As expected, the future of Carson Wentz in Philadelphia is fast becoming a hot topic in the NFL news cycle. This morning, Adam Schefter of ESPN.com published a report saying that Wentz is not interested in being a backup quarterback and will ask to be traded if Jalen Hurts continues as the team’s starter.
Obviously, no player wants to be a backup, especially a player like Wentz who is not too far removed from being a legitimate MVP candidate and whose massive contract has quickly turned into an albatross. But if his goal is to get a fresh start somewhere else, then leaking his unhappiness might not be the best way to go about it, as it could hurt the Eagles’ leverage with other clubs and add another layer of complexity to trade talks.
According to Schefter, Wentz is unhappy with how his benching has unfolded. It seems his primary point of contention is that head coach Doug Pederson has not said whether the switch to Hurts is permanent, though sources tell ESPN and Ian Rapoport of the NFL Network (video link) that the rookie passer will remain the starter for the rest of the regular season (and presumably into the playoffs if Philadelphia should qualify). Schefter’s report also lends credence to prior rumblings that Wentz’s confidence was shaken when Hurts was selected in the second round of this year’s draft.
Just last week, we heard that the Eagles are committed to Wentz as their long-term solution under center, though many believe that was simply to help themselves in their seemingly inevitable trade negotiations. As we detailed in that story, the club will need to make a decision on Wentz’s future by the second day of the 2021 league year, which will be sometime in the middle of March. On the third day of the league year, Wentz’s 2022 base salary of $22MM becomes fully-guaranteed, and he will receive a $10MM roster bonus for 2021.
In addition to the Colts, Eliot Shorr-Parks of 94 WIP sees the Patriots, Broncos, and 49ers as potential trade partners.
suck it
I’d LOVE to be a BU QB, especially with that contract.
As for his confidence ‘being shaken’ by them drafting a person at his position, it really show inside that he’s not all that good. I think highly of Hurts. He was a winner in both Alabama & Oklahoma, says a lot about him. But for a 4 year starter with sad feelings, its silly and certainly the wrong message in the city of brotherly love.
if Wentz is so emotionally damaged by them drafting a QB or benching him then he doesnt have the makup to be a franchise QB. you have to be able to deal with adversity. have you seen how Rodgers has responded to them taking Love? yeah, he’s been killing it thus year. Wentz needs to buck up and take that job back if he really thinks he should deserve a QB1 job, here or anywhere.
^^^^^^^
Ditto….
You can’t compare Wentz’ situation with that of Aaron Rogers. The Packers are a superior football team in every facet.
The Eagles, as an organization, are a train wreck. No direction and no foundational pieces. They are also staring at salary cap hell. Can’t blame the guy if he wants out, regardless of how poorly he’s played. They tried to build talent around Wentz but it’s been an absolute failure
Haven’t we seen this movie before? A backup QB comes in who is a little bit of an unknown, defensive coordinators don’t know quite how to scheme for him, and he rattles off a hot streak. That’s what Hurts is doing. I completely understand riding that while you can if you’re Philly. They may be shooting themselves in the foot down the road, though?
The Indy fit makes too much sense not too happen, if they’re going to trade Wentz. I also think SF would be interesting, if they move off of Jimmy G. I’d like to see Carson get a shot somewhere with more talent around him and a good HC.
NE has no weapons. The Broncos presently don’t have strong coaching.
Wouldn’t it be interesting to see SF move Jimmy G back to the Pats, and them orchestrating a trade to get Wentz which might really solve a bunch of problems and issues.
Hurts had an outstanding NCAA career for 2 ranked programs. His notoriety, or lack thereof, is all on the media coverage which paled in comparison to Tua & Burrow.
I picked him up a few weeks into the season and started him the past 2 weeks; easily winning both playoff games
ps: BOOMER!
Reich was his coach during his best season. Best bet Indy makes a play for him and rivers off to the sunset
As a bears fan I would gladly give them back their foles guy for him lol
Foles had his 15 minutes of fame…..had a great run through the Super Bowl, but seemingly has illustrated why he isn’t considered the 16 game season answer a lot of teams are looking for these days.
