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When he had finished dressing, Carson Wentz was sitting in front of his locker and staring at the floor for a few minutes.
"Extremely frustrated by this game," he said later. "Really, just pray just to appease my mind and my heart for the future."
Wentz was inconsolable and you can not blame him.
After a brilliant debut, he endured a dismal finish and the Eagles, for the third time in franchise history, lost 17 points in the fourth quarter.
Much of the blame will go to the defense, and rightly so.
But Wentz, with a new series of passes inside the Panthers' 25-yard line and 71 seconds from time, responded with an almost unbelievably bad playing range.
And this time, there was no miracle return. Only a 21-17 loss to the Panthers, a record 3-4, two consecutive home defeats, an eight-hour flight to London in a few days, and Wentz alone looking down.
"Really, offensively, we have to look closely in the mirror – myself included – and late in the games we have to be better," said Wentz. "It's just not a way for us to finish a game, I thought we were getting the ball forward well, somehow we did some things we know we can do, and it just seemed that we dropped the gasoline in offense and stopped making games. "
Even after the Panthers scored 21 points in 10½ minutes to turn a 17-0 deficit into a 21-17 lead, a 48-yard interference call on Panthers cornerback James Bradberry, who was covering Alshon Jeffery gave the Eagles a pair. Carolina 22 with 71 seconds remaining.
This is the kind of game that the Eagles could have played last year with Wentz or Nick Foles at the helm.
Not this time.
1st and 10th: Wentz and Zach Ertz had a communication problem and Eric Reid seemed to take Wentz's pass on the 4-meter line, although the call from INT was reversed. "It was just a communication problem between Zach and me," Wentz said. "We have to solve this problem."
2nd and 10th: Wendell Smallwood ran eight yards in the middle of the field, putting the Eagles in third and second place on the Panthers' 14-yard line.
3rd and 2nd: Wentz plunged into the end zone, where Jeffery was covered in double cover: "I was just trying to give him a hand to play," Wentz said. "I have to ride the ball higher if I want to do that.I have to see the band – there might have been another guy open … … I've just tried to force a person in there that I'm not sure. Probably should not have.
4th and 2nd: With the online game, Wentz could not even get a pass. He was dismissed by Julius Peppers and fumbled, ending the match. "I saw Alshon open in the middle late and when I was trying to throw it, I got hit and the ball went out."
What's so crazy, is that Wentz had the game of his life before this ugly final series.
"When you're on the field in the end, with a shot and the ball is in your hand, it's frustrating," he said.
Wentz finished 30-for-37 for 310 yards with two touchdowns and no interceptions.
In the past month, he became the 11th quarter of the NFL history with four straight games of 275 yards, a 65% completion percentage, two or more bets and no interceptions.
His figures for the year are insane: 71%, 10 DT, 1 INT, 108.1 evaluations.
But with the online game … it was terrible.
"Very disappointing," he says. "We had chances to win there in the end, Offensively we had the chance to seal the deal with both records before and we did not do it."
The Eagles' last three records totaled 22 yards.
In comparison, the last three records of the Panthers totaled 236 yards.
Wentz's statistics are unprecedented.
But he has only won two of five starts since returning from his ACL injury.
"We are almost at a break or a break," he said. "It's hard to say exactly what it will take, we know what we can do, we do it here, we just have to put everything together."
"We expect a lot to come out and my approach will never change, whether it's winning or losing."
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