Dave Spadaro

Of all the hot takes and instant win-loss record projections for the2025 Philadelphia Eagles season, perhaps one important macro-view take was overlooked: The Eagles have at least five scheduled prime-time games for the fourth straight year. Philadelphia has appeared in the second-most primetime games (109, tied) in the NFL since 2000.

What does that signify? Clearly, it means the Eagles are and have been for 25 years a team that the national audience loves to watch. The NFL wants the Eagles to be a marquee team and, for real, that's what the Eagles are.

We're talking about a generation of this kind of national exposure, and the Eagles have responded to the attention: 8 trips to the NFC Championship Game, 4 Super Bowl appearances, 2 World Championships.

People who are in their 30s and 40s scarcely remember the tougher times, and only those on the back nine of their employment years recall when the team was flat-out bad. These are the great times, have been for a long while, and show no signs of slowing down.

One day after the 2025 regular-season schedule was released to the public, the Eagles reported to the NovaCare Complex for another day of the offseason program. They are in Phase 2 now and the players are on the field, no uniforms, no helmets. They are conditioning and being fed the playbooks and learning how to be professionals. How to be Eagles.

At the same time, there is an enormous undertaking ahead for the weekend: The8th Annual Eagles Autism Challenge, presented by Lincoln Financial. Nearly 7,000 participants will report to Lincoln Financial Field on Saturday morning for the league's most connected event of the year. It is an incredible event that grows every year because of the bond that continues to deepen between the Eagles and their fans and the challenge that the autism spectrum brings to one in 31 children and one in 45 adults, adding up to an estimated 168 million people who are affected globally.

The dollars raised more than $30 million to date, with the goal of another $10 million-plus this year alone go toward research and grants and ways to win this battle and to get those affected into the workplace in a safe, productive way.

This has always been the mandate from Chairman and CEO Jeffrey Lurie from the time he bought the Eagles in 1994 to win Super Bowls and to impact the community every day in a positive way.

"Those key principles have maintained themselves: Team-oriented, it's not about being MVP or the stats leader. Be humble. Never think too much of yourself," Lurie said in New Orleans, days before the Eagles defeated Kansas City 40-22 to win Super Bowl LIX. "Because you have a great team, as an owner, I never thought more highly of myself, that I'm smarter or any of that stuff. It's always just about wanting to win a lot, win big, and do it with pride and do it very connected to the community.

"I made those the priorities. It's always been about what is correlating with winning big? Sometimes you can't succeed you have injuries or you make mistakes. But, go for it. You know? Go for it. Those have always been the core principles. Team building has always been the core principle."

What is happening right now is the perfect microcosm of Lurie's vision: The duality of preparing what is expected to be a very good football team for the 2025 season with putting things in place for a life-changing Saturday with the Eagles Autism Challenge.

This is what fuels the Philadelphia Eagles, a team that is once again in the national spotlight for what it has done on the field, in the community, all with a family of fans from around the world who share in the success.