Honorable Mention: Philly Sports

- 00:00 — How the Philadelphia Eagles' season ended.
- 01:45 — What changes should people expect with Jeff Stoutland OUT and Ryan Mahaffey IN as Eagles run game coordinator?
- 12:30 — Will Mekhi Becton return to the Eagles?
- 14:45 — Do the Eagles have a Plan B to re-signing Dallas Goedert?

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Ahead of the Eagles’ wild card matchup against the San Francisco 49ers, we brought back O.J. Spivey to break down the keys to the game.

00:00:55 - What are the playoff vibes like in Philly this week?
00:02:45 - Is it too early to say Nick Sirianni made a mistake sitting starters in Week 18?
00:10:30 - What is the key matchup in Eagles vs. 49ers?
00:14:20 - LA RAMS: Largest road favorites in the Super Bowl era at Carolina?


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Ahead of Week 18, the Philadelphia Eagles’ playoff positioning is largely set. Host Matt Rogers and our guest O.J. Spivey from the Philadelphia Tribune take a look forward at the Eagles’ potential playoff matchups.
 
- 00:01:26 - Who is going to start on OL for Tanner McKee?
- 00:07:38 - Thoughts on the Eagles’ chances vs. the Rams?
- 00:09:26 - Would you prefer to play: GB, SF, or SEA?
- 00:24:25 - Confidence in the Eagles offense?
- 00:27:32 - Confidence in the Eagles defense?

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• Are the ghosts of 2023 back for the Eagles?
• How does the Eagles o-line get it fixed?
• Minor tweaks to improve the Eagles’ offense
• Carter: OUT; Herbert: Injured — Advantage?
• Sydney Brown: On the hot seat
• Concern level for the Eagles’ run defense?
• Expect a return of Slay, Becton, or neither?
• Will the Eagles wrap up the NFC East quickly?
• Who wins the AFC South?
• Who wins the NFC South
• Who wins the NFC North?
• Who wins the NFC West?

Chris Franklin is an NFL reporter for NJ Advance Media, covering anything and everything that has to do with the team. Chris joined the Eagles beat in 2020, spending the previous three years covering local news in South Jersey, including local government and the Jersey Shore. Chris has won two National Association of Black Journalists (NABJ) Salute to Excellence awards for his writing and was nominated for a third award.

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• “Jaelen Phillips has all of the tools!”
• “We’re not talking enough about the Eagles’ defense.”
• “Will Saquon get to 1,200 rushing yards?”
• “Eagles to lean on Barkley more in the passing game?”
• “Third down screens over ‘coward’s draw’, please!”
• “Good offensive minds in Philly: please stand up.”
• “Young fans don’t know how good we have it.”
• Eagles @ Cowboys: Over/Under
• Who wins the AFC North?
• Will the Broncos hold on in the AFC West?
• Who wins the NFC North?
• Who wins the NFC West?
• Eagles @ Cowboys: score prediction
• Keys to victory vs. the Bears in Week 13?

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• How does Jaelen Phillips fit with the Eagles?
• How and how much do Jaire Alexander & Michael Carter II see the field?
• Is Saquon Barkley primed for a big second half?
• Is the A.J. Brown “trade” talk finally over?
• Who wins the AFC North, AFC West, AFC North, and NFC West?
• Keys to the game and score prediction for Eagles @ Packers on MNF.

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• 01:25 - Why did Jalen throw the ball 39 times to 11 total carries on the day?
• 04:30 - “It was the same vanilla, predictable offense that we’ve been seeing the previous 4 weeks.” — Jeff Warren
• 06:28 - “If you have a running back and they were Offensive Player of the Year the year before, you might want them to have them carry the rock more than 6 times in any game — no matter what.” — Matt Rogers
• 10:05 - “I came away from the game weirdly encouraged… You’ve got to take an L. You get to roll right into Thursday against the Giants.” — Matt Rogers
• 14:50 - “I don’t usually see player props on carries, but I guaran-damn-tee y’all that we’re not going to see 6 carries from Saquon Barkley at MetLife.” — Matt Rogers
• 16:40 - Will Nakobe Dean make his season debut on Thursday night?
• Has Kelee Ringo done enough to hold onto the CB2 job?
• Will Landon Dickerson be ready to go on Thursday night?
• “The next 4 weeks you get: at Giants, at Vikings, vs. Giants again, the bye, and then you get the Packers.” — Matt Rogers

