Carson Wentz looks sharp in brief outing against 49ers
Breaking down how QB Carson Wentz performed after replacing Taylor Heinicke against the 49ers.
The Washington Commanders appear set to make yet another change at quarterback. After Carson Wentz was injured early in the season, Taylor Heinicke took over and sparked the team into life, leading the Commanders into the playoff hunt. However, the offense has struggled to score points with Heinicke at the helm and the team has stalled over the last three games. Against the 49ers, the Commanders benched Heinicke after two consecutive turnovers and Wentz finished the game.
Wentz led the team on two drives, completing an efficient 12 of 16 passes for 123 yards and a touchdown before time expired. He looked sharp and more poised than he was earlier in the season. Ron Rivera has yet to announce his decision on who will be starting this week, but it’s expected Wentz will get the nod, especially after receiving some praise from Rivera in his press conference on Tuesday.
“He made very quick decisions. He showed us that quick twitch that you look for in quarterbacks and his decision making seemed to be right on. One of the things that he handled very well was he picked up the blitz a couple times and got the ball out very quickly, which was something that early on I think he wasn't as quick with. Now it looks like he's got a little bit better sense and better feel for that, especially within this offense”
Upon reviewing the performance from Wentz, I agree with Rivera’s assessment there. What stood out was how well Wentz handled a heavy dosage of blitzes that the 49ers threw at him and how he handled those blitzes in different ways.
There were a couple times where the 49ers looked to bring blitzes, especially off the slot, to try and pressure Wentz. But Wentz spotted them and either looked to throw over them or get rid of the ball before they could arrive. The first play of this clip is a run-pass option play, with Wentz simply reading the numbers. Before the snap, the 49ers have a corner over each receiver to that side, but just before the ball is snapped, the slot corner slides inside and prepares to blitz. Wentz spots that movement and as soon as he snaps the ball he flicks it out to the bubble screen and gets a first down as a result.
On the second play of this clip, the 49ers again bring a slot corner blitz, but this time they add on a linebacker from the same side, attempting to overload the Commanders protection scheme. The Commanders call a basic concept with a corner-flat concept to the right and a drive concept to the left. This play is usually read the corner-flat concept first before coming back to the drive concept as it works into the quarterback’s vision. With that in mind, it would be easy for Wentz to miss the blitz coming from his left as he works to the right side off the snap. However, from the end zone angle, you can see Wentz takes a brief glance to his left and spots the blitz while adjusting to the low snap. He then works to the corner-flat concept and while it’s not the cleanest look, he manages to get the ball out to the flat route before the pressure can get home.
The 49ers come back with the same blitz on the third play of this clip, but this time the Commanders are prepared. Wentz sees the blitz coming and simply dumps the ball off to Antonio Gibson in the flat, throwing over the blitzing defenders and giving Gibson two blockers out in front.
When he wasn’t throwing over blitzes, Wentz was making sure to get the ball out on time. The 49ers made their intent clear that they wanted to blitz Wentz as much as possible once he entered the game. But Wentz stayed poised, trusted his protection and made sure to get the ball out on time instead of falling into bad habits of drifting backwards and holding onto the ball while trying to do too much.
The first play of this clip is a simple timing route to Jahan Dotson. Dotson aligns outside to the right and runs a curl route. The 49ers show a pressure with a linebacker walked up on the line of scrimmage, but this is just a bluff to disguise the real blitzer coming off the slot to the left. With the blitz being disguised and coming from the slot instead of up the middle, Wentz knows he can beat it simply by getting the ball out on time. He takes his drop and sets up to throw quickly, delivering the ball before Dotson even makes his break. As a result, Dotson catches the ball before any rusher even gets close to pressuring Wentz.
The second play of the clip is a little bit more complex of a concept, but Wentz still manages to play on time and process quickly. This time Wentz is afforded a little more time in the pocket as the 49ers only rush four and the Commanders have a tight end and running back chip the edge rushers to help the offensive line. That allows Wentz time to drop back in the pocket and scan the field. However, he reads the defense are sinking into a Tampa-2 coverage, which negates a lot of the routes called on the play, so instead of falling into the trap of holding onto the ball and drifting backwards, inviting pressure on himself, he simply checks the ball down to the running back in the flat, giving him a chance to pick up some yards after catch and moving swiftly onto the next play.
Hitting checkdowns was something Wentz did well in the first game or two this season, but then he reverted back to his old self as the season progressed, where he’d drift backwards in the pocket and hold onto the ball for too long while waiting for something to open up. This invited pressure to arrive and gave the offensive line a really tough job, resulting in Wentz taking a lot of unnecessary sacks. What the Commanders will be encouraged about in this brief cameo was that Wentz was quick to get the ball out and hit checkdowns, even under pressure.
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