Nick Foles speaks out on his team for next season
After he came off the bench late in the season and led the Eagles to their first Super Bowl championship, the question Nick Foles is most often asked has nothing to do with repeating, but rather his future with the team.
Carson Wentz is the team’s unquestioned starter, and it’s a mixed bag when it comes to backup quarterbacks who win the Super Bowl returning to that starting role.
Tom Brady and Kurt Warner remained as starters after winning their first Super Bowls, while their teams’ former starters were traded away (Drew Bledsoe) or benched (Trent Green) the next season.
Trent Dilfer replaced Tony Banks midway through the 2000 season and led the Ravens to a Super Bowl victory. Both players left as free agents the next season, which makes Dilfer the only quarterback to be let go after winning a Super Bowl.
But it seems as though everyone is thinking more about Foles’ future than Foles himself.
He went on “The Ellen DeGeneres Show” Tuesday and addressed his future, giving an answer that is tailor-made to the Ellen audience.
“My honest answer, all I want to do is be with my wife and my daughter,” Foles said. “All that stuff will take care of it self. It’s a long season, we go through a lot, the family sacrifice is a lot, so being able to be at home and be present, to go on walks with my dog. Those little things, that’s what I look forward to. We’ll see what happens with my career.”
Foles is under contract through the 2018 season with the Eagles and is due $7 million in total compensation. But Philadelphia is positioned well with its quarterback spending as Wentz is on his rookie contract, is signed through 2019 and has a 2020 club option.
The Eagles rank just 19th in the league in terms of spending for the quarterback position. Also, Peter King of Sports Illustrated reports General Manager Howie Roseman isn’t inclined to get rid of Foles unless he’s blown away with an offer.
“I don’t think Philly trades quarterback Nick Foles, unless some team makes an offer that start with two first-round picks,” said King. “Even then, I’m skeptical they’d pull the trigger. This is why they got Foles in the first place — because GM Howie Roseman and [coach Doug] Pederson think the backup quarterback is one of the 10 or 12 most important players on the team.”
There’s also the reason Foles became thestarter in the first place: Wentz’s knee injury. Just before the Super Bowl, Wentz revealed that he tore his LCL in addition to tearing his ACL in the Eagles’ Week 14 win over the Rams. It had previously been reported that he had just torn his ACL.
Wentz said he’s “hopeful” to be back for Week 1. Ryan Tannehill is questionable for the Dolphins’ OTAs, which will be eight months after his ACL surgery; eight months removed from Wentz’s surgery will be the middle of preseason.
From Foles’ appearance on “Ellen,” it doesn’t sound like he’ll demand a trade or a starting position. He knew he was signing up to be a backup when he joined Philly last year, and he seems content to return to that role before entering free agency in 2019.
Foles also talked to DeGeneres about the “Philly Special” play in which he caught a touchdown pass. Foles let on that the Eagles had originally planned to run the play later in the game but a fourth-and-1 in the first half prompted them to use it earlier than expected.
“Coach Pederson and I had talked about it, and we had talked about it a couple of days before when we want to do it: second half, different situation,” he said. “But fourth-and-1 in the Super Bowl, you’re going against the Patriots, you’re gonna have to do some stuff that is sort of risky to win this game, and the Philly Special came to mind.”
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