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Matt Rogers and O.J. Spivey from The Philadelphia Tribune/WDAS 105.3 preview the Week 2 Eagles vs. Chiefs “Super Bowl Rematch” and the rest of the Week 2 slate. They give their picks on: PHI @ KC, DEN @ IND, CHI @ DET, ATL @ MIN, TB @ HOU, LAC @ LV.

• • 03:38 - “Often times — as we have seen throughout the Super Bowl era… We’ve seen teams reach the Super Bowl and say ‘Oh yeah. If they just get this or they just do this, that, a third, they can get back.’ And some never get back. And, as we’ve seen, a couple have gone back but they haven’t gotten it done.” — O.J. Spivey

• • 04:20 - “It’s not even a guarantee that you’ll even make the playoffs the following season. Every year (and I get these stats directly from the NFL) since 1990 — this even predates the current format of realignment or the 2002 realignment — (free agency, salary cap, etc.): there will always be at least 4 new teams that have made the playoffs who missed the playoffs the previous year.” — O.J. Spivey

• • 05:45 - “I always say when I talk about football: the Eli Manning example. All you need is a ticket to the dance and think things can just fall the way they need to and you end up with your team’s colored confetti.” — Matt Rogers

• • 09:58 - “Landon Dickerson has been a full participant in practice this week, but he was a little banged up. So that’s going to be a little interesting to see. But, as we saw in the Super Bowl, Chris Jones: he was not a factor at all.” — O.J. Spivey

• • 12:05 - “I think it appears as though he [Zadarius Smith] got in a full week of practice and he’s so eager and energetic when he spoke with the media this week. He looks in tremendous shape — by the way.  I’d say maybe about up to 25% of the snaps perhaps.” — O.J. Spivey

• • 14:20 - “Is it going to be no-step-drop, throw to whoever Adoree Jackson is guarding? Because last week he was BBQ chicken. They were just licking their fingers. They had BBQ dripping all in their stache’ and in their beards.” — Matt Rogers

• • 16:20 - “You brought up Ringo. I didn’t want to bring up Ringo, but now that we’ve brought up Ringo, it’s pretty crystal-clear that Ringo’s not the guy. They went and got Jakorian Bennett. They’ve got Adoree out there getting roasted last week and Ringo’s still on the side sticking to just the Special Teams duty. I don’t think I saw Ringo with any snaps.” — Matt Rogers

• • 21:05 - “What fans have to realize is that winning teams are not good for the sports-talk business. Sports radio thrives off of losing. Sports radio thrives off of having fans to vent that ‘oh yeah this team sucks’, or ‘fire the coach’, ‘fire this’, ‘get rid of this guy; get rid of that guy.’ When you have a winning team, such as the Eagles and you have an elite superstar, Super Bowl MVP QB in Jalen Hurts, you have nothing left to do but to conjure up from the sublime to the ridiculous.” — O.J. Spivey

• • 23:10 - “A.J. is saying all of the right things — for the most part. But you see little inklings here and there. Of course he wants the ball; we all understand that. DeVonta Smith wants the ball. But you see media guys are trying to chip away; trying to get them to say something... A.J. has to be careful… We’re talking about Jalen Carter not taking the bait. A.J. can’t take the bait.” — O.J. Spivey

• • 33:28 - “I do think — oddly — somehow, someway that Adoree Jackson is going to find his way hands to having the football in his hands. He’s going to get a lot of opportunities to make it happen, too.” — Matt Rogers

• • 35:10 - “If y’all re-watch the run … I don’t mean to throw him under the bus. Adoree, if you’re listening: hey, [this is] tackling fuel. But on that long run to Miles Sanders before the fumble, watch Adoree Jackson on that play.” — Matt Rogers

