Step by step. Sometimes, it reeks of repetition. Most days, it is sensory and information overload, intentionally so. The challenge is to stay on course and climb the seasonal ladder with the same purpose, intensity, and focus each day.
And then do it again tomorrow.
For the Philadelphia Eagles, the celebration of winning Super Bowl LIX is long, long over. As the team's Organized Team Activities began on Monday at the NovaCare Complex, the 2025 Eagles were collectively pointed at the task right in front of them, and that's it.
"The process is always the same, honestly, regardless of whether we won or not," wide receiver A.J. Brown said last week. "It's always watching film, trying to rediscover yourself and to get better and find ways to get better. You have to grow in this league. If you don't, you'll get exposed.
"As a team, just growing. Pushing each other each and every day. Not worrying about the results at the moment, but just worrying about the effort."
Winning the Super Bowl on February 9 and subsequently celebrating in the day-long Super Bowl Parade on February 14 made for a launching point for the fans, but the football team had very little time to continue the party. The NFL Scouting Combine happened two weeks later and then free agency opened and then the NFL Draft started and then …
Here we are. This is the time when Head Coach Nick Sirianni maximizes every bit of time the players and coaches are together as he sets the culture, shows the new players what is expected, integrates the systems on offense, defense, and special teams – important stuff, particularly on offense with Kevin Patullo as the new coordinator – and promotes connections.
This is the foundation of the 2025 season and everything builds from here.
"I think this is the season right now in the offseason where we're collectively trying to build out the system and structure things the way it's going to be for this iteration of the Eagles," quarterback Jalen Hurts said.
He's right. The "iteration" of the Eagles is that this team is not "defending the Super Bowl victory." Instead, the Eagles are a new team and the mission remains the same: To win it all.
And to do that, as the Eagles learned in the aftermath of a Super Bowl win in the 2017 season and a Super Bowl loss in the 2022 season, is the realization that nothing is guaranteed for the following year. Every season brings change and challenges.
Hurts, for example, is coming off a Most Valuable Player performance in the Super Bowl, yet he is pushing himself as the great ones do. Where can he improve? How will defenses attack him this season? What are the nuances of his game that need to elevate?
"You have to be able to decode, detect, and then correct. Refine the things that you need to refine," Hurts said. "The more important thing is being able to detect what I can improve on and how important is it to improve in that. We can all work hard in something, but not necessarily be working hard on the right things.
"Right now, it's just laying the foundation, trying to figure out what this iteration of the team will be."
OTAs are the first time the coaching staff sees the players in offense vs. defense situations, albeit with no tackling or real contact. It serves as a fine test for the mental retention of what the players have learned and how that translates to their on-field play.
It is, as Hurts says, a very necessary piece of the puzzle and one that the Eagles embrace. The team, the organization, is not still in the "thrill of victory" emotional basket. It is onward and upward understanding that a new season is here and that it is all fresh and real and a huge challenge.
That's just the way the Eagles want it. The slate is clean and each movement is one in a forward direction and a refreshed attitude and very much step by step by step by step.
