Carson Wentz reportedly working with Jon Gruden, hoping to play this year

We’re halfway through June and Carson Wentz is still unsigned.

But the former Eagles quarterback is reportedly intending to play in 2023, according to ESPN’s Adam Schefter.

If the 30-year-old Wentz does sign with a team this season, it’ll be his fourth team in four years. Quite a fall from that MVP runner-up season back in 2017.

Last season, Wentz played in eight games with seven starts for the Commanders. He finished with a 2-5 record, throwing for 1,755 yards with 11 touchdowns and 9 interceptions. Wentz faced the Eagles in Week 3 and was sacked nine times in a 24-8 Eagles win. The Commanders released him in February.

In the 2022 offseason, the Colts traded Wentz to the Commanders after just one season in Indianapolis. Then-Colts head coach Frank Reich vouched for Wentz and the Colts traded away a package that included a first-round pick to get him in 2021. Wentz went 9-8 that year in Indy but struggled late in the season and the Colts decided to move on.

Wentz’s last season with the Eagles came in 2020. That year was a disaster for Wentz and the Eagles. Wentz was benched by Doug Pederson late in that season and then wanted out of town to the Eagles traded him.

Since then, things have worked out much better for the Eagles and Pederson than they have for Wentz. While Pederson was fired that offseason, he resurfaced in Jacksonville a couple years later and has that franchise on a good path. And the Eagles quickly rebounded with Jalen Hurts, who was an MVP candidate last year, leading the Eagles to Super Bowl LVII. Hurts, who was once Wentz’s backup, got a mega contract extension this offseason and has become the type of franchise quarterback the Eagles once thought they had with Wentz.

Gruden, 59, had a long career as an NFL coach and certainly knows offensive football. But Gruden resigned from his job as Raiders head coach in 2021 after a league investigation uncovered emails from Gruden that included racist, homophobic and misogynistic terms. He was also removed from the Buccaneers Ring of Honor. Gruden was the Eagles’ offensive coordinator from 1995-97.

The Eagles drafted Wentz with the No. 2 overall pick back in the 2016 draft. They moved up from 13 to 8 to 2 just to select Wentz out of North Dakota State. His NFL career got off to a good start. He became the full-time starter as a rookie and showed some good signs. Then he broke out in Year 2 and was on his way to winning the MVP award before he suffered a torn ACL and LCL in December. Wentz then watched Nick Foles lead the Eagles to their Super Bowl LII victory and things were never the same.

That’s not to say Wentz didn’t have good moments in 2018 and 2019. He did. Wentz even led the Eagles on a four-game win streak at the end of 2019 to get into the playoffs. But he was knocked out of the playoff loss to the Seahawks after just a handful of snaps. It’s the only playoff action Wentz has seen in his seven-year NFL career.

At this point in the NFL offseason, there don’t appear to be any logical landing spots for Wentz. According to Schefter, Wentz is “awaiting the right situation” and maybe he finds it. But how many chances is he going to get at redemption?

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