick Six of Feb. 10, 2025.)
2. The Chiefs weren’t going to let Saquon Barkley beat them. Jalen Hurts and a dominant defense were plenty. That, and other quick-hitters from Super Bowl LIX, including a poll on officiating.
• Doing it right: When the Eagles win Super Bowls, they do it right — first against Belichick, Brady and New England, now against Reid, Mahomes and Kansas City, and both interrupting what might have otherwise been a three-peat.
Their 41-38 victory over the Patriots after the 2017 season featured the second-most points scored against a New England defense in the 429 total games Belichick coached the team. Their 40-22 victory Sunday handed the Chiefs their second-worst point differential in a game with Mahomes in the lineup (Kansas City lost 27-3 at Tennessee in 2021), even after two garbage-time K.C. touchdowns.
These were signature victories of the highest order.
• Hurts’ validation: Jalen Hurts carried the Lombardi Trophy from the Eagles’ locker room into a hallway, where he sat with the hardware and, appearing exhausted, took some time to soak in the moment. His redemption story is well-known. Now, it is complete. He’s a Super Bowl champion, Super Bowl MVP and, along with Brady, a winner over Mahomes’ Chiefs on the biggest stage.
Was pretty cool seeing @JalenHurts walk away with the Lombardi Trophy, trying to take in a pretty crazy moment. Guy who was benched in college, dismissed as a pro prospect, and kept his head down.
Great lessons for everyone in the Eagles QB’s path. pic.twitter.com/Z1ESXnjFUG
— Albert Breer (@AlbertBreer) February 10, 2025
• Lurie joins club: Eagles owner Jeffrey Lurie, who purchased the team in 1994, joined a short list of current owners with multiple Lombardi Trophies.
Robert Kraft has six since buying the Patriots that same year. Kansas City’s Clark Hunt has three since succeeding his father as owner in 2006. Dallas’ Jerry Jones has three since 1989. The Giants’ John Mara has two since succeeding his father in 2005.
Other families have won more than one, from the Glazers in Tampa to the Rooneys in Pittsburgh, but not under their current principal owners.
• Barkley to Hurts: Twenty-five carries. Fifty-seven yards. Longest gain: 10. That was the stat line for Barkley against the Chiefs.
It was enough to move Barkley past 1998 Terrell Davis for most rushing yards in a full season, counting playoffs. Barkley needed 20 games to surpass what Davis did in 19. His regular-season rushing accounted for 32 percent of the Eagles’ total yards, the third-highest rate for a leading rusher on a Super Bowl team (1998 produced the top two, with Davis at 33.6 percent and Atlanta’s Jamal Anderson at 33.0).
The chart below extends the same research to include playoff production, with a focus on Super Bowl winners since 2005. Barkley’s rushing accounted for 33 percent of Philadelphia’s total yards, the first time any back has topped 25 percent since 2004. Again, he was the engine that drove this Eagles offense — even Sunday, when the Chiefs sold out to stop him, creating opportunities for Hurts to exploit in the passing game (17 of 22, 221 yards) and as a runner himself (game-high 72 yards on 11 carries).
It’s been decades since a team won a Super Bowl by leaning so heavily on one running back. After Barkley led a league-wide renaissance at the position, is this a model to follow moving forward? An outlier?
GO DEEPER
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While running games are on the upswing across the league, the Eagles did it with the league’s best running back, best offensive line and perhaps the best defense, too. That’s a difficult formula to recreate.
• Moore to Saints: Would the market for soon-to-be New Orleans Saints coach Kellen Moore be stronger now if six of the seven teams with head-coaching vacancies had not made their hires already? Jacksonville and Dallas conducted virtual interviews with Moore, but that was the extent of his market outside New Orleans.
By leaning into the run game, Moore bucked the stereotype of the offensive coordinator who tries to help his job prospects by padding his stats through the air.
The head coach has something to do with that as well. What’s his name again?
• Credit to Sirianni: When we outlined NFC contender concerns in early December, there were two for the Eagles.
The first was their 1.3-point scoring average in first quarters, which ranked 792nd out of 796 teams since 2000 to that point in a season, per TruMedia. Philly averaged a league-leading 10.3 offensive points per game in first quarters from that moment through the playoffs. Problem solved.
The second concern for the Eagles entering the season’s final stretch: Sirianni’s temperament.
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“It is amazing how they have evolved and how Sirianni now is Coach of the Year material,” an exec from another team said at the time. “Can Sirianni keep it going another month? They have players and they have really competent coordinators. I think they learned from what happened last year. The defensive guys especially are in a better place. They have punched the clock better and more consistently as workers than they did last year.”
Mission accomplished. Sirianni handled the Super Bowl spotlight comfortably. His team was ready to play every week.
“From my perspective, working with successful teams and non-successful teams, it’s all about the head coach,” another exec said. “How is he managing all of the things at his disposal to get players to play well on Sunday? Calling plays is the most overvalued thing with a coach. Having a good game plan, having good processes, getting your guys to play hard through things. To me, that is the mark of a good coach.”
• About that OPI call: Before the Eagles pulled away, officiating threatened to become a leading storyline thanks to a call for offensive pass interference on the Eagles’ opening drive. The call wiped out a 32-yard gain on fourth-and-2, precipitating a Philly punt.
The Eagles were called for Offensive PI on this play 🟨
Do you agree with the call? pic.twitter.com/WIWgpCgRVh
— FOX Sports: NFL (@NFLonFOX) February 9, 2025
I asked four coaches to rate the call on a 1-10 scale, with 10 being at the most egregious end of the spectrum.
Their answers: 8.0, 7.5, 7.0 and … 2.0.
“Very rarely does that get called,” one of the coaches said.
Think of it another way. If officials failed to make the call, would the Chiefs submit the play to the league office for retroactive review? Probably not.
The outlier coach said he was OK with the call because the receiver, A.J. Brown, significantly hindered the defender, cornerback Trent McDuffie, in a one-way exchange that would not qualify as hand-fighting.
The coach rendering a 7.5 grade noted that the official throwing the flag, side judge Boris Cheek, ranks highly among officials at his position in penalty rate.
Fortunately for everyone but Kansas City, the call became a footnote, nothing more. The flags evened out some when a call for unnecessary roughness against McDuffie prolonged the Eagles’ second drive.
GO DEEPER
Chiefs’ DeAndre Hopkins: ‘A lot of touchy calls’ in Super Bowl LIX
(Photo: Patrick Smith / Getty Images)
