The floor falls out in 2020
The 2020 season for Carson Wentz has been described by many as regression.
In reality, it was more of a collapse.
Perhaps nothing highlights that more than a Monday Night Football outing against the Seattle Seahawks. In front of a national audience, Wentz struggled mightily. His confidence shattered, the Eagles sputtered to get anything going on offense. No play illustrated that more than a failure to see what was there to be seen on a vertical concept, something that was brought to light by both Brian Griese and Louis Riddick in the booth, and something that brought my mind back to his days at North Dakota State:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DIlRidENHc8
It all came crashing down the next week against the Green Bay Packers. Amidst reports that Doug Pederson and the offensive staff were trying to simplify the offense for him, Wentz struggled again. It even showed up with Wentz running one of the staple Philadelphia passing concepts, a day one installation termed “Arizona” that combines two in-breaking routes with a slant route on one side of the field.
Again, this is a day one install play.
Watch how slowly the quarterback works through his options on this play:
In a light most-favorable to him, Wentz is trying to work through his reads and get to the best option. The problem is how deliberate he is, unsure of what he is seeing, similar to the above video breakdown. The confidence is gone, the quarterback sure of what he is seeing has disappeared.
Wentz would be benched in the second half after this final attempt:
Hesitant and unsettled in the pocket, Wentz passes up an open route right in the middle of the field to force this throw in the direction of John Hightower late in the down. The pass sails high and falls incomplete.
It would be his last throw in an Eagles’ uniform.
But the question looms: How did this happen? Many have tried to address that, and there are multiple answers you can choose from. You can make it about the injuries, and how the back injury and the knee injury and the head injury from the previous playoffs finally reared their ugly heads. You can also point to injuries compounding mechanical problems. I’m Mister “mechanics don’t matter until they matter,” but as we saw from Wentz this season, the mechanics mattered:
The Wentz pick. Already two great breakdowns from @EaglesXOs and @BenjaminSolak who are smarter than me, that you should definitely watch.
I'm gonna focus more on the throw – and the mechanics – than the decision.
*Locking the front leg
*Breaking the chain
*Finishing away pic.twitter.com/RO4Gx26p2L— Mark Schofield (@MarkSchofield) September 22, 2020
So there is a mechanical issue with him, but it is fixable according to Quincy Avery, who knows a thing or fifteen million about coaching quarterbacks:
His base has gotten really wide and he's crunching not rotating properly. Very fixable with deliberate practice
— quincy_avery (@Quincy_Avery) September 22, 2020
Speaking of Benjamin Solak, there is also a more global issue with Wentz, and whenever Ben writes about the Eagles quarterback, I listen. I quote at length:
Wentz hates the players to whom he’s throwing the football, as they reward his targets with poor routes, drops, incompletions, and interceptions. He plays like a quarterback in fear of his teammates and how their failures will reflect on him, in a locker room he has never won over, to a fanbase that has forever wondered if a better option is on the bench — an idea only encouraged by the same front office that considered his current weapons sufficient when they drafted Jalen Hurts. When he throws to them, he throws beyond them and behind them and below them.
And the throwing itself? Wentz’s sudden and steep decline in accuracy is partially, but insufficiently explained by a regression in his mechanics. His throwing base is wider than ever, all of his velocity generated by his arm, his lead foot closed to his target. Every throw looks laborious, forced, fearful of consequence. Wentz has never had the cleanest throwing motion, but he was accurate then — he is inaccurate now, which puts his entire process into question.
What, then, is the problem with Carson Wentz? Everything is. He isn’t healthy, his mechanics are worse, he doesn’t push the ball down the field, he isn’t responding well to pressure, he has no playmaking ability, and he couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn. He is not on the same page as his offensive designers, he hasn’t taken coaching to improve his game, he has no rapport with his wide receivers, and he doesn’t think his offensive line will protect him. There is nothing redeemable about his 2020 play, save for the exasperated utterance that he has to be better than this.
What solves these problems? Everything does. Better receivers, better game plans, better coaching, better protection, better quarterback. There is no chicken nor egg when Carson Wentz’s disastrous 2020 is considered: everything is bad around him, and finally, he is bad enough to reflect it. The offense cannot improve by stepping back into 2019, when the same stale designs and poor receivers were buttressed by Wentz’s quality play — that quality play is no longer there. The offense cannot improve by stepping back into 2017, when the designs were fresh and supporting cast was healthy — those coaches are gone and those players are hurt. There is no lighthouse beyond this fog of uncertainty, this thick and layered haze.
There is a lot to fix. Everything to fix. Perhaps rather than trying to fix everything, the Eagles just took a different approach. Fix everything by eliminating the need to fix everything. Fix everything, by moving on from Wentz.
He is no longer their concern, but his new team has to believe they have the answer.
What is that answer?