Super Bowl 2023 Opening Night: Donna Kelce upstages her sons, QBs in spotlight as Super Bowl week begins

Jalen Hurts, Patrick Mahomes and the rest of the Eagles and Chiefs players met the media at Footprint Center in Arizona

PHOENIX -- This year's championship teams met for the first time Monday night, with the Eagles and Chiefs taking the stage at the Footprint Center for Opening Night. Days ahead of their anticipated Super Bowl LVII showdown at State Farm Stadium, the two contenders fielded questions from thousands of media members, reviewing their journey to the big game and previewing the culminating matchup of the 2022 season.

MVP finalists Patrick Mahomes and Jalen Hurts were among 20 different players from both teams who appeared at designated podiums on the Opening Night floor, while dozens more mingled with the media throughout the night. Eagles center Jason Kelce and Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce, the sibling stars of the upcoming Super Bowl, also made a joint appearance atop the Opening Night stage, which has been erected at the center of the facility.

Here are some immediate takeaways from Footprint Center:

The Kelce brothers reign supreme

No one owned the spotlight quite like the Kelce brothers on Monday night. In fact, their mother, Donna, may have stolen the show from both of them, presenting her sons with Tupperware containers of homemade cookies. But their unprecedented big-stage showdown was a hot topic all night. The brothers were predictably complementary of each other, but Travis took a few playful jabs from the podium, telling reporters that Jason was full of rage as a child, running into things when he was frustrated, and that he could easily adapt to a different position better than his sibling, suggesting the elder Kelce has lost whatever route-running skills he may have had as a kid. Stay tuned for the next round of Kelce banter -- and their on-field clash -- at the Super Bowl.

The future of the QB position

If the Kelces weren't the story of the night, then the starting quarterbacks surely were: even though Patrick Mahomes has been to this stage before, his pairing with the Eagles' Jalen Hurts very much felt like a fork-in-the-road moment for the NFL. Going into the week, there's been a lot of talk about them making history as the first pair of Black starting QBs to face off in the Super Bowl. But they just felt like they belonged on Monday night, oozing an equal amount of poise, calmness and mutual respect. They felt like the faces of tomorrow's NFL, showcasing a true businesslike approach at the podium.

Talent disparity apparent

Mahomes' presence, along with that of coach Andy Reid, guarantees the Chiefs can't be written off in any game. But just from an anecdotal standpoint, the Eagles' edge in talent across the board was apparent just from the podium setups on Monday. Almost every Eagles microphone featured a Pro Bowl-caliber starter and/or icon from the team's 2017 title run. The Chiefs, meanwhile, sometimes drew more sparse crowds of reporters for secondary play-makers like Isiah Pacheco, Jerick McKinnon and linebacker Nick Bolton. That obviously means nothing in terms of the actual game, nor does it lessen those Chiefs players' potential impact on Sunday. But you couldn't have guessed, from the faces and emotions on the Opening Night floor, which of these two teams has actually been to three Super Bowls in four years.

[Feb 6, 2023 at 10:55 pm ET · Jordan Dajani]

Patrick Mahomes says he doesn't trash talk pass rushers because he knows they can hit him a lot harder than he can hit them. Says he actually compliments them on plays. 

[Feb 6, 2023 at 10:36 pm ET · Jordan Dajani]

Frank Clark says fans should have realized from the beginning of the season that the Chiefs and Eagles were the two best teams in the league. 

[Feb 6, 2023 at 10:29 pm ET · Jordan Dajani]

Everything! 

[Feb 6, 2023 at 10:02 pm ET · Jordan Dajani]

Patrick Mahomes says he will play through any injury the trainers allow him to. That's the baseline. 

[Feb 6, 2023 at 9:33 pm ET · Jordan Dajani]

Donna Kelce: "The plan is to scream really loud anytime someone has the ball."

[Feb 6, 2023 at 9:28 pm ET · Jordan Dajani]

Andy Reid on his former team, the Eagles: "It's a great organization. I had 14 years there. I loved every minute of it."

[Feb 6, 2023 at 8:52 pm ET · Kyle Stackpole]

CBS Sports NFL writer and resident Eagles expert Jeff Kerr actually dug into the comparison between Jalen Hurts and Michael Jordan ... and why Nick Sirianni might actually be on to something (check out the story here).