Whither Wentz?

The Hunt for Carson Wentz
After a roller-coaster rookie season, the Eagles quarterback still feels confident and ready to stalk his prey in Year 2

Peter King

http://mmqb.si.com/mmqb/2017/06/12/carson-wentz-philadelphia-eagles-fathers-day-books-peter-king

I don’t know if Carson Wentz is going to be a good player or not. It’s more likely than not he’ll have a successful career, but as Bill Parcells has said about 1,600 players in his life, they don’t sell insurance for that stuff.

But I talked to Wentz for awhile the other day, as he drove home from an offseason practice, and I came away thinking he’s got a good chance. He reminds me of Eli Manning in terms of mentality and confidence—I’ll explain that in a few moments—and I don’t think the game’s too big for him, which I’ll explain too.

I don’t believe Eli Manning’s ever been hunting for Himalayan Tahr (a wild goat) and Chamois (a goat-antelope species) and red deer in New Zealand, though. And that’s one of the things that’s got Wentz particularly excited these days. “I went with my brother to New Zealand for a week [in late March], on what I know would be a bucket-list hunt for so many hunters,” Wentz told me.

“It’s probably the most exhilarating hunt I’ve been on. I got my Tahr with a bow from about 40 yards, and boy, that was rewarding. It’s addicting.”

“What would be more rewarding from 40 yards—getting a Tahr with a bow and arrow, or throwing a touchdown pass from that distance in the Super Bowl?” I asked.

Pause. “God willing, playing in the Super Bowl one day, and making that pass like you say, would be a blessing—that’s what I’m working for right now,” Wentz said.

A bit of a game-rewind on Wentz, the phenom who grew up in North Dakota, starred at North Dakota State, and was fed to the Philadelphia wolves with the second pick in the 2016 draft. He was supposed to wilt. He didn’t.

Wentz was an early sensation, ripping off three wins to start his career and sending the normally skeptical Philly fans into a Wentz-for-Canton tizzy. But it was too good to be true, as these number illustrate:

……………………………….W-L…Comp. %………. TD-INT……….. Rating
The Good Start….. 4-2….. .638…………………. 8-3……………………. 92.7
The Rough End…. 3-7…… .616…………………..8-11…………………… 73.4

Odd: Wentz’s only three wins in the last two months of the season came against NFC playoff teams—the Falcons, Giants and Cowboys. So the most famous athletic North Dakotan since Roger Maris entered a long off-season with more question marks than exclamation points.

Mostly this: As the season went on, Wentz never got a crisis of confidence or questioned that he should be playing as a rookie from North Dakota State. Basically, his confidence occasionally signed checks his arm couldn’t cash.

To start a five-game Eagles’ losing streak, Wentz threw a laser into a forest of four Seahawks just before halftime, down nine points, that was picked by Kam Chancellor and killed an important drive. There were more where that came from.

Wentz didn’t have a crisis of confidence. If anything, he had a crisis of decision-making.

“The thing is, I never pressed last year,” Wentz said. “I learned a lot. Windows are smaller, I have to make decisions faster … athletes, obviously, are better. But my motto was, ‘It’s just football.’ I didn’t make anything bigger than it was. I made some mistakes, but I didn’t get shaken by them.”

“Did anything last year, making that jump from North Dakota to the NFL, bug you?” I wondered.

“Never,” he said. “Definitely never.”

That’s where the Eli comparison is appropriate. I’ll always remember after the February 2012 Super Bowl win over New England, an emotional-less Manning was being shuttled through the Giants’ locker room to a media obligation by a phalanx of yellow-coated security people.

Looking at the scene, Justin Tuck of the Giants said, “That’s Eli—he’d look the same whether we just won or lost this game.” Manning felt if he left everything in preparation and performance on the field, no sense crying about a bad loss. And he never got very high after his biggest wins.

It’s early, but that’s Wentz’s way. He went to work with Tom House’s quarterback-mechanics protégé, Adam Dedeaux, in southern California for two weeks after the season to polish footwork, the timing between arm and legs, and learn the kind of shoulder exercises and “prehab” work that will prevent his shoulder from aching during heavy throwing periods.

(Dedeaux recently took over House’s business tutoring quarterbacks.) “What made me go there?” Wentz said. “Knowing so many good players went there and it helped them. I never want to stop learning. There are so many little things about playing this position that to the naked eye you won’t see when you watch me. But I do feel I am improved mechanically.”

Wentz has confidence he can play faster, he said, because he’s not thinking as much. In the Eagles’ OTA workouts—important not just for Wentz, but also for his chemistry with new receivers Alshon Jeffery and Torrey Smith—he said he feels faster and more comfortable in his second year under offensive coordinator Frank Reich. “Way more comfortable,” he said.

“It’s OTAs, I know. But things have slowed down. I’m not thinking about everything anymore—last year I was. Now I can feel the important things early in the play—where’s my answer, what are my options, what will work? It’s a different game when you can dial it down and feel you know what’s important to look for, and you’re not looking at every little thing out there. I mean, cover-2 is cover-2.”

On the topic of hunting, Wentz, who turns 25 this year, did a lot of it with American League MVP and Eagles season-ticket holder Mike Trout, 26. “Ducks, geese, sometimes just shooting boxes of shells and getting nothing. But there’s nothing like laying in a field, waiting for a shot. He’s a ridiculous fan of ours, but we don’t talk sports, really. Just life. We’ve got a lot of common ground.”

Eagles fans certainly hope so. Executive VP of football operations Howie Roseman dealt two starting defenders (Kiko Alonso, Byron Maxwell), plus first-, second-, third- and fourth-round picks to move from 15 to eight, then eight to two, in the draft to pick Wentz. So he’d better be the guy.

One of the things Wentz needs to be significantly better doing is throwing downfield. His 6.2 yards-per-attempt was 31st in the league—and Wentz has a good arm. There’s no way Trevor Siemian and Case Keenum should be better downfield throwers than the second pick in the draft, with a good arm and a load of confidence.

The Eagles got the speedy Smith and the productive deep weapon Jeffery to make Wentz better intermediate and down the field. Now he’s just got to do it.

For now, you’re not shaking Wentz’s confidence. Reich and coach Doug Pederson have emphasized smarter throws when diagnosing some of his 2016 mistakes. Wentz understands.

“I never found myself pressing last year, and I won’t this year,’’ he said. “Losing bugs me. But I’m a very optimistic person. I continue to refine what I do. I’m loving working with these new guys. The attitude here is very good, very positive. Going into this year, I’m really happy where we’re at.”