Crossing Broad
If you’re an Eagles fan you know about the guys who bring the “Run the Ball” sign to the NovaCare Complex. Back in 2017, they were frustrated when the Birds threw the ball more than 40 times in a road loss to the Chiefs. They returned in December of 2023, when things started to go south for that ill-fated Birds squad, and really pissed off the beat writers. Fast forward a a little more than a year and the Eagles win the Super Bowl while Saquon Barkley runs for more than 2,400 yards and sets a new NFL regular+postseason record.
So what now? The Eagles ran the ball all the way to a championship. Does that mean we’ve seen the end of “Run the Ball?”
No. The guys brought the sign out on Monday to welcome the Birds back from New Orleans:
One of the Run the Ball guys is Joe, and he tells me that in addition to bringing the sign back to NovaCare, they handed out Run the Ball t-shirts to the fans who were down there. They were able to get a couple of the shirts to Brandon Graham and Big Dom. Then, at Friday’s parade, they started in South Philly and walked up to the Parkway and distributed more of the shirts along the way, which were wrapped with mental health awareness bands. They’re gonna turn this into a larger effort to “Run the Ball for Mental Health Awareness.” Joe tells me that when they first brought out the sign back in 2017, they then walked across the street to FDR Park to play some tennis and a round of golf. Now he’s thinking that he wants to organize a “RUN THE BALL for Mental Health Awareness Golf & Tennis Outing,” which sounds like a great idea.
If that does indeed get off the ground, we will give you the details, but the short version of the story is that the Run the Ball guys want to take what started as a highly-memeable protest and turn it into a larger charitable effort.
Here are some pictures from their last few weeks:
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