Philadelphia Eagles will NOT be on HBO Hard Knocks this year

The Philadelphia Eagles will NOT be the NFL team featured on this year’s edition of HBO series Hard Knocks. Eagles Chariman and CEO Jeffrey Lurie confirmed as much on Tuesday evening.

The Eagles were one of eight teams eligible to be forced by the NFL to be featured on this year’s show. Teams that can’t be forced onto Hard Knocks have to meet at least one of the following three conditions:

1 - Have a first-year head coach

2 - Have been featured on Hard Knocks at least once in the last 10 years

3 - Have appeared in the playoffs at least once in the past two seasons

Thus, the Eagles could have been forced into doing the show since:

1 - Doug Pederson was a rookie head coach last year in 2016

2 - The Eagles have never been featured on Hard Knocks

3 - The Eagles haven’t made a playoff appearance since the 2013 regular season

But now we know they won’t be on this year. In a way, that’s a bummer because it would be cool to get a behind-the-scenes look at at the team. But a lot of people would also be against it because some view Hard Knocks as a potential distraction.

The Eagles will need to make the playoffs this season in order to make sure they can’t be forced into doing it next year. Or they could fire Pederson but that’s certainly not ideal.

So who will be on Hard Knocks? Remaining eligible teams include the: Tennessee Titans, New Orleans Saints, Tampa Bay Buccaneers, and Chicago Bears. The Indianapolis Colts, Baltimore Ravens, and Cleveland Browns are also theoretically eligible but their owners said their teams won’t be featured this year.