Best Ever? The 2024-25 Eagles Are In The Conversation

Coming off the best rushing season in NFL history, Eagles superstar running back Saquon Barkley wasn't shy when discussing what his Super Bowl LIX-winning team was able to accomplish.

“I firmly believe when you look at our team that we had last year ... I think we’re a top-five team of all time," Barkley said on Exciting Mics, the podcast hosted by his teammates Reed Blankenship and Cooper DeJean. "... If you really look at the season outside of the first four games, it was belt to ass.”

The Eagles started 2-2 before scaling back the offense during a Week 5 bye to lean on Barkley and the game's best offensive line to finish by winning 16 of 17, including the drubbing of the dynasty-like Kansas City Chiefs club with Patrick Mahomes and Andy Reid in Super Bowl LIX.

The only loss over that span was Week 16 at Washington when Philadelphia lost quarterback Jalen Hurts to a concussion six minutes into the game and were still leading until the Commanders scored a game-winning touchdown with six seconds left.

The case is there for the Eagles.

The team's 18 wins (including the postseason) tied an NFL record with three other teams (1984 San Francisco, 1985 Chicago, and 2007 New England). Philadelphia also set new NFL marks for postseason points (145) and rushing yards (818), as well as a conference championship record of 55 points against the Commanders.

In the regular season, the Eagles had the sixth-most rushing yards of all-time (3,048) and had the league's No. 1-ranked defense.

Best of all-time is always a hot-button issue, and it's more of a fruitless exercise in professional football. All sports have evolved with major changes in how baseball and basketball are now played related to analytics more than anything else. The NFL's has that plus the safety dogma that has the modern players engaging in an almost completely different game.

Than there's the nostalgia.

The 1972 Miami Dolphins would probably get the most votes for remaining the only perfect team over 50-plus years after pulling it off.

The 1985 Bears are highly regarded as perhaps the most dominant and physically imposing team, while more modern fans might go back to the "Greatest Show On Turf" St. Louis Rams of 1999. There's plenty of Terry Bradshaw Pittsburgh teams, Joe Montana San Francisco incarnations, and Tom Brady-Bill Belichick New England teams that can be debated.

For me, the 2007 Pats are the best team, and they didn't even win, going 18-0 before being upset by the New York Giants in Super Bowl XLII.

The 2024-25 Eagles are unquestionably one of the best teams in the modern era, and if you're in that conversation, that's all that matters.