Former Eagles GM Jim Murray always found a way. His son’s photo with the pope is proof.

The tickets were hard to land, but Jim Murray was the kid from a West Philadelphia rowhouse who became the general manager of the Eagles. Surely, he could find a way to see Pope John Paul II’s Mass in 1979 on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway.

But Murray’s seats on Logan Circle were a few rows back from the rail. He admired the pope so much that he named his newborn son earlier that year after him. Murray was hoping to have the Eagles’ team photographer snap a picture of the pope passing by baby John Paul. He needed a better spot.

“There were rows of empty seats in front of us,” said Ed Mahan, the Birds’ longtime team photographer. “We joked that maybe it was a bunch of nuns whose bus broke down. So we did the Irish thing. My dad taught me how to sneak into Frankford High’s football stadium. So we did the instinct and moved up.”

Murray, who died Aug. 25 at age 87, had his spot, but he still needed the pope to come his way. The plan was for the pope to travel in a car from the Cathedral Basilica of SS. Peter and Paul to the altar installed at Logan Circle. That wouldn’t work. The pope called an audible, ditched the car, and walked to the altar.

The pope had two options: pass by Murray or walk the opposite way on Logan Circle. He chose Murray’s side and the quick-thinking kid from Brooklyn Street passed his baby to the oblate priest he brought with him.

Father Murray hoisted 7-month-old John Paul Murray into the air and started yelling in Latin as Mahan stood atop a chair and readied his camera.

“I can see the pope hear the Latin in my lens,” Mahan said. “I see him turn to where the Latin was coming from. He saw the baby and broke ranks. He headed right towards the baby. I knew something was going to happen.”

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The pope stopped his procession to make the sign of the cross on the baby’s head after Father Murray told the pope the infant was named after him. The GM was a few rows back and couldn’t see over the crowd. But he got his picture.

“One shot,” Mahan said. “It was October light. The sun was slightly diffused behind me. If you were in a studio, you couldn’t ask for better light. My exposure was right on it. Everyone was going crazy. Jimmy was a few seats behind and never even saw it.”

In a crowd of 2 million, the pope found Jim Murray’s baby. Of course he did. That was Murray, whose funeral was Saturday at St. Thomas of Villanova Church.

He went to Mass every morning, dreamed of becoming a priest joining the priesthood before the Augustinians bounced him from the seminary as a teenager, and became the general manager of the Eagles a few years after managing a bar in Malibu, Calif. Murray found ways to get things done.

Murray persuaded Dick Vermeil to join the Eagles, ran the front office when the team acquired players like Ron Jaworski and Bill Bergey, helped create the first Ronald McDonald House, and was the GM when the Birds reached their first Super Bowl. A photo with the pope? Murray found a way.

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“That was Jim,” Jaworski said. “At the end of the day, he always came out on top. He made it work. He was the most positive guy I’ve ever been around. I’ve been around a lot of amazing people, but Jim never had a negative word to say about anyone. He was always positive and always saw the good things about everyone.”

Murray was a sports writer for the Villanovan, the university’s student newspaper, when he interviewed Villanova baseball coach Art Mahan for a story. Mahan played one season in the majors as a first baseman for the 1940 Phillies, who lost 103 games and finished 50 games behind the pennant-winning Reds.

“He had one good stat in 1940,” said Mahan’s son, Ed. “He met my mother on a blind date.”

Murray noticed after the interview that Mahan was picking up the baseballs and gathering the bats. He asked the coach if it was his job to clear the fields. Mahan told him that it was the student manager’s duty but that the team didn’t have one. Murray said he’d be the student manager. He spent two seasons with Mahan, who then helped Murray get a job in minor-league ball.

Murray spent a few seasons with teams in Virginia and Georgia before leaving to manage the Wharf, a Malibu bar his friend owned that was frequented by Hollywood stars.

Two years later, Mahan was Villanova’s athletic director and needed a new sports information director. He remembered the kid who volunteered to clean up the baseballs and told Murray the job was his. But Mahan needed to know right away. Murray went to Our Lady of Malibu Church, prayed for an hour, and drove back to Philadelphia the next morning.

Art Mahan heard in 1969 that the Eagles were looking for a public relations assistant. He told Murray to go for it. The NFL was growing, and he thought that Murray would be a good fit. Murray wanted to stay at Villanova but agreed to meet with Eagles general manager Pete Retzlaff. He returned to Mahan’s office and his boss asked how it went. Murray said he simply handed Retzlaff his resumé.

“Dad said, ‘No. Go back and push for that job,’” Ed Mahan said.

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Murray returned to the Eagles and asked Retzlaff for another interview. He nailed it and the job was his.

“He got along with everyone,” Ed Mahan said. “You wanted to be with Jimmy because he was always happy. You wanted to go to work with him because you knew you were going to have fun. The job got done.”

Murray quickly rose with the Birds as owner Leonard Tose saw his potential. Tose fired Retzlaff and promoted Murray to the position in 1974. He was just 36 years old.

