There are certain inflection points in our existence that, even when they may seem huge in the moment, have ripple effects beyond what we could ever imagine. For the Eagles franchise, that was Dec. 10, 2017.
I think of the voiceover from the 1980 samurai film Shogun Assassin, which was famously sampled in “Liquid Swords” by GZA.
“That was the night everything changed.”
The Eagles were 10-2 heading out to Los Angeles to face a 9-3 Rams team. Second-year Birds quarterback Carson Wentz was the MVP favorite. Those Eagles were just special. The energy in the city was unlike anything I had ever felt previously in my life. The defense came up with timely turnover after timely turnover. Everything the offense tried worked. The most important thing though was Wentz.
The Eagles had a true franchise quarterback for the first time since Donovan McNabb. He, frankly, felt like a savior for this franchise. The Birds were finally going to get over the hump and win a Super Bowl for the first time because of his superstar-level play. He was a Houdini in the pocket. He made third down magic with his legs and could fire it all over the field. McNabb was awesome, but I had never seen anything quite like that from an Eagles quarterback. At the time, he was the total package.
When the game itself started at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, it was everything as advertised. It was a back-and-forth, high-scoring affair. Fate intervened late in the third quarter though. Wentz, making something out of nothing for the zillionth time that season, scrambled and dove into the end zone for a would-be touchdown. The play was ultimately called back due to a holding penalty, but the damage was done on that specific play. Wentz, unbeknownst to everyone, had torn his ACL there.
Gutting it out, Wentz finished that drive, which saw him toss a two-yard touchdown on fourth and goal to Alshon Jeffery. It was the last snap that Wentz would play that season and, again unknown to everyone in the football world, the last time he would ever be the Birds’ no-doubt-about-it, unquestioned franchise QB.
Nick Foles came into the game in relief of Wentz and held his own enough to hang on to a win, but in the fourth quarter, news circulated about the severity of Wentz’s injury. It was a swift kick in the gut. They won the battle that day in L.A., but without the would-be MVP, they were going to lose the war and not win the Super Bowl. It would be another parade-less winter in Philadelphia.
I was at the game. A company flew me out to Los Angeles for a job interview. Naturally, being a sicko, I asked if they could fly me out on Sunday so that I could “adjust to the time change” when in reality it was to get my ass to the Coliseum for the game of the year. At halftime, with the Eagles leading, I felt on top of the world. I was about to graduate from college. I was going to get a full-time job in sunny Los Angeles and the Birds were going to do the damn thing. Roughly an hour later, my world had come crashing down.
I remember leaving the stadium. Eagles fans were hype and screaming and cheering because the team had just clinched the NFC East title. I was sick to my stomach. Maybe it was the $23 Bud Lights, but I felt like I could puke. The dream was over. I recall going to some burger place in Santa Monica after in an absolutely miserable state. It’s burned into my brain.
The Eagles lost Wentz for the year and I didn’t get the job I went out there for. It was a double whammy of epic proportions.
We all know what happened next, but in the moment, the night of that game, it felt so improbable to even consider.
Foles turned in a fantastic performance in the Meadowlands the following week, but laid two stinkers to close out the year against Oakland and Dallas. I wanted anyone else at quarterback. I’m not ashamed to admit it. We all whiff on sports takes, especially with something as fragile as a Super Bowl opportunity hanging in the balance. Nate Sudfeld. Sign a guy off the street for all I care. Colin Kaepernick. Get Tony Romo out of the booth. Do something, anything.
I don’t need to rehash the Super Bowl run too much. We all lived through it. Foles turned in two of the greatest performances in Philly sports history, if not the greatest given the magnitude of the respective moments, in the NFC title game and Super Bowl as the Birds became world champs.
As much as that ACL injury sapped Wentz of his mobility to a degree where he couldn’t be as spectacular as he once was, seeing his backup win Super Bowl MVP and become a legend in this city clearly broke him. Wentz was never the same. 2018 was so rocky before he went down for the year, again, and Foles came in to lead a playoff run, again. 2019 saw him finally start a playoff game, but when he was knocked out of it against Seattle early with a concussion, that was really it for him. 2020 was a disaster. He was benched during the season and second-round rookie QB Jalen Hurts came in to replace him. Wentz was later dealt to Indianapolis that ensuing offseason.
Fast forward a few years later. Two of Wentz’s backups had now won Super Bowl MVP for the Birds with Hurts joining Foles in that illustrious company. Wentz is a journeyman and, on Sunday, will become the first quarterback in league history to start for a sixth different team in six straight seasons.
The picks the Eagles received in return for Wentz, in part with general manager Howie Roseman’s wizardry, helped land the Birds the likes of DeVonta Smith, Jalen Carter, A.J. Brown, Cooper DeJean and Jalyx Hunt. Not only did Wentz going down lead to a cinematic turn of events where the Eagles won their first Super Bowl, but his trade out of Philadelphia gave them the pieces to win their second Super Bowl.
I don’t know what happens if Wentz stays healthy in that game in Los Angeles. Maybe the Eagles win it all. Maybe Wentz and Doug Pederson are still here and the team is in the mix annually. All the credit in the world to Wentz for helping the team clinch home-field advantage that season, something they would not have won the Super Bowl without, but it ultimately worked out for the best for the Eagles. Losing a player of Wentz’s caliber at the time and still winning it out made that first Lombardi Trophy so special and his departure led to Hurts taking over for good and the team crushing Kansas City in this past season’s Super Bowl.
Wentz’s early success was so needed, but so was everything that’s transpired since.
Philadelphia: the only place in the world where your franchise quarterback’s career falling apart would turn into a positive.
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