Eagles beat Jets in Gardner Minshew’s first Philly start, 33 to 18

The Philadelphia Eagles are 6-7 after beating the New York Jets on Sunday. Final score: 33 to 18.

Minshew Mania was in effect early on with the Eagles’ backup quarterback lighting up a bad Jets secondary. The Birds needed him to be sharp with their defense inexcusably struggling against a suspect Jets offense early on.

Jonathan Gannon’s unit eventually settled in and the Eagles were able to use their run game to protect their lead. All told, the Eagles did exactly what was expected in terms of comfortably beating one of the league’s very worst teams.

The bad news for the Eagles is they left this game with two key injuries: both Miles Sanders and Jason Kelce left the game in the fourth quarter. The good news is that players will have an opportunity to rest up during the bye week.

Speaking of injured players, it’ll be really interesting to see what the Eagles do at quarterback after this performance. One would assume Jalen Hurts will retake his starting job ... but Minshew did his best to give the team something to think about. He finished the game with the following stat line: 20/25 (80% completion), 242 yards (9.7 average), 2 TD, 0 INT, and a 133.7 passer rating.

Read on for a recap and stay tuned for BGN’s postgame coverage.

FIRST QUARTER

• The Eagles won the coin toss and elected to defer. The Eagles immediately surrendered a 79-yard kick return Braxton Berrios. Not a good start! Five plays later, Zach Wilson hit Elijah Moore for a 3-yard touchdown. The Jets’ kicker missed the extra point. EAGLES 0, JETS 6.

• Gardner Minshew’s first snap appeared to be a miscommunication with him getting tackled for no gain. It wasn’t a bad omen, however, with Minshew leading a six-play, 75-yard touchdown drive. The Birds made a clear effort to get the ball to Dallas Goedert, who was severely underutilized in Philly’s loss to the Giants last week. Minshew floated a ball up while falling back to find Goedert down the field for the 36-yard score. EAGLES 7, JETS 6.

• The Jets went 68 yards in 11 plays to score their second touchdown of the game. Pretty bad stuff from the Eagles’ defense to allow the league’s worst starting quarterback to move the ball so easily against them. Wilson capped off the drive with a sneak. The Jets missed another extra point attempt. EAGLES 7, JETS 12.
• The Eagles’ second drive started with another screen pass to Goedert, who easily picked up a first down. Minshew had a nice pass to Quez Watkins on a crosser over the middle on 3rd-and-6 for a conversion into NYJ territory.

SECOND QUARTER

• On 3rd-and-4 from the Jets’ 25-yard line, Minshew floated a pass to Goedert for another touchdown. A little underthrown but it didn’t matter with Goedert so open. Passing game looking pretty nice early on! EAGLES 14, JETS 12.

• The Jets once again moved through the Eagles’ defense with ease, going 75 yards in nine plays. Wilson hit a wide open Ryan Griffin on 4th-and-goal for New York’s third touchdown. The Jets failed their two-point conversion attempt. Pretty pathetic stuff from Jonathan Gannon and his players. EAGLES 14, JETS 18.

• Jalen Reagor let the kickoff go over his head, thinking it would be a touchback. Instead, it bounced at the 1-yard line and he had to go get the ball and was tackled at the 6-yard line. Reagor STINKS. Get him away from being able to touch the ball and call up Jason Huntley already. Minshew had a first down conversion to DeVonta Smith, who stiff-armed a linebacker (!) to get beyond the marker. Kenneth Gainwell bobbled a pass multiple times in the open field but managed to catch it for a first down. A little later, Gainwell took a carry for 18 yards and the Eagles’ third touchdown of the day. Gainwell benefiting with Boston Scott not playing. EAGLES 21, JETS 18.

• The Eagles’ defense FINALLY got a friggin stop with Josh Sweat sacking Wilson on 3rd-and-3 to force a punt. Disaster almost struck for Reagor with him muffing the return but it somehow worked in his favor with him picking it up and running for 20 yards. Fortunate error.

• Minshew FINALLY threw an incompletion with 1:25 left in the second quarter. He threw the ball in the dirt with the Jets taking away a screen throw. The Eagles got to the Jets’ 34-yard but a holding penalty on Landon Dickerson set them back. Weird call by Nick Sirianni to run the ball on 2nd-and-20 with the passing offense looking good. On 3rd-and-19, Minshew found a wide open Quez Watkins for a first down. Helped that Watkins’ guy simply fell down while trying to cover him. Hurt that Minshew underthrew him, limiting his YAC opportunity. Gainwell tripped over a troublesome blade of glass on a screen reception to put the Eagles at 3rd-and-12 from the Jets’ 15-yard line. Minshew checked down to Gainwell for a 2-yard pickup to bring on Jake Elliott with 22 seconds left in the first half. Elliott made the 31-yard field goal attempt. EAGLES 24, JETS 18.

