Groundhog Day for Carson Wentz Speculation
PHILADELPHIA - Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow Tuesday and you know what that means? Six more weeks of speculation surrounding Carson Wentz.
As the snow piles up around the Delaware Valley, the NFL's new league year looms, set to begin on March 17. Two days after that is presumably decision day when Philadelphia has to guarantee $15 million of Wentz's 2022 salary.
In other words, that's the drop-dead date for Wentz's immediate future in Philadelphia. If a trade is not agreed to by then Wentz will be in the 2021 plans, be it as the starter (the most likely option) or in a full-fledged competition with Jalen Hurts (the feigned meritocracy angle floated by new coach and cliche-master Nick Sirianni).
To date, Sirianni has been vague because he has to be. To make a definitive statement at this point before knowing if Wentz is agreeable to any reclamation project in Philadelphia is counter-productive.
The silence from Wentz is notable if only because it swims against the current of typical behavior.
On social media for instance, when things were going well and Wentz was the clear leader in Philadelphia he was a “welcome guy” on Twitter, going out of his way to make sure anyone coming to the organization got a little public support from the face of the franchise.
Wentz has been silent this offseason despite the fact he's got new people to work with, most notably Sirianni and his inner-offensive circle of offensive coordinator Shane Steichen, passing game coordinator Kevin Patullo, and quarterbacks coach Brian Johnson.
From what SI’s EagleMaven can gather from sources close to the QB Wentz would prefer to start over in another city. That doesn't mean he's demanded a trade or is locked in on never playing another down for the Eagles, however.
What it does mean is everyone has to keep their options open because the landscape might not even permit a changing of the guard until 2022 even in Jeffrey Lurie rubber-stamps $33M in dead money in response to a Wentz trade demand right now.
Remember one of the results of the recently-agreed upon Matthew Stafford-Jared Goff trade is that two of the teams in the QB market are now already out of it.
Furthermore, there are a host of cheaper options in the draft available for organizations looking to reboot at the game’s most important position and plenty of veterans as well, from pie-in-the-sky Deshaun Watson-like dreams to the more realistic Jimmy Garoppolos of the world.
Wentz staying in Philadelphia would result in three potential end-games: the good, the bad, and the ugly.
The first two scenarios are pretty obvious: a successful reboot under the new coaching staff and a simple market correction from a hiccup en route to Wentz becoming a true QB1 again or a clear loss to Hurts, even less value on the open market next year, coupled with a little less dead money for Lurie in exchange for little or nothing in return for the quarterback.
The ugly is mediocrity but still better than Hurts.
That turns Groundhog Day into Groundhog Year with the "Seer of Seers, Sage of Sages, Prognosticator of Prognosticators, and QB Prophet Extraordinary" showing up next February to answer all the same questions.
John McMullen contributes Eagles coverage for SI.com's EagleMaven and is the NFL Insider for JAKIB Media. You can listen to John every Tuesday and Thursday on "The Middle" with Eytan Shander, Harry Mayes, and Barrett Brooks on SportsMap Radio and PhillyVoice.com. He’s also the host of Extending the Play on AM1490 in South Jersey. You can reach him at jmcmullen44@gmail.com or on Twitter @JFMcMullen
Ed Kracz is the publisher of EagleMaven. Check out the latest Eagles news at www.SI.com/NFL/Eagles and please follow him on Twitter: @kracze.
