Eagles 2026: What We Learned in 2025 and What's Coming in Philly

Last season

Philadelphia opened 2025 the way this franchise likes to open — 24-20 over Dallas at Lincoln Financial Field on the first Friday of September. Then came the moment that framed the whole first half of the year: 20-17 at Kansas City in Week 2, a road punch against the defending champs that had South Philly buzzing before the plane even landed. From there they rolled — 33-26 over the Rams at home, 31-25 at Tampa. Four games, four wins, and the ceiling looked like the ceiling everyone imagined.

Then the middle of the season did what middle seasons do. A 21-17 home slip to Denver, then a 34-17 road beatdown by the Giants at MetLife — the kind of game where you turn it off. They regrouped hard: 28-22 at Minnesota, 38-20 revenge on the Giants back at the Linc, a grinding 10-7 win at Green Bay, and a 16-9 squeeze past Detroit at home that felt earned to every gap on the roster. Nine wins by mid-November. The NFC East was theirs to lose.

They lost some of it. 24-21 at Dallas. Then a home stinker to Chicago — 24-15, a post-Thanksgiving no-show that made every talk-radio segment sound the same. A 22-19 road loss to the Chargers stretched the skid to three. Three losses in fifteen days, and the noise in Philadelphia picked up the way it always does.

The response was the response you want from a real team. 31-0 over Las Vegas on a December Sunday at the Linc — the kind of shutout that isn't a stat, it's a statement. 29-18 at Washington. Then, on the road in Buffalo two days after Christmas, a 13-12 rock fight where the winning margin came off a fingertip. Three straight to close, and the seed math got interesting.

Then Week 18. Washington came to South Philly and won 24-17, and that was that. 11-6 on the year — a record most franchises would sign for in blood, and one that, in this building, still tasted like a missed step.

This season

Preseason is done. The Eagles went to Baltimore on Aug 15, to New England on Aug 22, and finished at home against Cincinnati on Aug 29 — three tune-ups and the usual mix of vets on ice, rookies on tape, and starters ducking hits. If you want the last one in detail we wrote it up here. The rest is projection.

Here's our read. The 2025 defense that shut out Las Vegas 31-0 and held Buffalo to twelve isn't a fluke unit — it's the identity. Coordinators around the NFC East know it, they'll plan for it, and the front office spent the offseason making sure they still can't stop it. The offense's story is the same one it's been for three years: when it's on schedule it's an avalanche; when it's behind the sticks it can look small. The margin the coaching staff has to chase this fall is that stretch — the third-and-longs, the trailing scripts.

The 2025 season didn't end the way South Philly wanted, and everybody in that building knows it. That's a dangerous mood to bring into September.

The NFC East will be a knife fight again. Dallas took a game off Philadelphia last year in Arlington. Washington did it twice — once in the finale, at the Linc. The Giants blew them out in October and got blown out in return. None of that gets forgotten between January and September. And Week 1 is Week 1: our Week 1 pick'em preview has the whole slate lined up.

Our take

Bold call: the Eagles clear 11-6 and finish first in the NFC East. That defense doesn't dip. The offense finds another gear in the red zone once the games start counting.

Bold call: at least one home win by twenty-plus. The 31-0 over Vegas wasn't a one-off — this roster hunts blowouts when the crowd shows up at Lincoln Financial.

Bold call: the Washington finale gets answered. Whenever the Commanders show up at the Linc this year, it will not be close.

Season starts now. The Linc is loud, the schedule is real, and Philadelphia does not do quiet Septembers. Grab your board and make your picks.