By Patrick Del Gaone, Sports Talk Philly staff writer 
Earlier this season, Doug Pederson compared Carson Wentz’s comprehensive preparation to that of NFL legend Peyton Manning.
Today, the first-year coach spoke of his prized rookie’s poise and toughness in the same light as former Green Bay Packers' gunslinger Brett Favre.
“I think he does have it,” Pederson said. “The things you wanna see from that guy is you just don’t want to see them waver. You want to see zero doubt, you want to see all confidence. Obviously the one player that comes to mind is Brett Favre, for me, the one that I spent eight years with. Just watching him in two-minute situations, and how successful he was, and how he could put a team on his back and win the football game. I see Carson eventually getting to that spot. But what I see now, I see the confidence, I see him rallying the troops, I see him making some difficult throws. Is it perfect? No. But it’s still a learning opportunity for him.”
Wentz was sacked twice on both the first and last drives of the game, and consistently pummeled after releasing passes on most of Philly's possessions in between.
Pederson and Frank Reich have often cited Wentz’s consistent body language as one of the reasons they traded up to draft him. Last Sunday, Wentz showed tremendous leadership through his cool temperament and unwavering physical behavior.
Instead of sulking like Cam Newton of the 1-5 Panthers when he was repeatedly planted into the grass, or throwing his hands up like the 1-6 Bears' Jay Cutler would've after seeing Zach Ertz drop a 4th down pass, he remained positive for the duration of the game.
Then, after the game, he told reporters that the Ertz pass was thrown too high.
As great leaders do, Wentz pointed the thumb as opposed to the finger.
“We try to keep him as clean as we can early in games,” Pederson said. “As with any quarterback that gets hit early in games, it can affect you as the game wears on. But one thing with Carson last week too, the more he got hit early, it seemed like he stood in there a little bit more and a little bit more, and made some good throws late in the football game.”
One of those throws was a strike over the middle to a streaking Dorial Green-Beckham while under duress on the final offensive possession.
“DGB” has come up with a few key receptions for the Philadelphia offense, but still seems to be held to more of a part-time role. Yesterday, Reich mentioned that Green-Beckham no longer has limitations regarding his knowledge of the playbook. But this morning, Pederson told the media that he’s not quite there yet.
“He’s really done a nice job of understanding what we’re asking him to do,” Pederson said. “[We’re] moving him around a little bit in formations but still trying to keep it to one position for him. Utilizing his strength, I think he’s a tremendous slant runner, I think he can run those deeper ‘in-routes’ and utilize his height and strength in the redzone a little bit more. Can he be an every down starter? I think he can eventually get there. I would love to have a full offseason with him to really fine tune his craft, because we got him so late in training camp that we just didn’t have the time to work. So we’re kind of bringing him along slowly each and every game.”
Defensive tackle Bennie Logan, linebacker Mychal Kendricks, as well as cornerbacks Ron Brooks and Leodis McKelvin are all listed as questionable for Sunday’s home game against the 5-0 Minnesota Vikings.
You can watch the full press conference from Pederson below.
