BY SHAGGY SHRAGIS

It's three weeks before Hotbird Summer presented by Summerseat Crush officially starts, but eager fans were able to watch their first glimpse of the Phoenix in action when the Hotbirds took on the New York Empire in a preseason scrimmage this past Saturday. With tons of turnover on the Phoenix roster, including a complete coaching overhaul from last season, this was our first chance to get a good inkling of the 2025 Philadelphia season.

Results were mixed. Philadelphia fell to New York 20 to 18, a close loss to an Empire team all too familiar with defeating the Phoenix by one or two points. They accomplished the feat without several of their star players including: former MVP Ben Jagt, former DPOY Antoine Davis, all UFA performers Jack Williams and John Randolph, and an extremely interesting free agent signing in Calvin Brown. It could be argued that the Empire were down six of their seven most important players for the 2025 UFA season.

To Philadelphia’s credit, New York called much tighter lines amongst their players who did show up, with basically everyone you would expect given the roster playing the majority of points. Philly chose to spread the love around, with plenty of players getting in on the action in the second half. A fun coaching decision from the Phoenix – the O-line mostly played defense from the third quarter on. The Hotbirds were tormented last season with an abysmal defensive effort on offense after a turn, so any additional production on that front is crucial towards a successful season.

Perhaps it was this adjustment that led to such a prodigious deep game from the Empire, who were without two of their most important deep threats in Ben Jagt and Jack Williams. Sheppard connected on several hucks with both Shapiro and Labar, peppering the Phoenix with massive yardage threats. This was an area that the Philadelphia D struggled with last season, and they will need to shore up their deep defense. This is particularly true against Toronto, who returns both Lewis brothers and Mark Lloyd, dangerous deep threats in their own right. While Philly did a good job applying pressure to underneath cutters, they will have to improve their deep options in order to be successful.

This game also gave us insight into what the Phoenix will look like for the first half of the season, before the return of the collegiate athletes. Philadelphia expects prodigious reinforcements halfway through the year from such players as Adam and Sam Grossberg, Casey Thornton, Michael Maroon and others. With those players out of the lineup until the college season ends, it was interesting to see who could step in to fill the roles. Colin White seems to have earned himself a starting position on the defense, and racked up three goals against New York.

Philadelphia’s offense gave key insights into life after the Roger Chu era. With James Pollard moving to Minnesota, Dimitry Suvorov heading to New York, and the retirements of Jordan Rhyne and Alex Thorne, this is the most turnover that Philadelphia has seen on the offense since the pandemic. Scott Heyman stepped into the big play threat role vacated by Pollard, and a full season of Heyman will be very exciting to watch. Will Tober played well, and is an extremely smart cutter to pair with Pastor and Martin downfield. Also intriguing was Nate Long. Although Nate has played several seasons with Philadelphia, this will be his first carrying a major offensive load. Nate looked calm under pressure, and if he can maintain high efficiency with 20-plus touches per game, he will fill an important role on the Philly O-Line.

We are two and a half weeks away from the start of the season, when the Phoenix travel to DC to take on the Breeze. They will follow that up with their home opener against Toronto on May 4 at Neumann University, and taking on Toronto again on the road in Week Three. These two Toronto games are must wins for Philadelphia if they have any hope of heading to the playoffs. Whatever happens in these games, the Phoenix will look very different this season compared to years past.