CARNAGE: The Philadelphia Eagles didn't only win Super Bowl LIX...
... they pumped life into the sport itself. Here's our column from the Superdome, where Josh Sweat, Cooper DeJean and the Eagles left the back-to-back champs bloodied and beaten.
NEW ORLEANS — The quarterback beaten to a pulp ambled toward the postgame microphone, took a seat and pointed the finger directly at himself. Immediately, Patrick Mahomes cited the turnovers, the “14 points I gave them.” He tried to stay optimistic. These Kansas City Chiefs are young, he told us, and they’ll learn from the experience.
Such grace in defeat is admirable. Nobody was open, he ran for his life and Mahomes himself was sloppy — a brutal combo.
But there’s nothing to technically learn.
At no point this offseason will Mahomes nestle into a La-Z-Boy with a cup of tea, tap open his tablet, study film for three hours and shout to his wife: “Aha! That’s why we lost!” There was no super-secret schematic answer to a drubbing that wasn’t nearly as close as its 40-22 final score. Super Bowl LIX was more corporal punishment than classroom lecture. One team — the Philadelphia Eagles — unlooped the belt from its waist, pinned its ends together and wailed away.
From Drive No. 1 on, this was a merciless flogging. There was no place for Mahomes to hide. The Eagles scored. The Chiefs took over. The humiliation only deepened. Those fans booing Taylor Swift in the first half were soon chanting “WE WANT WENTZ!” and mocking the Chiefs’ chop by the second half. Honestly? Sitting down the quarterback who’s won three rings would’ve been a compassionate decision.
Regardless of who won, who lost, tens of millions of viewers were treated to the same beautiful gift.
Super Bowl LIX was a resounding triumph for the sanctity of football.
Moments later, on the other side of the black curtain dividing this interview room, Josh Sweat took a seat. The edge rusher who compiled 2.5 of his team’s six sacks thought Mahomes was able to keep his composure much of the game. “But,” he adds, “you could see hints of it as it went on.” He wasn’t studying the quarterback’s demeanor. “But,” he adds, “it had to be getting to him for sure.”
At halftime, the Eagles had more points (24) than the Chiefs had yards (23). Kansas City had one first down. Mahomes’ passer rating was 10.7. The score was 34-0 by the time Kansas City finally advanced the ball past the 50-yard line. A swarm of midnight-green bodies relentlessly pressured Mahomes and — most importantly — hit Mahomes. Unlike other teams, they weren’t worried about how the game would be officiated. Instead, these Eagles played with a level of hostility these Chiefs hadn’t experienced in 1,463 days… the last time they lost a Super Bowl.
“To be real,” Sweat said, “we’re just competing with each other out here. That’s what it is. When we come back, we want to outplay each other. That’s what’s setting the bar for each of us. We want the bragging rights. That’s how we push each other. We want to see who can get it done.”
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Despite the 10-cent-head suits on Park Avenue instructing officials to splatter the gridiron with laundry, football will never be “safe.” Nor should it be “safe.” This is a violent sport that requires violent people, and the Eagles possess those specimens in droves. Football should forever serve as the ultimate test of manhood that weeds out the meek, the weak. This sport is either for you, or not. And if it’s not, that’s OK.
There’s the soccer ball. There’s the tennis racket. Have at it, sport.
Despite the finest efforts of the booming X-and-O Industrial Media Complex, football cannot be nerdified. All week, all mainstream outlets pried your eyes open and obsessed over film. Some of it is useful, but most of it is overkill. Telestrators do not win championships, no, destroying the man in front of you (repeatedly) does. It’s as true now as it’s been since the 2000s… the 90s… the 80s… the 70s… right back to the last team to win three titles in a row: Vince Lombardi’s Green Bay Packers of the 60s. Whereas the NBA has become nothing but dunks, 3-pointers and flops — a beautiful sport corrupted by analytics — we can all breathe a sigh of relief. Rejoice fellow lovers of real football.
Mathematical equations will not devour America’s true pastime.
This year, we have the Eagles to thank.
Blocking and tackling still wins. Football, at its core, is still won by physically pummeling the man in front of you.
Years from now, be sure to remind your wives, your husbands, your friends and co-workers how this title was won.
Let’s not let historians gloss over how these Eagles ambushed a dynasty on Feb. 9, 2025.
Quarterback Jalen Hurts enjoyed a splendid evening at the office, completing 17 of 22 passes for 221 yards with 72 rushing yards and three total touchdowns. The pictures and videos of Hurts clutching hardware went viral deep into the night. After losing in such crushing fashion two years ago, this one was sweet on a personal level. But this night, Hurts was not the No. 1 reason the Eagles won. This victory was the New York Giants mauling Tom Brady in ’07 and ‘11. This was the “Legion of Boom” Seattle Seahawks eating Peyton Manning whole in ’13. This was the ‘15 Denver Broncos rendering MVP quarterback Cam Newton a Temu knockoff. This was the Tampa Bay Buccaneers chasing Mahomes around for 497 yards’ worth of sacks and scrambles in ’20.
