Doug Pederson wants Carson Wentz to be “starter ready” by Week 1

On Monday, the Philadelphia Eagles held their first practice at training camp with rookies and selected veterans. Out of the selected veterans whom were at the first practice were quarterbacks Sam Bradford and Chase Daniel. It is not far-fetched for all quarterbacks to be at camp this early as they need to get in as many reps as possible before the regular season opener.

While this upcoming season is essentially a contract year for Bradford, all the attention is on second overall pick Carson Wentz and his progression in training camp.

Today, Eagles head coach Doug Pederson spoke after practice about all three quarterbacks, and how he wants Wentz, along with Daniel to be “starter ready” by the regular season opener against the Cleveland Browns on September 11.

“Right now, we’re just going to get Carson as many reps as we can. Get him caught up. Get him to where he needs to be. I’m very comfortable and excited with where Sam left OTAs and where he’s coming in now. Chase is a solid two. We’ll just have to wait and see what happens down the road.’’

Pederson is right in that the Eagles do not want to rush Wentz into action, but instead get him comfortable with the offense and nuisances that come with playing quarterback in the NFL. The Eagles, unlike other teams who draft quarterbacks early in the draft, have the luxury of letting Wentz sit and learn behind a quarterback such as Daniel.

However, despite Bradford looking good in OTAs, Pederson also added, “You want (Wentz) to be in a position where if there’s an injury or somebody goes down, you plug him in and you don’t have any worries”.

Each year,we see starting quarterbacks go down with an injury, and the backup having to be ready to play right away. Sometimes it works well like we saw with the Pittsburgh Steelers, who still made the playoffs last season even with Ben Roethlisberger missing some time. And other times it goes south, such as Dallas Cowboys losing Tony Romo last year.

It is obvious that Pederson will not rush Wentz into action right away as there is still some things he has to work on as an NFL quarterback, but the talent is there for him to be special.