They knew it was coming. You knew it was coming. EVERYONE knew it was coming.

And still the Eagles had no idea how to stop it.

One of the lingering memories of the wild-card loss in Tampa was the Bucs blitzing on just about every snap and the Eagles looking like they hadn’t spent one minute preparing for it.

The Eagles’ inability to deal with the blitz was one of the biggest reasons for their 32-9 loss to the Bucs and one of the biggest reasons for their late-season collapse.

And fixing it has been one of the biggest priorities of the offseason.

Kellen Moore is here for a lot of reasons, but his proven ability to provide a quarterback with answers vs. pressure is a huge part of it.

“It's just having a clean tool box,” Moore said. “There's a lot of different things we can do. Just making sure it's clean, effective. As you build it, you've got to continue to evolve so that one week maybe your answer is a certain play, then maybe the next week you've got to make the adjustment off of that.

“Ultimately, those guys have to be aligned and on the same page … where we can have the answers necessary to handle the different challenges that defenses present.”

Moore isn’t the only new piece in the blitz pickup equation. One of the big challenges for Cam Jurgens as he replaces Jason Kelce is understanding how defenses are attacking and setting protections to account for extra rushers.

“You're not going to be right every time so you just have to make sure you have answers when you're not right,” Jurgens said. “If you’re not right but you have answers, then you’re right. So just being confident in what we're all doing, we're all on the same page. 

“There's too many times last year where we weren't all on the same page.”

Working on protections and blitz pick-up was clearly a priority during training camp.

But with the offensive starters sitting out all the preseason games, there’s no way to know exactly how much progress the Eagles actually made.

“I think we've gotten better in all aspects,” Jalen Hurts said. “I think as a football team, we've taken steps in the right direction and now we have the opportunity to assess where we are and that's the exciting part about it.”

Let’s take a look at some numbers from last year. Yeah, sorry. We have to.

According to Pro Football Focus, when Hurts was blitzed he completed 62.6 percent of his passes for 1,491 yards but with eight touchdowns and eight interceptions and 15 sacks on 241 drop-backs. 

When he wasn’t blitzed, according to PFF, Hurts completed 67.3 percent of his passes for 2,367 yards with 15 touchdowns, seven interceptions and 21 sacks on 381 dropbacks.

Passer rating when blitzed: 80.5.

Passer rating when not blitzed: 94.7.

There’s plenty of blame to be spread around here. Hurts could have made better decisions at times. Brian Johnson was the one calling the plays and isn’t without fault. But ultimately, the Eagles’ failures against the blitz are on Nick Sirianni, who has given Moore total control of the offense this year.

“I think he came out and addressed it in a great manner,” backup quarterback Tanner McKee said of Moore. “’This is what happened last year, we had problems with pressure, and we needed to address it.’ He said, ‘These are our answers, this is what we’re going to do.’ 

“I think it’s great answers and great game plans. We have different schemes that we’re going to get to or different protections. Just different rules on what we’re going to have that we can apply and beat those pressures that … we didn’t really establish super well last year. 

“We’re putting that now at the forefront. It’s going to be more an emphasis and more in focus this year.” 

In Moore’s four years as the Cowboys’ offensive coordinator, Dak Prescott had the 5^th-lowest sack percentage in the NFL – 4.4 percent of his dropbacks. Hurts in three years with Sirianni is at 6.6 percent – 8^th-highest. Now, a lot of that is because Prescott and Hurts are different sort of quarterbacks.

But Moore does have a proven track record with this stuff.

Look at Prescott’s stats against the blitz and not against the blitz from 2019 through 2022, the four years Moore was his O.C.:

Not blitzed: 68 percent, 59 TDs, 28 INTs, 11.3 yards per completion, 97.2 rating.

Blitzed: 64 percent, 40 TDs, 12 INTs, 13.9 yards per completion, 107.7 rating.

So he was more accurate when he wasn’t blitzed but made more plays down the field when he was blitzed. This is what you want from your quarterback, to make quick decisions and use the blitz as an opportunity.

The Eagles have weapons who should be available for Hurts when he’s blitzed. Between Dallas Goedert, Saquon Barkley and Kenny Gainwell, he’s got three receivers who know how to get open underneath the coverage and make plays in the middle of the field against pressure.

“Obviously, at the end of last year, we had a lot of pressure, and we struggled with it,” McKee said. “We’re expecting to see pressure at the beginning of the season, so we’ve got to get those fixed. 

“We know it’s going to happen. We know it’s going to come. We’re going to have answers for it. We’re going to be able to address it and move the ball down the field.” 

The best offenses are the ones that don’t just diagnose blitzes but make big plays against them.

And the Eagles have the weapons to make big plays.

“Somebody's covering A.J. Brown, DeVonta, 1-on-1,” Jurgens said. “So let's get the ball out and make people pay for that.”

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