Can Ex Eagles QB Carson Wentz Reignite Career in Week 18 With Rams?
The Los Angeles Rams don't yet know their exact seed, but coach Sean McVay's squad has locked up a playoff berth and will be traveling on the road for Wild Card Weekend. As such, quarterback Matthew Stafford is among the veterans that will be resting in Week 18, opening the door for former Philadelphia Eagles star Carson Wentz to get his first start of the season against the San Francisco 49ers.
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Wentz was signed by the Rams in November, and has served as Stafford's backup since then. The 31-year-old's first snap in Week 18 will be the first he takes as a member of the Rams, as he's yet to see game action this season.
The past three seasons, of course, were tumultuous for Wentz. Playing with the Eagles, Indianapolis Colts and Washington Commanders over that period, Wentz has thrown 54 touchdowns to 31 interceptions, posting a 14-21-1 record. He's gone from a player who helped lead an undermanned Eagles team to the postseason in 2019 to an afterthought, one that the NFL machine has seemingly chewed up and spit out.
It's unlikely that Wentz will be able to show enough in Week 18 to earn a starting opportunity next season. However, if he plays well enough without all the key pieces for the Rams at his disposal, that may assure he has a job on Week 1 of the 2024 season, whether that's with his current employer or another. And as Geno Smith of the Seattle Seahawks has demonstrated, if you hang around on NFL rosters long enough, you might get another opportunity to start.
Wentz reviving his career with the Rams would be quite ironic, as we previously pointed out. The Rams traded up to the No. 1 pick and selected Jared Goff, rather than Wentz, in the 2016 NFL Draft. Wentz tore his ACL -- ending his MVP campaign and forcing him to miss an eventual Super Bowl run -- while playing against the Rams in Week 14 of the 2017 season. And it was another late-season matchup of the Rams where Nick Foles helped to re-ignite the Eagles postseason hopes in 2018, when a fracture in Wentz's back forced him to miss time.
San Francisco has already clinched a first-bye and home-field advantage throughout the postseason, so coach Kyle Shanahan will be trying to strike the balance of not letting his team get rusty but also making sure key players don't suffer injuries in a meaningless game. Perhaps that will open the door for Wentz to surprise in the final game of the regular season. It still feels like there might be another chapter to be written in his NFL story.