If you don’t want to be a backup then don’t play like one.
Great comment!
He’ll be the greatest QB of all time if his on-field production ever matches his arrogance.
The Eagles drafting Hurts in the second round was a terrible decision at the time, and I think it was easy to predict that it would rattle Wentz. Wentz has always had injury problems, but a solid veteran backup might have been a better call than using a second round pick when the team had bigger needs.
That being said, Wentz has no one to blame but himself here. He was playing pretty badly and leading the league in picks, so it’s not like the Eagles had it out for him when they benched him. He just wasn’t doing his job. Also, I get the human element of it (these guys are people too), but if your starting quarterback can’t mentally handle a little bit of competition, that says a lot about him. A lot of other quarterbacks would have welcomed the competition and it would have lit a fire under them, instead of wilting and letting it get the best of them. The Packers picked a quarterback in the first round and Aaron Rodgers responded by having one of the best years of his career. That’s the difference.
Packers draft Love and now Rodgers playing out of his mind.
Not the same in Philly.
I know Eagles fans will not want to hear this but Carson might want to adapt the Eli Manning approach. When Eli with designated as the back up he handled it like a true professional and this was a guy with two Super Bowl titles and two Super Bowl MVP ‘s. Apparently Carson feels he is above all that and has proven what all the rumblings have been saying the guy is a cancer in that locker room and he needs to go.
Wentz doesn’t compare to Eli in any way, shape, or form.
Eli was also 45 when he did that, not in his mid 20’s.
Play better jackass and you won’t get benched
Amen
Not sure how NFL trades work with dead cap and everything. But if this was the NBA
I’d trade Jacobys Brissetts expiring deal plus a first round pick and a 4th round pick for Wentz if I’m the Colts.
Between Brissett and Rivers they have 40 mil coming off the books just at the QB position. That’s easily enough to absorb Wentz contract and he would be a huge upgrade for that team.
You played your way out of a starting job and were given every chance to turn it around. You have no one else to blame.
Ehhh you’re also acting like the Eagles weren’t a dumpster fire this year all around.
They sure have played better with Hurts. As
Someone said, Wentz wasn’t the entire problem but Hurts is the solution.
For a few games, maybe. Then, as with every new QB(particularly mobile ones), defenses will figure him out and his production will fall. The only way that this doesn’t happen is if the coaching staff puts together good game plans and develop his instincts, and if the GM puts better players around him.
It’s just short-sighted to admit that Wentz is more a victim than a perpetrator and also want him out. Hurts injected some juice, undeniably. He can better make up for bad plays with his legs, he has a good mindset, and he just isn’t as worn down as Wentz. But he eventually will get figured out as he is now, unless he gets better, the coaching gets better, and the roster gets better. We all saw what happened with Drew Lock. If the Eagles do not get better coaching and better receivers and better linemen, Hurts will eventually end up like Wentz and they would have canned their highly drafted quarterback for nothing.
The Eagles have made such a strong financial commitment to Wentz that it would be difficult and probably unwise to pull the trigger on a trade. Unless that OL is rebuilt you wont see Hurts having any long term success either.
Are you watching this game ?
Yeah, they lost.
Who went on record saying Wentz said anything? And if Wentz was content being a backup is when it’s time to be upset. This is such a nothing garbage story.
He might want to play better and get hurt less, in that case.
You’re right he’s brittle and soft…played through a shredded knee and broken back. Then last year he suffered a concussion when he was cheapshotted by Clowney. All three injuries he’s had in his career resulted in the team taking his helmet away.
Then he should get better.
If you’re betting on Hurts bring the answer after a handful of games, go ahead. Just don’t be surprised if Hurts starts losing later because the Eagles have a bad offensive line, bad coaching, and bad receivers with an inconsistent defense.
