Following the Philadelphia Eagles‘ brutal 34-17 defeat to the New York Giants on Thursday, October 9, 2025, which saw quarterback Jalen Hurts throw one interception and miss several key throws, former Eagles linebacker Seth Joyner fiercely defended the team’s franchise star.

Joyner’s defense came as Head Coach Nick Sirianni faced questions about potential offensive play-calling changes after the offense was shut out in the second half. Taking to his social media handle X, he captioned a video that he shared on QB Jalen Hurt’s situation as:

“For sure! I’m concerned about my QB, but I’m not jumping ship on him! And I’m not gonna sit by while doubters and haters trash a defending Super Bowl champion and MVP! Like no other QB in the #NFL has had a rough patch! Go Birds.”

Hurts wasn’t just bad on Thursday; he made two game-changing mistakes that directly impacted the direction of the Eagles’ game. First came the missed opportunity. In the third quarter, he overthrew a wide-open DeVonta Smith for what should have been an easy 89-yard touchdown. There’s simply no excuse for that kind of miss from an MVP. Instead of seven points, the Eagles punted, and the Giants immediately marched down the field for a touchdown, pushing their lead to 27-17.

The second error came during the early fourth quarter. Hurts, driving to cut the deficit to one score, threw his first interception of the season. His out-route to Jahan Dotson near the goal line was perfectly anticipated by cornerback Cor’Dale Flott, who took it 68 yards the other way. The Giants scored soon after, sealing the loss. To add salt to the wound, Hurts had an open A.J. Brown waiting in the end zone.

Joyner is still sticking to his point, elaborated by arguing that even the league’s best quarterbacks have off days, pointing directly to a recent slump by the Chiefs’ star:

“Every damn QB struggles, I don’t care who it is… Patrick Mahomes on the first five weeks struggled. He looked good last night but the first five games he looked like an average fr**kin QB. But we want to beat our QB up. And I am concerned about him? Yes.”

On the other side, former Eagles quarterback Ron Jaworski analyzed Hurts‘ mistakes and suggested the problem is that Hurts is now playing by a “hyper-cautious approach.” His fear of making mistakes has replaced the aggressive “clutch gene” from his Super Bowl run, resulting in a predictable and stagnant offense where he misses open receivers (like DeVonta Smith for an 89-yard TD and A.J. Brown in the end zone) by throwing passes away, taking sacks, or forcing throws like his interception to Cor’Dale Flott.

Nick Sirianni still has faith in Eagles offensive coordinator Kevin Patullo

Nick Sirianni is standing by his staff despite recent struggles. When he met with the media last Monday, he was adamant that there would be no immediate changes, especially as he expressed full confidence in his offensive coordinator, Kevin Patullo. Sirianni framed the team’s issues not as a fault of one individual. Talking to the press, he said,

 “Yeah, like I said earlier, not in this sport is it ever on one person, and we’re not in the business of assigning blame… We’re in the business of finding solutions. As we watched the tape today, it was a little on everything, and that’s this game of team football.”

For a solution, for a better game play in week 7, Sirianni mentioned that Patullo has already met with the offense, and their key focus is improving efficiency on first and second downs. This is a direct attempt to avoid getting into so many third-and-long situations, which have been a major weak spot for the team.

A big area critics are pointing to is the struggles with the running game. Patullo has been criticized for not sticking with the run even when it’s working. The recent Giants game is a perfect example: Barkley got off to a hot start with over 30 yards rushing on the very first drive, but finished the entire game with only 58 yards, suggesting Patullo abandoned the successful run game prematurely. The team needs to really do well in their upcoming game.