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HBO's 'Hard Knocks in-season' to follow NFC East in 2025

IMG_6598by: Nick Kosko05/21/25nickkosko59
USATSI_14794032 (1)
Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports

A couple of Hard Knocks announcements came Wednesday, including the in-season version featuring the NFC East this year. NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport reported the Buffalo Bills will be on the standard training camp show while one of the premier divisions in football will get the in-season treatment.

The defending Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles, Washington Commanders, Dallas Cowboys and New York Giants will be followed by documentary crews during the 2025 season. It’ll be a new thing for some of these teams.

The Cowboys have been featured on Hard Knocks three times (2002, ’08 and ’21). The Giants were the team subjected to the first offseason edition of the show early in 2024. Meanwhile, the Eagles and Commanders have never been featured on any version of the show. The in-season part of the show will begin in December, just in time for the stretch run.

Hard Knocks began in 2001 and had two years in a row where they featured the Baltimore Ravens and Cowboys. Following a five-year hiatus, Hard Knocks returned in 2007 and has had a season every year, sans 2011.

The in-season version of the show began in 2021 with the Indianapolis Colts, the Arizona Cardinals in ’22 and then the Miami Dolphins in ’23. HBO decided to do an in-season Hard Knocks season with the entire AFC North last year, going around the horn with four teams.

That trend will continue with the NFC East this season after the training camp show premiers in August with the Bills. It’ll be an inside look at the Bills, who are coming off an AFC Championship loss to the Kansas City Chiefs.

Initially, Hard Knocks wanted to follow North Carolina and new head coach Bill Belichick over the summer, pivoting to the college game for the first time. However, those plans fell apart, allegedly due to Belichick’s girlfriend Jordon Hudson. Belichick claimed it was simply because UNC and college teams don’t have traditional training camps.

“’Hard Knocks’ is training camp, and we’re not training camp. We’re just not,” Belichick said. “That’s not what we are. The drama of training camp, who’s a cut and all that. Like, we’re a season, and they don’t want that. Yeah, there are film issues too, but forget about the film issues. Just say you could straighten all those out, Hard Knocks just didn’t fit for us.”