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Jalen Hurts Deserved Better. We All Do.

In a country that treats workers as expendable parts, Hurts’s playing through a blood clot is just the highest-profile example of the price workers pay in an oligarchy.

The Philadelphia Eagles’s Jalen Hurts during the NFL match between the Eagles and the Jacksonville Jaguars at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on October 11, 2026, in London, United Kingdom.

In a world where the attention spans of sports commentators and fans are roughly the same as that of a cat chasing a laser pointer, sometimes a story breaks through that demands our undivided attention. Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts could have died this week, and, despite the relentless churn of the news cycle, we must not look away.

The 2025 Super Bowl MVP was told by the Eagles’ medical staff that he had a “superficial blood clot” after an opponent’s cleat smashed into his calf on October 8. Hurts found himself the night before game day in a London hospital until 3 am, where he was told that sleeping could cause the clot to spread and risk his life. Hurts then, according to reports, attempted to pull an all-nighter, though he may have taken a nap at the stadium before game time—this part of the story is unclear. He then played in the game, where he attempted 40 passes. The Eagles lost 19–17, and Hurts took another transatlantic flight home. After he attended practice for another two days, an ultrasound revealed that Hurts’s condition had worsened. He was diagnosed with deep-vein thrombosis and bilateral pulmonary emboli, meaning he now had multiple blood clots in both lungs. Hurts is out for the season, taking blood thinners, and fortunate that he avoided a pulmonary embolism.

When the story first broke, “NFL insider” Tom Pelissero had the following hot take: “How committed is Jalen Hurts to football?”

So committed, Pelissero wrote, that “after........

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