PHILADELPHIA - The Eagles didn’t just keep their backup quarterback plan quiet this week. They kept it quiet right up until game day.
About 90 minutes before kickoff against the Washington Commanders, the inactives answered the question that had been bouncing around all week: Andy Dalton will back up Jalen Hurts. That means Tanner McKee, who held the top backup role last year ahead of Sam Howell, is not the No. 2 for this one.
Head coach Nick Sirianni had spent the week declining to tip his hand, and he framed the decision as part of the competitive process.
“We want everybody to compete and to work their butt off,” said the coach. “I don't think there's a negative to have them both preparing as if they're the No.
- When we make decisions of when to tell guys certain things, again, we make that decision for what's best for our football team and then we move on from there.
Both those guys had to prepare this entire week as if they're the number two quarterback. I don't see a negative in that.”
Dalton, who turns 39 at the end of October, is in his 16th season, and he said the week felt like business as usual.
“It's what we've been doing this whole time, so I guess it's nothing new at this point,” said Dalton. “We're handling it the same as that we've handled it from the beginning.”
McKee, meanwhile, is in the final year of his rookie contract and is likely headed elsewhere after the season unless the Eagles decide to give him a fair market-value deal. A trade is also on the table. He never fully looked settled in Sean Mannion’s new offensive scheme, though Dalton could be moved as well.
McKee said the process of learning a new offense still has value for a quarterback, even when the results aren’t always neat.
“I feel like any time that you can learn a new offense as a quarterback, I think is great,” said McKee. “Just seeing different perspective because, like for the most part, you run similar plays. It’s how you're gonna read it, what's the window dressing before and after the play.?
“The plays are generally similar but just having a different way of looking at them or reading a different guy or how, tagging this on the backside instead of the front side, I feel like is very eye-opening for a quarterback and it just allows you to grow as a football player.”
For the Eagles, the backup spot is usually a footnote as long as Hurts stays upright and handles the whole game - on Sunday, and ideally all season. But football has a way of making the emergency plan matter, as Seattle found in the season opener on Wednesday. Sam Darnold left after five plays with a hip injury, and Drew Lock finished the job in a win over the Patriots.
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