JALEN HURTS
25 • The future of football
By Peyton Manning
I first met Jalen Hurts—who led the Philadelphia Eagles to the Super Bowl earlier this year—when he was in college and a counselor at the Manning Passing Academy, a summer football camp for high school players. I’ve admired him ever since. I strongly respect his willingness to learn. He’s always thinking about getting better. For example, he will sometimes text me questions about plays that his team can run in the red zone. Though I sometimes have to remind him I haven’t played in seven years (I have to dig into some old archives to remember plays), I’ve so enjoyed these conversations. Jalen is a natural leader who cares about his job and the organization that he plays for. The Eagles signed Jalen to a record-breaking contract extension this offseason, and he feels that accountability and responsibility to make them glad they made that investment. He’s not celebrating. He doesn’t see it as a reward. He sees it for what it is: the Eagles are paying him for what they expect him to do now. He’s a model of how to approach a job. This is where the hard work begins.
Manning is a two-time Super Bowl champion
R.F. KUANG
27 • Capturing complexity
By Constance Wu
When I began reading R.F. Kuang’s 2023 novel I could not put it down. It was thrilling to me to have an Asian American writer write something that is so prescient and engaged with issues such as cultural appropriation, anti-wokeness, cancel culture, and the internet mob, questioning authority and gatekeeping. It’s the kind of story that you can’t stop talking about, which is the kind of television I want to watch—engrossing stories that spark conversation. Like any great artist, she’s not preoccupied with external perception. There is a wildness and
