The Eagles Ran A Modified ‘Philly Special’ During Their First Game After The Super Bowl

The Philadelphia Eagles’ Super Bowl win was highlighted by the decision to throw a touchdown pass to Nick Foles at the end of the second quarter. The Eagles were knocking on the doorstep while up 15-12 and facing a 4th-and-goal, and decided to run a trick play that ended with Foles reeling in the first catch of his career for six points.

It was a delightfully brash decision, one that we later learned was casually suggested by Foles and agreed to by head coach Doug Pederson. A statue outside of Lincoln Financial Field was unveiled earlier this week, and because Pederson is a fun head coach, the team ran a modified version of the play during their season opener against the Atlanta Falcons on Thursday night.

This one is a little different — Foles didn’t score and took the snap here, while that responsibility fell to Corey Clement in the Super Bowl. But the result was the same, as a receiver (then Trey Burton, now Nelson Agholor) hooked up with Foles for a reception.

Sure, this wasn’t as bold as calling it during a high-leverage situation in the Super Bowl, and it also didn’t come on the heels of Tom Brady dropping a pass, which made it much funnier the first time we saw it. It was still a dime by Agholor, a beautiful catch by Foles, and as is always the case when Philly sports do a cool thing, worthy of a tweet from Joel Embiid.

And for the sake of looking at the dang thing, here’s the statue inspired by the play.

There’s no word on whether the second Philly Special will lead to another statue, but Eagles did go on to score at the end of this drive. It gave the team a 10-6 lead in the third quarter, which is a nice consolation, I suppose.