State of the NFC East: Eagles are the standard of NFL’s ‘glamour division’
. Washington Commanders. 4. team. 58. . 1-2
It has been a rough start to the season for Carson Wentz and the Commanders.
There’s no nice way to state this. Residency in the NFC East’s cellar belongs to the Washington Commanders. They’ve lost two straight games after winning their season opener versus the Jacksonville Jaguars.
It’s been a struggle for the Commanders these past two weeks. They’ve been blanked during the first half in both Week 2 and Week 3. To make matters worse, the competition hasn’t had any issue with doing whatever they wanted versus Washington’s defense as Jack Del Rio has watched his unit surrender an average of 23 points over that time.
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Then, there’s Carson Wentz. He was pummeled by the Eagles’ defense during last week’s game to the tune of nine sacks and a lost fumble. Wentz’s numbers aren’t horrible if you look at the surface level. He’s thrown for 861 yards and seven touchdowns versus three interceptions, but as you know, numbers don’t always tell the story.
Wentz has struggled during the first half of games this season and hasn’t been at his best when his team absolutely needed him to be. He’s racked up a ton of yardage versus softer coverages in garbage time with games out of reach as he did in Week 3 versus Philadelphia.
607 of his 861 passing yards have come in the second half of games as have five of his seven touchdowns. Again, that sounds fantastic, but it doesn’t tell an entire story. He’s killed any momentum that his team has had with costly turnovers at inopportune times. Stop us if any of this sounds familiar.
Sure Wentz has had his problems, but his offensive line hasn’t had his back. He’s been sacked 15 times. Then again, the time between the snap of the ball and his release is just too long and ranks among the league’s worst. Again, stop us if you’ve heard this before.
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Can the Commanders snap their two-game losing streak versus the Cowboys on Sunday? Will they fall farther behind the other teams in their division? Conventional thinking leans toward the latter theory.
The NFC East has been competitive through September, but anything can happen from one week to the next. In two weeks, we will reassess where these teams are, but until then, the Eagles are clearly the class of the division, and the Commanders have a lot to think about in the cellar.