• • 47:30 - “Whether you are a critic of [C.J.] Stroud or not, it’s looking like they are doing him a disservice. And the way that line has been looking — going back from the second round of the playoffs to last week — Stroud might not get through this season healthy if this keeps going. Something has to give.” — O.J. Spivey

• • 48:12 - “I think C.J. Stroud made a big mistake. Even if he decided, in his own head, that he wanted to say, ‘I’m him; I’ve figured out the NFL.’ But when you say that … This is a league people are paying mortgages on and their mamas’ mortgages and their cousins’; generational wealth. People like a Todd Bowles will take offense at that. ‘Oh, you’ve figured this out?’” — Matt Rogers

• ⁃ 51:31 - “What were they telling Jalen Hurts a few years ago? No more excuses. No more excuses for Justin Herbert. If there is a time where you can slay the dragon, dethrone the champion Kansas City Chiefs. He’s supposed to have his coach now, right? No more excuses.”

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• 00:02:18 - “Jalen Hurts just threw a monkey-wrench into all of what society has been taught — or has been programmed, if you will — about what a quarterback should look like; how a quarterback should win.”
• 00:05:00 - “People want to act like Saquon ran for 200 in the Super Bowl. Nobody wants to actually reckon with the reality that the exact narrative they’ve been pushing for Week 1 of the [2025] NFL season is the exact narrative they pushed … ‘If you shut down Saquon …’” - 
• 00:11:00 - “When you watch the team that plays in Philadelphia with the green helmets, do they get over those yellow lines they put on the TV and those goal lines? … I thought that was what the game was about.”
• 00:12:45 - “Last I checked, the Bills run the ‘Tush Push’: this vaunted thing; this unstoppable play that just only Philadelphia can run. Somehow Josh Allen was trying to run it in the game two weeks previous to when the Eagles kicked the Chiefs’ teeth in. And Josh Allen wasn’t getting those first downs.”
• 00:19:48 - “I’d be really shocked if Kelee Ringo isn’t [the starting CB2].”
• 00:22:30 - “I don’t know if they are just maybe smoke-screening a little but or because Mukuba has been out nursing an injury — Cooper DeJean has been getting snaps at safety. I really would not want that.”
• 00:30:55 - Will second-year WR Johnny Wilson make the team?
• 00:43:00 - Will new Phillies closer Jhoan Duran give the Phillies some consistency?
• 00:47:35 - Will the Phillies be able to resign Ranger Suarez?

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• 01:55 - What is holding the Phillies back from being a consistent team?
• 05:50 - “I think of [Steven] Kwan … You just put him in left [field] and leave him there. That’s nice. That gives them another roster spot essentially because he’d essentially be replacing two players and not just one.”
• 05:55 - “Eugenio Suarez is the big right-handed bat that’s available at the deadline. If I’m the Phillies, I’m still in on him because Alec Bohm is out right now and you don’t know how quickly he’ll be back. I would just get him and figure out the rest later.”
• 10:27 - “To me, the [Alec] Bohm injury is a stark reminder that after next week, you can’t add any more players — period. It’s not like the old days when you could make waiver trades.”
• 11:50 - Which of the available closers actually ends up in Philadelphia at the trade deadline?
• 14:45 - Could the Phillies possibly get OF Byron Buxton from the Minnesota Twins?
• 15:45 -  “Watching [Jesus] Luzardo the other night, I think it’s very, very clear… And there is a good camera angle. You can go back and look. When he is pitching in the stretch — meaning runners on base — he is very much tipping his pitches.”
• 18:05 - “I don’t need him [Andrew Painter] to come up this year if it’s not time. Or maybe if he does come up in September, maybe he’s not even starting.”
• 19:05 - “Felix Bautista is out with an injury now so he’s probably not going be moved.”

• ⁃ 21:10 - Will the Phillies and Mets keep trading control of the division to a photo-finish?

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