Jalen Hurts on Jeffery Simmons' comments after Eagles' win over Titans: "I heard it"
Heading into their Week 2 matchup against the Philadelphia Eagles, Titans defensive tackle Jeffery Simmons said Tennessee needed to make Jalen Hurts "play quarterback."
Did Simmons' comments make their way to Hurts?
"I heard it," said Hurts, who led the Eagles on a game-winning drive in the fourth quarter in a comeback 24-20 victory over the Titans Sunday at Nissan Stadium.
"I'm happy we won," Hurts said.
After the Titans took a 20-17 lead with less than 2 minutes left in the fourth quarter, Hurts led the Eagles on a nine-play, 65-yard drive that ended with a 3-yard touchdown pass to Darius Cooper with nine seconds left to seal the win.
Hurts finished the game completing 26 of his 37 passes for 264 yards, along with two touchdowns and two interceptions. The two interceptions were costly and led to Tennessee points, but Hurts and the Eagles rallied to start the 2026 season 2-0.
During his postgame interview on the TV broadcast, Hurts ran into Simmons on the field and had a message for the All-Pro.
"You started that s***, I had to finish," Hurts told Simmons.
Simmons told Titans reporters after the game that his comments leading up to Week 2 weren't a shot at Hurts.
Simmons explained his comments to reporters postgame and said that he meant the Titans wanted to keep Hurts contained and prevent him from making big plays with his legs.
"It wasn't, 'Oh, he can't be a quarterback in the pocket,'" Simmons told reporters. "When it really mattered, we weren't at our best today."
With the win, Hurts, head coach Nick Sirianni and the Eagles are 2-0 heading into Week 3 vs. the Chicago Bears.
It's the fourth time Sirianni and Hurts are 2-0 to start the regular season. Sirianni's four 2-0 starts are the most by a head coach in Eagles franchise history.
Regarding Simmons' comments, Sirianni said he doesn't get "wrapped up" in it.
Sirianni is never shy to show his emotions and said his natural instinct is to fight when he heard what Simmons said. But he added that stuff leading up to the game doesn't matter once the teams hit the field.
"When you get wrapped into the battle of words or revenge or whatever it is, anger, that s*** lasts about two minutes in a game," Sirianni said. "It does. At the end of the day, the fundamentals take over, the situational awareness takes over, you're playing together as a team, your toughness takes over because that all fades. That's why it's so important to lock in to what you can control."