Quarterbacks tend to become mythical figures in pro football. Guilty as charged. But they’re not invincible, they’re not bulletproof.
This game — like all of those — was about the defense. As if the Buffalo Bills and all AFC victims who’ve been Mahomes’d politely tapped Vic Fangio on the shoulder and asked him to take care of the high-school bully who keeps giving them swirlies in the bathroom. The Eagles defensive coordinator blitzed exactly zero times and still managed to pressure Mahomes 26 times with 11 quarterback hits. There was no need to sacrifice bodies in coverage, so those other seven players blanketed Kansas City’s receivers.
It was obvious from the get-go that this would be a miserable night for Kansas City.
From our press seat, you could see it all happening the first two drives. Mahomes scanned the field. Nothing. Philadelphia collapsed the pocket. Scramble. Mahomes bobbed his head around. Nothing. Nobody could break free and it also doesn’t help that tight end Travis Kelce, the man who’s caught more postseason passes than anyone in NFL history, is now Patrick Ewing posting up on the block for the Orlando Magic. Give him a cane, dentures, the senior-citizen discount. Kelce is cooked.
It was fascinating to hear Sweat describe the mentality of the Eagles’ defensive line. All players up front view the concept of “blitzing” as a slap to their face.
Any help rushing the quarterback is an insulting gesture.
Said Sweat: “We don’t like when we got to send extra guys and stuff. That’s our pride to be able to just four-man rush it — and get it done.”
That’s why the 6-foot-5, 265-pounder from Chesapeake, Va., could only laugh when asked about having the game of his life. (“I was just in the right place!" I was just running around. I’m like, ‘Hey, let me go crazy.’”) Fangio pulled the correct levers and, in all, seven different players hit Mahomes. Even the greats get rattled. Difference here is that Mahomes appeared rattled extremely quickly.
A quarterback who went an NFL-record 83 drives without a turnover suffered two costly mistakes that effectively ended the game before Kendrick Lamar took the stage.
First came the pick-six to rookie cornerback Cooper DeJean, who pounced on Mahomes’ attempt to fit a tight-window throw to DeAndre Hopkins. Next came the Zack Baun interception. It was both a poor throw that Mahomes admittedly “sailed” and a highly athletic play by the All Pro linebacker who spent four seasons as a backup in this same stadium for the New Orleans Saints. Two snaps later, Hurts connected with wide receiver A.J. Brown for a 12-yard touchdown to go up 24-0 with 1:35 remaining in the second quarter.
Rout on. Game over.
A towel draped around his neck, tape around his wrists, white Nike gloves still on, DeJean took a seat on his 22nd birthday with a Super Bowl Champs t-shirt over his shoulder pads. Look closely and you’ll also spot the “712” area code inscribed on his cleats with an arrow pointing to the “215” area code. A nod toward his journey from the western swath of Iowa to Philly. It’s been quite the calendar year for this rookie cornerback. Back in a mid-November practice in 2023, DeJean fractured his fibula for the Hawkeyes. The injury was a massive blow to the draft stock of this Big Ten human highlight reel.
So, Go Long asked DeJean if he ever could’ve imagined a storybook night like this back when he couldn’t run, couldn’t train, had no clue what his NFL future entailed.
“I didn’t,” DeJean said. “From not going where I wanted to in the draft to falling here. I think it was a blessing in disguise being able to get drafted to this organization and put my best foot forward every single day for the people in the building and now we won the Lombardi Trophy.”
The “Cooooooop!” chants roared in what was an overwhelming pro-Eagles crowd.
DeJean lived the dream of every kid who’s ever picked up a football.
He, too, credited the pressure up front. Unlike so many victims past, these Eagles were never psyched out by the big, bad Chiefs. They didn’t try piecing together a completely new gameplan just because Andy Reid and Mahomes were on the other sideline. Instead, head coach Nick Sirianni and Fangio stuck with exactly what’s worked all season long: Rush four, tighten passing windows in coverage, savagely rally to the ball. Do all of this, while stopping the run in Cover 4, and turnovers are a guarantee.
Philadelphia refused to over-complicate the sport. Coaches saw no upside to changing anything on the sports world’s grandest stage.
“They helped us prepare this whole week,” DeJean said. “We just had to focus on us. It’s about us. What we do on that field. We know we have the guys to go out there and play well as a defense and as a team as a whole.”
