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Tim Mcmanus
Philadelphia – Jalen Hurts’s father, Aparion, was waiting for the field entrance into the Superdome when the last minutes of Super Bowl Lix detached from the clock on Sunday.
The occasional roars, the whistles and the songs of the Eagles resonated through the tunnel when Philadelphia gave the last touches to a resounding 40-22 victory over the heads of Kansas City, and the son of aptudion was about to be named MVP . Hurts, who had 293 yards and three touchdowns, definitely exceeded Patrick Mahomes. Soon, the learner would arrive in the field and share a long hug with his son, green and white confetti under his feet.
“I am so humbly happy for him. That is the first and most important thing and that is all that matters to me as a dad,” Averion said, speaking with a cadence and exuding a command that sounded and felt like Jalen.
“I cried a little earlier. And I have not cried from USC-Alabama. I had not shed a tear since then. But for any reason, it came out. So I suppose it was the right time: they won that game and won this game so obviously, the Tears brought joy and victory. “
USC-Alabama was Hurts’s first university game. He had recently graduated from Cannelview High School, where he trained him, and joined the tide. Jalen left the bank and scored four touchdowns to lead a 52-6 defeat.
Much has happened between then and now. Since becoming the first true first -year student to start for Nick Saban and take Alabama to the game of the national title in each of his first two seasons, until he is in the bank in the half -time in the 2018 championship game against Georgia and later losing the initial concert before tua tagovaila.
There was the rebound after transferring to Oklahoma, where Hurts finished second in the Heisman trophy vote before being selected by the Eagles in the second round of the NFL 2020 draft. He beat Carson Wentz for the initial work, had a season of MVP caliber in year 2 and the game of his life against the Chiefs in the Super Bowl LVII, but fell short in a 38-35 pink. The promise of a return to that stage in 2023 was shaken by a historical collapse.
There was a capture in the typically stable voice of Hurts while reflecting on some of those moments on the podium after the victory of the Super Bowl.
“It is not normal,” said Hurts, with a gray championship shirt with the matching hat that turned back, a smile briefly crawled down his face. “It has been a very unprecedented trip. It is always the beginning until it is the end.
“It means a lot: quantify all that work over the years, embrace everything, bring each challenge in front and take every joy and moment of achievement and success also and process them all as one.”
It was a different type of the year for wounds. The offensive coaching staff decided to focus more on the Saquon Barkley corridor after a 2-2 start of ball losses, seven of which were accused of injuries.
He had only three gifts the rest of the way and ended up tied in the slightest amount of field marshal in the season, helping Philadelphia reduce 10 consecutive victories. But with an aerial performance of more than 200 yards in the last seven regular season games, there were questions about whether the wounds could activate the air attack.
Hurts replied that emphatically in the NFC championship game against Washington commanders (20 of 28, 246 yards, TD) and the Super Bowl versus the Chiefs (17 of 22, 221 yards, 2 TD, 1 INT). He scored it with a 46-yard touchdown launch to Devonta Smith at the end of the third quarter that extended Philly’s advantage to 34-0.
“Upon entering this game, it was the youngest of my concerns,” said the president and CEO of the Eagles, Jeffrey Lurie, his voice barely rose about the celebration after the game in the Eagles wardrobe to a stone launch. “I knew I would play very well, as he did two years ago. You have to worry about almost everything; that is something I didn’t even think. I just said: ‘We have the quarterback.’
“He is 26 years old, incredibly clutch, he knows what he correlates with winning. Sometimes it is through the land game, sometimes it is through the air game. You must be able to do both. Today, but Jalen is a great football pitcher, a quick decision maker when he needs to be.
Always grinding, one of the challenges for the wounds that entered this season was to assume a more vocal and forward role. According to teammates, that happened.
An example of wounded by stirring his teammates with his words came on the eve of the Super Bowl Sunday. As he did in the first confrontation of the championship with the Chiefs, coach Nick Sirianni opened the floor for the players to talk during the team meeting at the hotel on Saturday night.
“I will tell you right now, I knew we were winning that football game after all the players talked in front of that room,” said defensive Sydney Brown to ESPN.
Brown quoted two people specifically after making that statement: Safety CJ Gardner-Johnson and wounds.
“I don’t know how to explain the emotion that Jalen had in his speech,” Brown said. “It was incredible. There is a reason why the super bowl MVP won. It is the best in the world.”
The players of that 2022 team have not been shy on the lasting needle of the defeat of the Super Bowl Lvii against Kansas City and how he continued feeding them two years later. At the beginning of the following season, the live transmission of a teammate during a team function inadvertently showed that Hurts had changed the blocking screen on his phone to a photo of him coming out of the field after that defeat with the red confetti and gold that fell from heaven. It is still its blocking screen to this day.
When asked if he will change it now that he has a series of celebration photos to replace him, Hurts said he can keep it as a continuous motivation to return to another Super Bowl. After all, the history of Hurts’s triumphs cannot be counted without prefabricating with the setbacks from which he has recovered.
“I saw him get out of the field under that confetti and felt his pain,” Averion said. “I just didn’t want to feel that pain again.
“And I’m so happy, I don’t feel it because he doesn’t. I’m happy for him. It’s a blessing because of how hard he works.”
