After the Eagles had finished their pre-season it was time to get ready for another opening day with Sam Bradford at quarterback. To be quite honest with you, I had no excitement for the Eagles. As a Philadelphia sports fan there is nothing more sacrilegious than that statement. Football is king here. You will here sports talk radio in this town talk about the Eagles for 300 days a year and the other 65 is about the other three teams combined. But what was there to be excited about? Another year of watching a team go .500 or worse with one of the 12 worst quarterbacks in the league, who will get every excuse made for him in the world under center. Why would I want to watch? But trading Bradford changes everything.
Forget the fact they completely fleeced the Vikings. Howie Roseman stole a first round pick as well as a fourth rounder from Minnesota, so that the Eagles wouldn’t have to wait until day two of the draft to make their first selection. The opportunity to watch the (hopefully) future of the franchise start in week one has me completely changing my view of this season. Before all of this went down head coach Doug Pederson said that Carson Wentz might not play all season. Now, Carson “can’t miss” Wentz gets his chance week one and I couldn’t be more excited. The next era of Eagles football can finally begin.
I think that having Wentz play week one was the best thing for him since the day he was drafted. This is because no matter when you were deciding to have him debut, he will still have to go through the rookie struggle. He will see defensive schemes he is not used to seeing. He will have to adjust to the speed of the game that is 10 times faster than that of Division 1-AA. Having him start put in week one only speeds up that process. He can begin to make those adjustments a lot sooner in his career speeding up his development. I am a firm believer that the best way to learn, in anything not just sports, is by actually doing them. And instead of holding a clipboard and not suiting up, he can get that experience. This is especially true with Chase Daniel as the backup. He has been with Doug Pederson for years now and knows the ins and outs of the offense and can help mentor Wentz through his transition. Also, you will just be delaying the inevitable. The fans will be so anxious to see Bradford that every time he throws and interception “we want Wentz” chants would break out at Lincoln Financial Field. Bradford already showed with his mini-holdout that he wasn’t pleased with the drafting of Carson Wentz so this this situation is better for everyone. Have fun freezing your butt off in the Twin Cities Bradford.
Season Predictions
It does not really matter who is at quarterback for this team, I think the playoffs should not be expected. Ever since the Eagles made that trade with Cleveland this has been the year to rebuild/re-tool. This is the year to clean up the mess that Chip Kelly made. This is a season that I think will feature a defense that could be top 10 in the league with an offense that may struggle to score at times. I think that you will see Zach Ertz and Jordan Matthews take the next steps in their careers as well as Jordan Hicks to build off of his great rookie campaign until he got injured. Fletcher Cox will further prove why he got paid the way he did and that moving from a 3-4 defensive end to a 4-3 defensive tackle will make him even better. All in all, I will say that the eagles will go 6-10 and finish in third place in the NFC East. I think that they will have some struggles early on offensively but see great improvement over the season in Carson Wentz, making fans feel really good about the 2017-2018 campaign.