THIRD QUARTER

• The Eagles replaced Reagor with Boston Scott as their kick returner to start the second half. Nice to finally see No. 18 being held accountable. The Eagles went with five straight Miles Sanders runs to get to 3rd-and-1 at Philly’s own 38-yard line. A sixth straight run went for another first down. Then Minshew threw to Reagor for no gain. Please just stop letting him touch the ball. On 3rd-and-10 from Philly’s 44-yard line, Minshew did a nice job of rolling left and still being able to throw an accurate pass to Watkins for a first down. Kind of similar to the Jalen Hurts throw to Dallas Goedert on 3rd-and-12 in the Broncos game. Minshew took a deep shot to DeVonta in the end zone but the ball was slightly underthown and broken up. Minshew targeted Goedert on third down and the Jets were called for pass interference. Looked like a generous flag, there was more contact on the throw to Smith that went incomplete. The penalty set the Eagles up at 1st-and-goal from the 7-yard line. They ran twice and then called a pass on third down but Minshew fumbled the ball out of bounds for a 9-yard loss. Elliott came on to make it a two score game with a 32-yard field goal. Time-consuming drive with 8:22 taken off the clock. EAGLES 27, JETS 18.
• The Eagles got their second stop of the game with T.J. Edwards almost coming up with a pick. Three-and-out for the Jets.
• The Eagles got to 3rd-and-3 around midfield and Minshew’s throw for Smith was broken up. Ball was slightly underthrown/didn’t have enough juice on it and that allowed the Jets defender to make a good play. The Birds lined up to go for it on fourth down and Quincy Williams got called for encroachment. Fortunate call there because Jason Kelce definitely flinched and could’ve been called for the false start. Minshew threw short of the sticks to Smith to bring up 4th-and-1 from the 34-yard line. Sirianni called a timeout and then had Minshew sneak it ... but it was ruled short of the sticks. Bad spot. Sirianni challenged it and the ruling was ... overturned for an Eagles first down. It’s not every day you see a spot overturned like that but the Eagles benefited this time.

FOURTH QUARTER

• Jordan Mailata lost a block on 3rd-and-2 to allow a Jets defender to tackle Sanders for a loss. The Eagles settled for yet another Elliott field goal attempt, this one from 43 yards out. EAGLES 30, JETS 18.
• The Jets drove into Eagles territory. Wilson had Elijah Moore wide open into field goal range at least but the rookie receiver dropped an off target throw. Then the rookie quarterback way overthrew Jamison Crowder to get picked off by Marcus Epps.

• With Mailata pulling, Sanders broke a 34-yard to put him over 100 yards for the fourth time in his career. Season long run. Then Sanders got hurt after catching a pass and going out of bounds to bring up a 46-yard Elliott field goal make. EAGLES 33, JETS 18.
• Tevin Coleman had a 17-yard run called back by an illegal blindside block. The Jets came right back with a Wilson strike to Crowder for a first down. Then the Jets picked up another first down. Moore almost came up with a big catch going up against Darius Slay but the veteran corner had one of his hands between the mitts of the rookie to force the incompletion. On 3rd-and-10, Wilson wayyy overthrew Moore. The Jets wanted DPI on Slay but didn’t get it. On fourth down, Wilson threw short of the sticks into the ground. Game.
• The Eagles fed Gainwell to run clock. Nate Herbig, filling in for Kelce, had a really bad snap for a 22-yard loss on 3rd-and-5.
• The Jets picked up some garbage time yardage before the clock ran out.

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INJURIES

• Fletcher Cox got hurt on the Jets’ second drive. Trainers were looking at his right leg. It didn’t take long for him to reenter the game.
• Steve Nelson (shoulder) visited the medical tent after the Jets’ second drive. He was originally ruled questionable to return and later downgraded to OUT.
• Patrick Johnson (back) left the game in the second quarter. He did not return.
• Miles Sanders got hurt in the fourth quarter. He was ruled out with an ankle injury.
• Milton Williams got banged up in the fourth quarter.
• Jason Kelce got hurt late in the fourth quarter. He was shown slowly limping to the locker room.