The speculation about whether the regular season MVP or Super Bowl MVP will be under center for the defending Super Bowl Champion Philadelphia Eagles on Opening Night may be over.
According to Ian Rapoport of the NFL Network, Nick Foles will be the starting quarterback against the Atlanta Falcons.
The Eagles have not made any official announcement at this time.
However, it would not at all be surprising if Foles is the guy. The Eagles have every reason to be cautious in making sure that Wentz is truly 100% with minimal risk of further injury to his knee.
The signs have been there all along that Wentz won’t be ready for Week 1. First, there was the fact that the Eagles didn’t trade Foles in the offseason. Second, the team gave Foles a revised contract with incentives based on how many games he’d start, likely with the very realistic possibility that he could start a handful of games before Wentz was ready to go. Third, Wentz had been progressing very slowly through training camp, only participating in 11-on-11 work a little over a week ago.
When you add these signs together, it’s not at all surprising that the team would be cautious with Wentz and in the meantime trust the team to the quarterback that just led them to their first Super Bowl Championship.
A handful of people are concerned about Foles after his preseason play, but I think those concerns are so overblown. You can’t take August football seriously. I again point to the case of the ultimate fraud of a quarterback, Sam Bradford, who convinced Eagles’ fans that a Super Bowl would come their way in 2015 when he lit up the vanilla defense of the Green Bay Packers in August.
If you’re concerned about Foles at all, do yourself a favor and rewatch the highlights of the Super Bowl and NFC Championship game. The Philadelphia Eagles are in great hands until Wentz is ready to go.
