For the first time in four years, the Eagles have increased their season ticket prices.

Here is the breakdown:

Lower Level Sideline seats and Upper Level Loge seats have increased from $95 to $105.

Lower Level Endzone seats have increased from $85 to $95.

General Upper Level seats have increased from $70 to $75.

Every Thursday we select a few of your Twitter questions and provide the long-form answers they deserve. For a chance to have your question published on Birds 24/7, send it to @Tim_McManus.

It seems to be a story we write pretty much every offseason around these parts: The Eagles are looking for safety help.

They’ve tried and failed in previous years to fill the gaping hole in the back end of the defense. And so, Howie Roseman will try once again this offseason to find safety help in the draft and/or free agency.

“To me, that’s the hardest position to evaluate in college football is safeties,” Roseman said last week at the Senior Bowl. “The guys that used to be the most explosive athletes and were playing in the back end, they’re going to play corner because they feel like maybe at corner, they can play 10 years. You look at the franchise tag numbers, the corner position is higher than the safety position. That is going to be the constant struggle. When you talk to people around the league, it’s hard to find safeties.”

The good news for the Eagles is that this appears to be a pretty good group of college prospects.

Let’s focus back in on EJ Manuel. 

The former Florida State quarterback was on 97.5 The Fanatic Wednesday and restated his desire to come to Philadelphia to play for Chip Kelly.

“I’m just hoping that he gives me the opportunity,” said Manuel. “I would love to come and play in his offense, I would love to play for him and I would love to be his guy. It’s kind of starting off his tenure in the NFL, and I would love to be his first quarterback. I think it would be a great relationship.”

 The more we get to know Chip Kelly, the more we realize how much of his success is rooted in simplicity. Where Andy Reid boasted a playbook that could stretch from floor to ceiling, Kelly seems to believe more in focusing on a smaller amount of plays and perfecting them.

It is about execution, and on offense, it is largely about the men up front.

To get a feel for what Kelly wants out of his offensive line in Philadelphia, it’s best to go back to his Oregon days for clues. The Duck offense was based off the inside zone play. Kelly, in a NIKE Coaches Clinic back in 2009, discussed what he expects out of his offensive line on this play, while giving a glimpse at his overall football philosophy.

We want to get off the ball and be a physical, downhill-running football team. This is not a finesse play. We teach our offensive linemen a play we call the bust block. The idea is to bust their sternums up against their spines on every play. We want to come off the ball, create a double-team, knock the crap out of the defender, and deposit him in the linebacker’s lap.

From his thoughts on drafting a quarterback to his plans on running NFL practices, here are five Chip Kelly leftovers to chew on.

Throughout the course of the next several months, let this page serve as your Eagles mock draft headquarters.

We’ll constantly update the following table with projections for who the Eagles could select with the fourth overall pick.

It’s been just about eight years since the Eagles dropped Super Bowl XXXIX to the New England Patriots in Jacksonville.

And with this year’s title game just four days away, a new theory has emerged about why the Birds came up short in that game.

Rodney Harrison, who had a pair of interceptions and a sack for New England, argues that the Eagles wasted too much energy during pre-game warmups, and that contributed to their fatigue down the stretch.

On the flight down to Mobile, Ala. last week, my choice of reading material was a PDF.

We’ve linked to it previously in this space. It’s from a presentation Chip Kelly delivered at the Nike Coaches Clinic in 2011. The Oregon football Web site FishDuck.com received permission to publish the document, which details some of Kelly’s core coaching philosophies.

Below is a rundown of what stood out for me and how it might apply to Kelly’s tenure with the Eagles.

Another day, another coach reportedly added to Chip Kelly’s staff.

Virgina offensive coordinator/quarterbacks coach Bill Lazor will join the Eagles, according to Bruce Feldman of CBSSports.com.

The report does not specify what Lazor’s role will be with the Eagles, and the team is not confirming any hires until the entire staff is in place.

A reasonable guess would be that Lazor fills the void at quarterbacks coach.

Expect Alex Smith’s name to come up quite a bit in the coming weeks.

The story is pretty well-known at this point: The former No. 1 overall pick, in the midst of his best season as a pro, lost his job to Colin Kaepernick after suffering a concussion against the Rams back in November. Kaepernick pounced on the opportunity and has the Niners one win away from a Lombardi. Smith is now the odd-man out in San Francisco.

“It sucks, to put it frankly,” Smith told Peter King. “Tough pill to swallow.”

Smith has handled the situation well by all accounts, but the circumstances are such where it makes sense for both parties to move on.

LeSean McCoy has issued an apology following a heated exchange on Twitter with the mother of his son. It reads:

“In light of the recent events that played out over Twitter this past weekend, I would like to express how deeply sorry and remorseful I am to my family, the Philadelphia Eagles, my fans and every young person who views me as a role model. This is not who I am as a person, nor the image I ever wanted to portray of myself. It’s definitely not the example I want to set for my son.

“My Twitter account was not hacked. I take full responsibility and I apologize for trying to make it seem like it was not me. Due to my bad judgment and frustration, I allowed a very personal matter to be played out on a social network of all things. It was immature and unprofessional of me to do so and to encourage others to join in.

“As a parent, emotions are often magnified when there are stressful and emotional situations concerning them. I take great pride in being a good father and strive to one day be a great one. I’ve always done everything in my means to provide my son financially, emotionally and most importantly with my time and heart. I am sick over the fact that my actions have caused pain to him and all involved. I have decided to handle this matter privately from here on out and I thank everyone for their continued support.”

Chip Kelly comes to the NFL with a plan.

How much of that plan will mirror what he did at Oregon and whether it will actually work remain to be seen. But the Eagles’ new head coach knows he’ll have to make adjustments at this level. And perhaps the biggest adjustment will come in finding players and assembling a roster.

In college, Kelly never had a top-10 recruiting class, but he was still able to seek out talent without worrying about a salary cap, a 53-man roster limit or players who were past their primes. Those factors will all come in to play in the coming months.

Once the Eagles finalize their coaching staff, the next step will be putting the roster together. That’s where the relationship between Kelly and general manager Howie Roseman becomes critical.

We are closer to the Eagles naming a defensive coordinator, though it doesn’t feel that way.

A common thought as the rest of Chip Kelly’s staff got filled out was that there was a defensive coordinator all but locked in, and it was just a matter of said coach getting through with his Super Bowl run before it became official.

The presumed candidate was San Francisco defensive backs coach Ed Donatell, whom Brian Dawkins strongly endorsed on Sunday. There was little to suggest otherwise. Early hot names like Georgia’s Todd Grantham had cooled, Giants linebackers coach Jim Herrmann pulled out of the running, and Donatell’s name was the only one that had any stick to it.

Maybe he still is the guy. But as the days trudge on and the news cycle flips over, a couple new names have made their way into the conversation.

We’re still about three months away from the NFL draft, but after last week’s Senior Bowl, initial rankings and evaluations are beginning to take shape.

Mike Mayock spent the week in Mobile, Ala. and called the game for NFL Network. During the broadcast, he offered his thoughts on the quarterback class, saying he expects West Virginia’s Geno Smith and USC’s Matt Barkley to be first-round picks. Neither player participated in the Senior Bowl, but Mayock also offered thoughts on the six quarterback who were in attendance.

Below is a breakdown of what he had to say about each.