The Eagles, now the king of the city’s sports scene, were flirting with irrelevance in the 1970s. It was Murray who made the move that changed everything. He watched Dick Vermeil’s UCLA team rally in the second half on New Year’s Day 1976 to knock off Woody Hayes’ top-ranked Ohio State squad in the Rose Bowl. Vermeil was the Eagles’ guy, Murray told Tose.

They flew to Los Angeles and called Vermeil. He said no thanks before agreeing to meet them at the Beverly Hills Hotel. He told the Eagles that he loved his life in California and could recruit whomever he wanted after winning the Rose Bowl. Why would he leave?

“Jim Murray steps up,” Mahan said. “He said, ‘Coach, the fans in Philadelphia are so desperate for a winner that you’ll get a standing ovation if you win the coin toss.’”

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Vermeil agreed. Murray told him that he would never leave Philadelphia. Nearly 50 years later, Vermeil still calls the region home. Murray was the GM, but he let Vermeil and Carl Peterson handle the personnel decisions while he worked out the contracts. It was a great partnership.

“He was working for a real flamboyant, great guy in Leonard Tose and an inexperienced head coach,” Vermeil said. “He had a lot of work to do and he did it well.”

The Eagles finally turned things around in 1978 as they won nine games and returned to the playoffs. No win was bigger than Nov. 19 against the Giants: the Miracle at the Meadowlands.

Tose was undergoing heart surgery in Houston, and Murray was sick on the sideline in the game’s final minute as he thought about calling the owner to explain how the team lost to the Giants. The Giants had the ball and a five-point lead. They just had to kneel to run out the clock. Instead, they called a running play and fumbled the handoff.

Mahan was one of the few photographers still shooting with the game all but over. The team photographer was thinking about the next season’s yearbook and loved to shoot photos of seldom-used players. So he focused his camera on a rookie linebacker when the ball suddenly bounced across his lens.

“I said, ‘Whoa,’” Mahan said. “Out of nowhere Herm Edwards scoops the ball up and runs right towards me.”

Eight years earlier, Mahan had painted Murray’s home in Haverford. Mahan returned from the Vietnam War with the cameras he bought at the PX store — “I didn’t get the malaria bug, but I got the photography bug,” he said — and didn’t have a job. So he painted houses for friends.

He brought the photos he took in Vietnam to Murray’s home and Murray invited him to shoot the Eagles’ final game in 1970 at Franklin Field. Mahan’s first assignment was an NFL game. His father gave Murray a chance at Villanova. And now Murray was giving Mahan’s son a chance with the Birds.

“He met a kid who had talent but needed a good push down the runway,” Mahan said. “I think I proved my worth, but Jimmy saw that when maybe I didn’t even see that. He gave me a good break. Jimmy gave me the chance.”

Mahan parlayed his gig as the Eagles’ team photographer into the same role for the Flyers, Sixers, and Phillies. His career — Mahan recently retired from the Eagles after 55 years — started thanks to Murray.

Mahan was the only photographer to capture a photo of Edwards dashing into the end zone for his miracle touchdown. He turned his camera to the Eagles celebrating in the end zone. And there was Murray, hugging the players and no longer worried about how he would explain a brutal loss to the owner.

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“It wasn’t like I said, ‘I’m going to stay because I have this work ethic that you never leave,’” Mahan said about the 19-17 victory. “No, I was going to get on the team buses. God put me in the perfect spot at the perfect time.”

Mahan printed his photo of Murray’s son and the pope and brought it to Veterans Stadium to show Murray. First, he gave him a cropped version that just showed the pope’s hand on the baby. He wanted his boss to think he missed the shot. Then, he gave him the real picture.

“He broke down in tears,” Mahan said.

A year later, Ed Piszek — the Philadelphian who started Mrs. Paul’s frozen fish company and had become friends with Pope John Paul — visited the pope in Rome. He took a copy of the photo, which was shown on Monday Night Football, and got it signed for Murray. Three months later, Piszek came through again by flying Murray to meet the pope in Alaska.

It looked for a moment as if Murray wasn’t going to meet the pope in Alaska. But then the pope changed course, just like he did that day at Logan Circle.

The pope turned around as he walked up the steps to his plane and moved toward Murray. John Krol, the cardinal who was archbishop of Philadelphia, grabbed Murray’s arm and brought him to the pope. John Paul embraced Krol, who then walked away to leave Murray alone with the pontiff.

“He left me one-on-one with the 263rd successor to St. Peter and I didn’t know what to do,” Murray said to the Daily News after returning home. “It was such a beautiful, moving moment, one I wanted to share with so many people who weren’t there, that I didn’t know what to say. I finally said, ‘Holy Father, I thank you for blessing my son.’ And the Holy Father said, ‘I remember — in Philadelphia.’”

Murray, the kid who grew up watching the Eagles at Franklin Field and then was the GM who helped them reach the Super Bowl, found a way to find the right words. He always found a way.

“He had no ego,” Vermeil said. “The only thing he wanted to do was the best he could do for Philadelphia. His concern was always about somebody else. There were times when things didn’t go well for him and the only thing he was worried about were how things were going for other people. He had a tremendous Catholic faith. I think he was the best Catholic I ever met. I always said he should’ve been the pope’s offensive coordinator.”