Does Jalen Hurts deserve an apology from the media?
His head coach certainly thinks so. And since Philadelphia clinched the NFC, it’s open season on the Eagles quarterback’s critics. Emmanuel Acho has been one of the loudest, admonishing Hurts’ detractors as “stupid,” but the conversation is starting to get much more nuanced than that.
Michael Irvin says he’ll only apologize to Hurts if the Eagles QB takes down Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs in the Super Bowl.
For Keyshawn Johnson, though, an apology is long overdue.
“He deserves an apology from people who talked about his ability to throw the football,” said Johnson on his All Facts No Brakes with Keyshawn Johnson podcast. “His ability to throw the football — wanting, like he said in his presser the other day. He is not worried about the statistical side of the game like everybody else.
“Everybody else go[es] to the box score; they don’t care if he was 22-of-58. They don’t care if it said 500 yards. ‘Oh my God.’ He’s not caught up in that. So, I think the people that look at the boxscores and not looking at the game and understanding the game owes him an apology.”
As he read off an ad sponsor from Oikos, Johnson intertwined it with Hurts’ performance in a 55-23 win over the Washington Commanders in the NFC Championship Game: 20-of-28, 246 yards passing, one passing touchdown and three rushing. And in the process, he clinched his second Super Bowl appearance as a starter in four years.
Now, all he has to do, according to Johnson, is “cap it off with a W.”
“This is why I say we owe him an apology because people kept saying going into these games in the playoffs, ‘They can’t throw the ball. They can’t do this; can’t do that.’ Well, the dude put the ball in the air,” Johnson said.
The debate between Johnson and Irvin eventually devolved into a game of semantics, with them arguing whether Hurts’ three rushing touchdowns and one passing touchdown were enough to prove he wasn’t just a run-first quarterback.
Johnson wasn’t bothered by the details — 28 points are 28 points.
But Irvin argued it mattered because Hurts wants to make his mark as a quarterback. He doesn’t want to be remembered just for scrambling; he’s aiming to be known for his overall game.
“As long as I keep compiling my Ws, f*ck everybody,” said Johnson.
About Sam Neumann
Since the beginning of 2023, Sam has been a staff writer for Awful Announcing and The Comeback. A 2021 graduate of Temple University, Sam is a Charlotte native, who currently calls Greenville, South Carolina his home. He also has a love/hate relationship with the New York Mets and Jets.