In this past Spring’s NFL draft, the Philadelphia Eagles selected North Dakota State quarterback Carson Wentz with the second overall pick. The plan coming into this season was for Wentz to be the third string quarterback on game days with Chase Daniel being the backup and Sam Bradford as the starter.
However, that would not be the case as Wentz had a solid preseason debut against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, despite suffering a rib injury, which sidelined him for the last three weeks of the preseason. Wentz’s preseason debut along with the progress he made in practice gave Eagles head coach Doug Pederson and the rest of the front office confidence he could be the starter against the Cleveland Browns on September 11.
In a strange turn of events, Wentz was named the starter as the Eagles traded Sam Bradford to the Minnesota Vikings after Teddy Bridgewater suffered a horrific knee injury.
Coming out of the gate, Wentz looked good as he led the Eagles to an impressive 3-0 start, including a 34-3 victory over the Pittsburgh Steelers. In his first three games, Wentz completed 64.7 percent of his passes for 769 passing yards, five touchdowns, and zero interceptions.
As the weeks went on, however, the wheels started to fall off the bus for both him and the Eagles as they lost to the Detroit Lions 24-23 after the bye week. Wentz completed 75.7 percent of his passes for 238 passing yards and two touchdowns, but also threw the first interception of his career.
With 1:30 left to go in the game, the Eagles were looking to put together a game winning drive, but instead Wentz on the first play, decided to take a deep shot, trying to get the ball to wide receiver Nelson Agholor. Instead of the football ending up in Agholor’s hands, it ended up in the hands of Detroit Lions cornerback Darius Slay.
That would be the first of 11 interceptions Wentz has thrown in the last several weeks. Over the last seven weeks, Wentz has had three games with two interceptions and a game with three interceptions, which came last week against the Cincinnati Bengals.
Wentz’s performance last Sunday, where he threw the ball 60 times, has been analyzed and picked apart by every analyst trying to figure out why he has regressed?
A main reason why Wentz has struggled over the past few weeks is because of his mechanics. In Bleacher Report’s NFL1000 Scouting Notebook, Doug Farrar analyzed all three of Wentz’s interceptions and pointed out that Wentz’s footwork has to improve, along with his elongated release.
If you watched Wentz play at North Dakota State or even with the Eagles, you probably have noticed his elongated release. His release is sort of like a windup and that most of his interceptions have happened because the ball sails on him.
But this is not a cause for concern and it is easily fixable. He has three coaches in Pederson, Frank Reich, and Joe DeFilippo, who were all quarterbacks and can work out the kinks. Although, if Wentz was still the third string quarterback or even the backup, these mechanical issues would not be noticeable or highly scrutinized.
But that is hindsight; he is the Eagles’ starting quarterback now and will have to adjust on the fly to fix these issues. With four games left in the season, Wentz is completing 63.1 percent of his passes, along with 12 touchdowns, and 11 interceptions.
While those numbers may not be pleasing to the eye, we have to remember that he is still a rookie and so is his head coach. We have to give both a full offseason and preseason to figure things out. So yes, while the interceptions are a cause for concern, look at the pieces around Wentz in comparison to his rookie counterpart Dak Prescott.
It is literally night and day as Prescott’s job is made easier because of the talent he has surrounding him, while Wentz is going through the typical rookie growing pains.
Many people don’t remember Peyton Manning’s rookie season, where he threw 28 interceptions. I highly doubt we will remember Wentz’s rookie season, if he can overcome these first-year struggles.