It’s easy to blame the quarterback. Wentz deserves some regardless of the other issues. But the blame here needs to be spread around a lot more than it currently is.
Hurts is playing with an even worse OL than Wentz played with with far better results. If the defense wasn’t completely injured they would have won today.
And he’s playing with better receivers. In any case, my point is not a comparative analysis between the two. It’s that the coaching in Philadelphia is the problem, not the quarterback.
The Cardinals have had one of the worst defenses in the NFL over the last few years. And a sample size of less than a quarter of a season is hardly enough to make think that the Eagles’ problems are suddenly solved. We should expect a young quarterback with mobility to inject juice into a struggling offense when he’s a second round pick. But unless the coaching and roster improves, it’ll wear off. Hurts is not even running the full playbook (not that Wentz was either at this point, to be fair). The Eagles have a lot of issues to fix-and while I do think that starting Hurts the rest of this year is a good idea, I want to emphasize again that pulling Wentz for Hurts is not the solution long term to the Eagles’ problems.
No, this line is not worse than what Wentz was stuck with and he now, as mentioned, has an almost full complement of receivers.
Notice how much better Alston Jeffery is playing?
You mean the not so secret Confidential Informant leaking nonsense to Josiah? Guy is garbage and only plays when he wants to. Notice his effort on that jump ball in the endzone to end their run in Cleveland?
You took the words right out of my mouth!
Notice how the rumors started up about Wentz as soon as the mouth started playing again…
No way the Eagles are getting rid of Wentz, one simple reason, trading and or releasing him will result in a $59.2 MM cap hit. With the cap looking to drop to around 160MM that will leave them with approximately $100MM for the 53 man team.
Like it or not Wentz is your QB next year.
Which reinforces the drafting of a QB in the 2nd round idiotic despite whatever he does on the field.
Another simple reason, he’s a franchise QB.
This thread crossed into hilarious.
Figure out new QBs especially the mobiles ones?
yeah okay
Hurts started & took Alabama to the championship game where he got … umm … hurt and Tua took over
He transferred to Oklahoma to follow Mayfield and Murray as the starting QB
His performance at the NFL level should surprise no one nor should it be dismissed as “new guy shiny”.
This is a league that’s had dual threat QBs for decades and any DC who uses the “we will be better prepared next time” excuse should be fired
Easy there, buddy. No one is saying that Hurts is bad (at least not on here that I see). Many are saying, to various degrees, that this upsurge is temporary unless the Eagles fix their other problems. Dual threats usually end up flaming out-unless they adapt too, just as defenses do. It’s the same with any quarterback, really. With the possible exception of Mahomes, who inherited a great team with a great coach, nobody just arrives on the scene as a league legend. They can start Hurts, but defenses will figure out his tendencies and he’ll have to adapt. That’s the difference between a good QB and a bad one. I’m not saying that he won’t-I think he has the right mindset to do it. What I’m saying is not to be fooled into thinking that starting Hurts has fundamentally fixed any of Philly’s most pressing issues.
Wentz being benched for Hurts is just a temporary solution, no matter who starts next year-unless the Eagles change what prompted their poor play as a whole. If that doesn’t happen, it won’t matter who starts.
+1
Not to mention Hurts struggled in the 2nd half of the Saints game and has made many poor decisions including the Safety as well as fumbling 6x in 2 games.
Yeah, they lost.
Sorry, wrong place!
Hurts…
The good…
647 yards passing.
251 yards rushing.
5 tds.
1 int.
The “spark” factor.
The bad…
55.1 % completion, lower than Wentz.
The ugly…
7 fumbles!
Only 1 int. but back to back games with dropped pick sixes which so many writers neglect to mention. Maybe they didn’t watch the games or they have an agenda, or most likely, both.
9 sacks. Only a sliver better than Wentz.
So despite what you read it’s a mixed bag. Some very good, some pretty bad.
Just not the night and day difference some would have you believe.
He does have a higher spark rating than Wentz, in fact he leads the league in spark and spunk as well