The bye week apparently did Jalen Hurts and his ailing left knee some good.
After the Eagles’ 28-23 win over the Cowboys in Week 9, Hurts said that selfishly the Eagles’ bye week couldn’t have come at a better time. And as the Eagles returned to practice on Thursday, Hurts seemed optimistic about the benefits of that extra rest.
“Yeah, definitely got some time out of it,” Hurts said. “That was the one thing that I kept saying.”
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While he’s never eager to talk about his injuries, Hurts on Thursday did confirm that he wasn’t wearing a sleeve or brace on his left knee during the first practice of the week as the Eagles began to prepare to face the Chiefs in a Super Bowl rematch on Monday night.
That is an especially good sign.
“Yeah, I think time is a sign of progress,” Hurts said. “As I said, the bye week came at a great time. We all took advantage of that or tried to take advantage of that time off. Everything is trending forward.”
Hurts, 25, has been dealing with this knee injury — which is reportedly a bone bruise — for several weeks. It was obvious that Hurts was hampered by the injury before the Eagles broke for their Week 10 bye. Against the Cowboys and the Commanders in Weeks 8 and 9, Hurts had a total of 42 yards rushing and was visibly limping at times.
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Despite the injury, though, Hurts was masterful from inside the pocket. Against the Commanders, he completed 76% of his passes for 319 yards and 4 touchdowns and against the Cowboys he completed 73% of his passes for 207 yards and 2 touchdowns. He also didn’t throw an interception in back-to-back weeks for the first time all season.
Hurts has clearly vaulted himself into the MVP conversation and is second at +300 in MVP odds behind just Patrick Mahomes (+260).
But in order for Hurts to be at his peak performance, he needs to have a little bit more mobility than we saw in those games before the bye week. Hurts has dealt with injuries in back-to-back Decembers, so the thought of him being healthier for this playoff push is exciting.
We’ll find out on Monday night just how much good the time off really did.
“Yeah, as I said, the bye couldn’t have come at a better time,” Hurts said. “I think a lot of the guys took advantage of that time, just being able to refresh, obviously getting ready for the second half of this year. I think it’s been good for us all.”
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