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February 05, 2025

Eagles-Chiefs Super Bowl preview: Five things to watch when the Eagles have the ball

How does the Eagles’ offense match up with the Chiefs’ defense?

Eagles NFL
020525AJBrown Mark J. Rebilas/Imagn Images

Eagles WR A.J. Brown

The Philadelphia Eagles are back in the Super Bowl for the third time in eight seasons. Their opponent is a familiar foe in the Kansas City Chiefs, who have been to the Super five of the last six seasons, and are looking to be the first NFL team to "threepeat" during the Super Bowl era. Here are our five things to watch, when the Eagles have the ball.

1) Saquon Barkley vs. the Chiefs' run defense

None of the Eagles' playoff opponents have been successful in stopping Barkley despite making him the focus of their game plans. You can be sure that slowing Barkley down will be the focus of Steve Spagnuolo and the Chiefs defense. Let's first look at the Chiefs' run defense:

Chiefs run D Stat Rank 
Rushing yards allowed per game 106.7 
Rushing first downs allowed per game 6.7 14 
Rushing TDs allowed per game 0.8 13 
Rushing yards per attempt 4.2 
Rush DVOA -16.2 
EPA/rush -0.07 12 
Rush success % 38.1% 14 


The Chiefs get great effort from their secondary players. CB Trent McDuffie, slot CB Chamarri Conner, and starting safeties Justin Reid and Bryan Cook are all very good run defenders, relative to other defensive backs around the league. They are part of the reason why the Chiefs allowed just 8 rushes of 20+ yards (tied for 5th best in the NFL), and 1 rush of 40+ yards this season. Obviously, that's a pretty big deal against a back like Barkley, who has ripped off 7 TD runs of 60+ yards this season.

Their front seven is just OK stopping the run. Nick Bolton racks up a lot of tackles every year, and Leo Chenal is a downhill linebacker who made his share of plays against the run in 2024, but the Chiefs' best linemen — Chris Jones and George Karlaftis — are better pass rushers than they are run defenders.

Statistically, the Chiefs have a borderline top third of the league run defense, though it should be noted that they played a lot of bad rushing offenses in 2024:

 OpponentRushing yards/game Rush DVOA 
 Ravens  
Bengals 30 16 
Falcons 10 
Chargers 20 21 
Saints 15 14 
49ers 11 13 
Raiders 32 31 
Buccaneers 
Broncos 17 24 
Bills 
Panthers 16 15 
Raiders 32 31 
Chargers 20 21 
Browns 29 29 
Texans 13 27 
Steelers 12 18 
Broncos 17 24 
Texans 13 27 
Bills 


They played nine games against teams who could not crack the top 20 in run DVOA. Against teams with quarterbacks who rushed for at least 500 yards — Josh Allen x2, and Lamar Jackson — the Chiefs allowed 145.3 rushing yards per game, and 6 rushing TDs.

In the AFC Championship Game, James Cook for some reason only got 13 carries. He had 85 yards (6.5 YPC) and 2 TDs, and the Chiefs were having trouble stopping him. Spoiler: The Eagles will not make the same mistake. They will feed Barkley.

This is a good-not-great run defense, and Barkley had success against better run defenses this season, notably the Packers, Ravens, and Buccaneers.

2) Chris Jones vs. his offensive lineman of choice

Chris Jones is one of the best defensive players in the NFL. He was named First-Team All-Pro each of the last three season, and was Second-Team All-Pro in 2018, 2020, and 2021. He's going to be in the Hall of Fame one day. 

But what makes Jones so dangerous is that you never really know where he is going to line up. If you've seen Chiefs games this year, you may have seen the telecast point out that he'll sort of roam around pre-snap, and pick the offensive lineman that he wants to rush against.

"He's big, strong, he's a long, long guy for a defensive tackle," Lane Johnson said. "He's able to go out there and play on the edge. They use him in all different alignments until he finds someone he likes. They rotate him all over. He just kind of goes up and down the line and sees what matchups he likes and goes from there."

If you look at Jones' snap alignments (via PFF), you'll see that he plays on the edge as much as he plays on the interior.

• Lined up at DT: 315
• Lined up over the OT: 302
• Lined up outside the OT: 151

Aaron Donald had 0 career sacks against the Eagles, partly because they knew where he was going to line up, and they simply doubled him all day. Donald hated playing against the Eagles (via Chris Long's podcast): 

In four career games against the Eagles, Jones has 5 sacks, again, because you don't know where he's going to line up, and thus he's more difficult to double. And even if you are able to double him, sometimes by design from the Chiefs' perspective, he can still hurt you.

"They try to blitz away from the slide side," Johnson explained. "A lot of guys will slide toward Chris Jones, and they'll try to blitz on the other side."

A great example of that was on the Chiefs' game-sealing play against the Bills in the AFC Championship Game, shown below. Jones is lined up opposite LT Dion Dawkins (73). Watch as LG David Edwards (76) initially goes to double Jones, and as a result Steve Spagnuolo got two defensive backs unblocked on the other side.

The good news for the Eagles is that they don't have any real weak links on their offensive line, unlike pretty much every other opponent the Chiefs face.

On a side note, Jalen Hurts improved dramatically against the blitz from 2023 to 2024, but expect Spagnuolo to make Hurts prove that he can beat his blitzes.


MORE: Five things to watch when the Chiefs have the ball


3) A.J. Brown vs. Trent McDuffie

McDuffie is short with short arms, small hands, and isn't an elite athlete by NFL standards:

But, he has become one of the NFL's best cornerbacks because he is tough, physical, he has outstanding body control, and he is hyper-competitive. He's giving up a fair amount of size to Brown, but I actually think he matches up well against him because he simply doesn't get bullied, and he's a sure tackler who limits yards after the catch. 

McDuffie also has inside-outside versatility, so if Brown wanders into the slot, McDuffie can follow him, as he did with Justin Jefferson last season (video via @LedyardNFLDraft):

And as we saw in the Super Bowl last season, McDuffie had Deebo Samuel on lock:

I imagine the Chiefs will ask McDuffie to trail Brown wherever he goes.

And, of course, if Brown draws McDuffie all day, that should open up favorable opportunities for DeVonta Smith against Jaylen Watson and Chamarri Conner.

4) Dallas Goedert vs. the Chiefs safeties and linebackers

In three playoff games, Dallas Goedert has been something of an X-factor, in that he missed a bunch of regular season games, but starting balling in the playoffs. In three playoff games, Goedert has been ultra-efficient, catching 15 of 18 targets for 188 yards (10.4 yards per target), and making the biggest offensive play of the day against the Packers in the Wild Card Round: 

The Chiefs allowed the second most receptions (106) and the most yards (1191) in the NFL to opposing tight ends this season.

5) Jake Elliott vs. himself

Elliott has 5 missed kicks in his last 4 games, all of which were at Lincoln Financial Field. Elliott has said in previous seasons that The Linc is the hardest stadium to kick in, so maybe he just doesn't like kicking in Philly?

If there's a bright side to Elliott's season, it's that he has been very good on the road, making 13 of 15 field goal attempts, and making all 25 of his PATs. His two missed road field goals came from 60 yards against the Saints Week 3 and from 56 yards on a cold day in Landover, MD, Week 16.

Conversely, Chiefs kicker Harrison Butker missed at least one kick in six of his seven road games in 2024. 


MORE: The Eagles are in the Super Bowl because they mastered the art of the turnover


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