For the 66-year-old Fangio, this was a crowning achievement. DeJean has seen the DC pour himself into the players all season, and make no mistake: the Eagles viewed themselves as Super Bowl contenders since August. Even the rookie from Iowa could see the title potential. A rocky 2-2 start didn’t shake confidence. Hard conversations were had, the Eagles fixed what needed to be fixed, beefs were handled and the result was a pulverizing tour de force: Sixteen wins over their next 17 games.
“We prepared like any other game,” Sweat said. “That was our big emphasis this week. Just don’t make it bigger than any other game. Prepare for the next one. Prepare for the opponent. We didn’t do anything different. I’m telling you. Nothing. He just called the game and we just executed it.”
The Eagles knew they needed to hit Mahomes early, often and that their barrage of pressure would be too much. Sweat was often the tip of that spear living in the KC backfield and Sweat will now be paid handsomely in free agency.
During the game, Sweat started telling himself: “Nothing can go wrong for us right now!”
“This is just that day,” he said. “It’s just who’s it going to be? That’s all it was.”
The Chiefs will be back. It’s not time to kill off dynasty talk. But there’s really nothing Reid could’ve done differently in the gameplan to change the outcome in NOLA — Philly simply kicked their teeth in. Much like the New England Patriots reinventing themselves between Super Bowl runs, they’ve got no choice but to make some structural changes. GM Brett Veach must make this team tougher up front.
Because, as detailed, an epic defensive performance like this doesn’t materialize out of thin air.
This took guts in the offseason. Eagles general manager Howie Roseman drafted Jalen Carter ninth overall when other teams were horrified of what they heard at the University of Georgia. He welcomed back the NFL’s No. 1 trash talker in safety C.J. Gardner-Johnson. He gave a starting opportunity to Baun, a special-teamer. And wayyyyy back to the 2018 NFL Draft — at the 130th overall pick in Round 4 — the Eagles GM selected a defensive end out of Florida State named Josh Sweat whose leg once snapped in half during an extra-point play in high school.
Forget Super Bowls. The doctor told Sweat there was a 98 percent chance he’d never even play football again after this knee dislocation. And, oh. One more thing. There was also a good chance he’d need amputation. Artery damage was expected, thus no blood would flow to the bottom of his leg.
As he walked out of the interview room — back toward an Eagles locker room transforming into a club — I reminded Sweat all about that 2014 night on a hospital bed.
No way could he ever have imagined winning a Super Bowl back when he was staring down at his mangled leg.
At a loss for words, a sparkling piercing on his cheek, Sweat smiles and shakes his head.
“I didn’t. I didn’t,” he says. “I couldn’t even imagine being a Super Bowl champion, playing the best team in the league, man.”
Off he went to party in the locker room. Wins do not get any sweeter, any more satisfying than kicking the ever-loving snot out of a team.
But it’s not only these 2024 Eagles who should celebrate.
Love football? Real football? Crack open a beer. Relax. Enjoy the offseason.
The sport’s future itself remains fully preserved.
Super Bowl LIX stories from New Orleans:
Talent vs. Vibes: How the Philadelphia Eagles avoided an 'avalanche' to get to Super Bowl LIX
Scorched Earth: Xavier Worthy is only getting started with the Kansas City Chiefs
Pod: How the Kansas City Chiefs mentally BURY you, with Joshua Brisco
Happy Hour Replay: Eli Manning HOF debate, Nick Sirianni & Bland Tom Brady with SI's Conor Orr
Nice piece of journalism Tyler!
Thanks for your candid, informative, and entertaining coverage and commentary on the Super Bowl.
Good story to top off a week of solid reporting, Tyler. Mr. Matlock (directly above) pointed out that the Kansas City footballers were skin-of-the-teeth victors a dozen times during the season, often against mid- to bottom-end teams. And yet, most of the NFL media, Tyler Dunne included, predicted Kansas City would win this game late, led down on the field on another gallant game-winning drive by the most recent G.O.A.T candidate, Paddy Mahomes. Why did every one, including the CEO of GoLongTD.com, discount the physicality of the 2024 Philadelphia Eagles? I’ll answer my own question: Because they are birds of the same feather.
Former Minnesota U.S. Senator Eugene McCarthy once said the media was like a large flock of blackbirds. One lands on a power line, then a few seconds later, another one lands. Then another, and still another. Before you know it, the entire flock sits comfortably on that wire strung between two poles. After a spell, one bird takes off, then another, then two more, then three and four and suddenly they are all gone.
This game was 34 nil with three minutes left in the third quarter and it was 40-6 halfway through the fourth quarter. How could so many football experts be so utterly wrong? Flock if I know.