Bleacher Report boldly names Carson Wentz one of NFL’s most overpaid players

The national media has really exhausted itself eviscerating the Washington Commanders‘ decision to trade for Carson Wentz, who’s become the punchline of NFL Twitter following his disaster final season in Philadelphia.

While the Commanders set their sights on Aaron Rodgers, Russell Wilson and Deshaun Watson, albeit to a much lesser extent, that was never going to happen. In essence, Washington had the following options: trade for Wentz or Jimmy Garoppolo, sign Mitchell Trubisky or Marcus Mariota or draft a prospect.

We can’t speak for everyone, but Wentz — regardless of the cost — is the superior quarterback of that foursome. For whatever reason, however, the national media has refused to acknowledge that Wentz was the best Washington could do at the time. Not only that, but he’s their most talented QB since Kirk Cousins.

At this point, the media will say anything to malign the trade, and Bleacher Report’s Ian Wharton proved that in a recent article in which he highlighted the NFL’s nine-most overpaid players entering the 2022 season.

Wentz checked in at No. 4, lower than Ezekiel Elliott (!).

https://twitter.com/NBCSCommanders/status/1544682713281712128

Is Commanders quarterback Carson Wentz as overpaid as Bleacher Report claims?

Wentz has three years and $81.7 million remaining on the four-year, $128 million extension he signed with the Eagles in 2019. The contract looked like a disaster after Wentz’s 2020, when he led the NFL in interceptions and was ultimately benched for Jalen Hurts, but he was fully deserving of the deal before that year.

Not to mention, a plethora of quarterbacks have since signed richer extensions, including Patrick Mahomes, Josh Allen, Aaron Rodgers, Dak Prescott, Kyler Murray, Matthew Stafford and Derek Carr. Wentz’s current deal will continue to drop in value once Lamar Jackson, Joe Burrow and Justin Herbert get extended, too.

For the sake of argument, let’s take a look at where Wentz ranks amongst quarterbacks in the major money departments.

• $32 million average salary: 11th
• $66.47 million fully guaranteed: 7th
• $13.367 million signing bonus: 21st
• $27 million in dead money: 13th
• $128 million contract value: 11th

Are we sure Wentz is overpaid? Maybe slightly, but that doesn’t necessarily make him one of the nine-most overpaid players in the entire league. After all, the 29-year-old has just one year left in guaranteed salary, so the Commanders can technically dump his contract after this season without accruing any dead money.

For all of his late-season shortcomings in 2021, we’re still talking about a quarterback who has 124 touchdowns to 43 interceptions since his rookie season. That’s a 3:1 ratio. Seems fitting for a $128 million QB, no?