As Jalen Hurts got behind the microphone at the Philadelphia Art Museum on Friday, thousands of fans began to chant “MVP!”
Then the Super Bowl MVP addressed them all.
The 26-year-old explained that when he came to Philadelphia, he vowed to never go to the Rocky Steps until the Eagles won a championship. The Eagles took care of that on Sunday when they beat the Chiefs 40-22 in Super Bowl LIX. Then they got to celebrate at the parade on Friday.
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Here’s the full speech from the Eagles’ franchise quarterback:
“Philly Philly. On behalf of my teammates and myself, we want to thank you for all of your support this year, all the passion, every ounce of it. I want to thank my teammates, thank my offense from the quarterback room to the receivers to the tight ends, the running backs, Shayshawn (Saquon) Barkley. Shayshawn! And from left to right on the O-line. Started off in the run game and then in the pass game, giving me time and allowing us to go out there and play hard. And going to the defensive side, defense wins championships! Defense wins championships. Lot of love for the defense. That front seven, how they played, how those linebackers flew around this year, how those DBs set the tone, fly to the ball. Were forces in run fitting, everything. Lot of thanks for those guys. I want to give a special thanks to the specialists as well. Jake Elliott showing up like he did in that last game. Rick (Lovato) and Braden (Mann) on the snaps, on the punts.
“Very thankful for my team and we couldn’t do it without leadership. We couldn’t do none of this without leadership and that starts with Coach Nick Sirianni. I want to thank Coach for his intentionality, his fight, his passion and seeing this s— through. Howie, for always doing what he does best, going out here and getting this great talent and being able to build this team. It all starts with him. And last but not least, Mr. (Jeffrey) Lurie. Mr. Lurie for having the faith in me, drafting me and bringing me to this city. I’ve got a lot of appreciation for him. And we can’t do it without the fans. We can’t do it without the fans. We all appreciate you, we love you.
“You know, I told myself when I got drafted that I wouldn’t come to the Rocky steps until I won a championship. And now we’re here. And I know this year, this team has had to battle through so much, this team has had to fight, this team has had to persevere and there’s been a ton of scrutiny, ton of opinions, a ton of all of that. But I know about this city, one thing we do is we fight. We fight. And you go through the course of these things and you learn that success isn’t build off of approval. It’s built off of endurance, it’s built off of strength. You can’t quit. You can’t lose if you don’t quit. And in Philly, we don’t quit. So thank you. The next pursuit begins. Go Birds.”
NFL
After Hurts, several other players, including A.J. Brown, Jordan Mailata, Landon Dickerson, C.J. Gardner-Johnson, Reed Blankenship, Cooper DeJean and Brandon Graham.
Hurts is just the seventh quarterback to play in multiple Super Bowls and win one in his first five seasons, joining Troy Aikman, Tom Brady, Patrick Mahomes, Ben Roethlisberger, Kurt Warner and Russell Wilson.