NEW ORLEANS — It wasn’t long ago — early December of 2017 to be specific — that Carson Wentz being in Super Bowl LIX, with the Philadelphia Eagles as the NFC participant, wouldn’t have seemed weird at all.
Wentz is here, and it isn’t how anyone would have scripted it a little more than seven years ago.
Wentz isn’t starring for the Eagles, or the Kansas City Chiefs either. He’s a backup for the Chiefs and hasn’t been a regular starter since early in the 2022 season. Kansas City is Wentz’s fifth NFL team already. It’s actually his fifth team in five seasons, which isn’t the career path he envisioned.
This is a player who was likely to win NFL MVP if he didn’t suffer a torn ACL in Week 15 of the 2017 season. Wentz was grateful to be back in a Super Bowl, healthy for it this time, but it’s safe to say it’s not the way he envisioned.
“It’s definitely a different transition,” Wentz said Wednesday about being a backup. “No one comes into this league, getting drafted where you get drafted, looking for that. But at the same time, it’s the hand I’ve been dealt.”
It’s funny that Wentz’s return to the Super Bowl comes against the Eagles. The 2017 Eagles probably don’t win a Super Bowl without Wentz’s contributions before he got injured. Philadelphia was 11-2 in his starts that season, and rode the No. 1 seed to the NFC title. But it ended in a sour way, with Wentz never again playing to his 2017 level and Jalen Hurts eventually taking the Eagles’ starting quarterback job.
Maybe with some better fortune, Wentz’s entire NFL story is different.
“You can look back and play the what if game all you want,” Wentz said. “But at the end of the day I feel confident I did everything I could everywhere I’ve gone. I’ve prepared my tail off, I go out and compete and let the results happen as they may. It hasn’t always gone the way I’ve wanted, and it’s gone well at other times.
“At the end of the day, I lay it on the line in any capacity I can and let the chips fall where they may.”
Carson Wentz’s journey
Wentz has made a Super Bowl before, kind of. During Super Bowl Opening Night, he sat in the stands with a big brace on his injured knee, with a small group of reporters around him while his teammates talked to the masses on the field level. Less than a week later, the Eagles won Super Bowl LII and Nick Foles was the game’s MVP.
“It was a special year,” Wentz said. “I finished hurt, so there was that bittersweet tension right there, but I don’t dwell on the negative. I’m grateful for that year. It was a lot of fun, some of those guys are lifelong friends. And we did something special.”
As Wentz talked to the media before that Super Bowl, Eagles owner Jeffrey Lurie made it clear that Wentz was the future of his team despite Foles’ playoff run. Wentz was a 24-year-old star. In June of 2019 he signed a four-year, $128 million deal.
In 2021 he was traded to the Indianapolis Colts.
That started Wentz going from team to team. He went from the Colts to the Washington Commanders to the Los Angeles Rams and then to the Chiefs. The Colts started him all season in 2021. The Commanders traded for him, he began the season as their starter but broke his finger and then was benched. He has been a backup since, never recapturing what he did when he was on track to win MVP in just his second NFL season.
“You can play the what if game with a lot of things, but that’s where I surrender my life to Jesus,” sWentz said. “That’s really the only peace I can have with it.”
Could Wentz start again?
Maybe there’s a path back for Wentz to start again. Sam Darnold’s revival with the Minnesota Vikings this season will give all highly drafted quarterbacks in the backup phase of their career hope for another chance. Wentz is on just a one-year deal with Kansas City and can perhaps look his sixth team in six seasons this offseason. Maybe a team would entertain the idea of him starting while they groom their quarterback of the future.
That chance to start might not be available at age 32. Wentz deflected all questions about what comes next.
“We’ll see,” Wentz said. “I’ll worry about that in a couple weeks.”
For now, Wentz will be ready in the unlikely case something happens to Patrick Mahomes on Sunday. He said he’s a competitor and he wants to play, like everyone else, but he understands his situation.
“I’m locked in ready to go here this week, excited to be back here,” Wentz said. “It’s a different capacity than the last time I was here all those years ago. But at the end of the day it’s a blessing.
“It’s something I don’t want to take for granted.”
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