Until it Hurts, Wentz can only play scapegoat ball
At some point in any football game, in any season, in any career, a quarterback will be asked to do something that could be a little painful. That time has arrived for Carson Wentz. That time has come for him to hang in there, literally and otherwise, and absorb every beating, criticism and bruise.
He’s a placeholder now, on the clock for the inevitable, around to wait it out until it is safe for Jalen Hurts to give it a try. He’s good enough, Wentz is, to keep the Eagles involved in games despite a tattered offensive line and creaky and unavailable point-producers. But a 38-29 loss in Pittsburgh Sunday showed that the Eagles are too far from NFL relevance to do anything for the rest of this season but hope that the other three teams in their division prove to be even worse.
“It wasn’t the end result we wanted,” Wentz said, after his record dipped to 1-3-1. “We left some plays out there. But we did some good things. We got a good rhythm going. We converted a lot of third downs.
“There’s some things we can build on. And getting into that rhythm today definitely helped us.”
If the Eagles had a rhythm, it was only after they were behind by 17. And Wentz did what he could, despite Alshon Jeffery and DeSean Jackson never playing and Zach Ertz aging and displeased with his contractual situation. The offensive line, with Lane Johnson leaving another game, was not of championship quality. The running backs had moments, but too little room to move. Sunday, the Eagles needed a 74 touchdown run from Miles Sanders and 10 catches and a touchdown from practice-squad graduate Travis Fulgham just to stay close.
Because he is responsible for saying such things, Wentz tried to characterize the offense as improving and perhaps even close to a consistent hum. But the only reason he was sacked five times Sunday is because his survival instincts prevented the Steelers from sacking him 10 times. Wentz’s evasiveness has always been high among his quarterback charms, but the Eagles are at a point offensively where they are trying to survive as much as they are trying to thrive.
“We just didn’t make enough plays,” Wentz said. “Plain and simple.”
Afterward, as if by some kind of in-room verbal pact, the Eagles tried to hide be
hind the most annoying of football shields. Once, twice, up to a half-dozen times,
Doug Pederson evaded comment on simple in-game matters that everyone, including the 5,000 or so on hand in Heinz Field, saw as a matter of standard football-game enjoyment. Instead, he said he needed to watch the film before commenting. But if there was a reason the Eagles didn’t make enough plays, it is because they don’t have enough play-makers. Fulgham was splendid Sunday, as he was a week earlier in a victory in San Francisco. But opposing coordinators are within a three-hour film study of figuring him out, even if Wentz was nice enough to praise him as “a baller.”
Sanders is gifted, and his two touchdowns in his hometown were memorable. But he had just five rushing yards, to
tal, on his nine other carries. It’s what happens when everything is collapsing on just about every play.
In other seasons, for other operations, Hurts could be an answer. He is that talented, and it is why the Eagles were right to spend a second-round pick on him despite the howls of critics influenced by knownothing draftniks. Not that he is necessarily better than Wentz, who has begun to steady after a horrific threegame start, but Hurts could provide a refreshing change for more than the occasional gadget play that the defenses see coming the minute he trots onto the field.
Yet to throw a rookie into a situation where he would be under assault two plays out of every five would put him at risk of everything from injury to a lasting confidence drain.
But that’s how bad the Ea
gles are as the NFL bleeds into Week 6. And that’s how convoluted their quarterback rotation, short and long term, has become just five years into Wentz’s career. They are so inept that they don’t even meet the standard requirements for a quarterback controversy. And that has nothing to do with the fact that they have yet to be approved to assemble fans to boo and demand one.
So Wentz it must be, at least as long as the rest of the division conspires to keep them in a cheap playoff race. That will be him, until further notice, ducking under passrushers of violent intent, trying to win by stretching out plays, and trusting that Sanders, Fulgham, Greg Ward and Boston Scott can provide enough scoring opportunities until Jackson and Jeffery are ready, Dallas Goedert recovers
from a broken ankle or Ertz gives Howie Roseman more reason to make him even wealthier.
“We knew they were a pressure team,” Pederson said. “They had five guys who can put the pressure on. Overall, I thought the guys played well. Right up until the end, I thought they held up well.”
Wentz has been sacked 19 times in five games, and at least some of his eight interceptions can be traced to the pressure he faces, play after play. He is paid plenty, of course, to win no matter what else is happening on the field. A quarterback, though, can be paid for other services, too.
Taking some hits while the next quarterback is readied is on that list.