Eagles to Battle Rams Sunday

🚦 THE Philly sports newsletter

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John Foley & Philip Keidel
January 14, 2025

© Gary A. Vasquez | 2024 Nov 24

Happy Tuesday!

In turf news, the Rams sent the Vikings home last night with surprising ease. The win earns them a date with the Eagles in the Divisional round of the NFL playoffs. For the Birds, a rematch against a team they beat handily in the regular season isn’t a bad draw.

On the ice, the Flyers notched another win against the Panthers. And they did it the hard way.

And in civic affairs (we’re a multifaceted newsletter), the fallout from the 76 Place chaos continued.

Lots to get into today. Luckily, we’re back at full human strength. Hurgly died on the way to his home planet.

In the email today:

🦅 Eagles to Battle Rams Sunday

Each NFL game is its own creature. The Eagles’ lopsided victory over the Rams in late November doesn’t ensure a win in the upcoming rematch.

But the Birds probably like their chances, considering Saquon Barkley rushed for 255 yards and a pair of touchdowns against LA in Week 12. It’s tough to scheme away that kind of dominance.

Vegas certainly likes the Birds chances, with the Eagles favored by six points at most sportsbooks on Tuesday morning. That spread implies about a 70% chance of victory for the good guys.

The Rams are coming in hot, of course, particularly on the defensive side of the ball. Sam Darnold is probably dealing with a few aches and pains right now.

We’ll explore the playoff matchup more closely and develop predictions as the week goes on. But our early take? The Eagles are the only team that can stop the Eagles in this one.

🌴 Flyers Beat Defending Cup Champs Behind Cates Brace

The Flyers started 2025 with four straight losses. Losing the home and home to the Toronto Maple Leafs was disappointing, though the Flyers did cadge a point from the overtime loss in Canada.

It was the fourth loss, to the Dallas Stars at home on January 9, that saw the Flyers booed by their own fans. This was a pivotal moment, as the Anaheim Ducks (and the hated Cutter Gauthier) were coming to town on Saturday.

Another loss would have been tough to take. Instead, the Flyers hung a tennis set bagel on the Ducks. As our colleague Anthony Sanfilippo noted, the vibes were back in the barn, at least for one night.

Make it two.

The Florida Panthers lifted the Stanley Cup in June while the Flyers were thinking about a fourth straight season with no playoffs.

Spotting the defending league champions a 2-0 lead through one period was a curious strategy.

But the Flyers treaded water in the second period, cutting the lead with an unassisted goal from Garnet Hathaway which came off a crossing pass that caromed in off a Panthers defenseman’s stick.

Sometimes it just takes that one weird break to change a game. The Flyers sandwiched goals from Noah Cates and Morgan Frost around a Panthers power play tally to end up tied 3-3 with 14 minutes left in the game.

Cates struck again at 14:09 of the third, and Flyers goaltender Sam Ersson — who struggled early in the game — withstood a withering attack from the Panthers in the final minutes to preserve the comeback and salt away the two points.

As ever, it seems like good news and bad news for the Flyers. They lost four in a row. That was bad. Then they won two in a row, vanquishing Gauthier and coming back from 3-1 down to the Panthers. That was good.

The two wins on the bounce drew the Flyers back to within three points of the last wild card spot. That’s good. Unfortunately, there are four other teams between them and that spot. That’s bad.

No time to think about all that, though. The Orange and Black are in Columbus to take on the Blue Jackets tonight.

❌ Sixers Arena Chaos: X Takes and Our Takes

Clearly, it wasn’t just your trusted scribes at On Pattison who reported doggedly and credibly about the Sixers’ very serious, definitely not a leverage ploy, statement of intent to put an arena in Center City.

Surely, once the Mayor of our fair city put her political clout on the line for this deal, it would have to happen, right? And she did!

Welp.

It’s not lazy of us to link to two Sanfilippo pieces in the same newsletter. He’s just that good. We let him do the capital J journalism while we do whatever this is and scroll Twit-, we mean, X, for the hot, cold and sexy takes.

As Dak Prescott might say, “here we goooooo.” Let’s start with a measured read from the boss.

Kyle’s (sort of) winners: The Flyers and Comcast. Kyle didn’t announce who he thought were the losers here. That’s just good business sense from the Maestro. Why make an enemy or enemies unnecessarily?

Especially when so many other voices are happy to do that lifting for you.

We certainly co-sign the first half of this post. The Mayor and anyone in City Council who stuck their necks out for 76 Place have to be smarting.

Her Honor unsurprisingly threw it in spin mode:

Where we mildly disagree with the take cycle is the part that emphasizes the “pain and turmoil” in Chinatown.

Unquestionably, business owners and residents in the neighborhood were concerned, even distraught, at the prospect of the arena displacing them. That is regrettable.

Two things, though. First, this wasn’t the first time Chinatown has had to deal with this, and it probably won’t be the last. Second…76 Place never really was. It was the Bolaris Blizzard. A lot of noise signifying nothing.

Which, when you think about it, pretty well sums up The Process, the Sixers, and this whole sorry saga.

📆 This Day in Philly Sports History

January 14, 1997 was a big day for Flyers milestones.

📊 Poll

Does Billy Wagner belong in the Hall of Fame?

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Results from yesterday:

📺 Coming Up

Games before our next send.

Tuesday, January 14, 2025

  • Flyers at Blue Jackets, 7:00 p.m. (NBC Sports Philadelphia+)

  • Sixers vs. Thunder, 7:00 p.m. (NBC Sports Philadelphia)

Thanks for reading. See you tomorrow.

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