Eagles' QBs: 3-part harmony

NEAR THE TOP of the list of spectacular things we haven't seen yet has to be the meeting room for the Eagles' quarterbacks.

"We have a really good room," Sam Bradford said Tuesday.

"We've got an awesome quarterback room," Carson Wentz said, minutes later from behind the same NovaCare auditorium lectern.

"I've been a part of some pretty good quarterback rooms . . . and I feel like this one is going to be a really good one," Chase Daniel told reporters.

An anonymous insider confirmed both accounts. "It's Sistine Chapelesque," the source said, "with granite countertops, ceramic tile, crystal chandeliers that double as ceiling fans. The wainscoting alone has moved to tears the most hardbitten of football lifers."

The room needs to be special, because a lot is being asked of it in the first season of Doug Pederson's NFL coaching tenure. It houses Bradford, the former No. 1 overall draft pick who will make $18 million this season to quarterback the Eagles. It also houses Wentz, the second overall selection in this year's draft, who could usurp Bradford, should he falter through injury or ineffectiveness. Then there's Daniel, Pederson's guy from Kansas City, who seems to be in line to make $7 million each of the next two seasons just so he can teach Pederson's offense to Bradford and Wentz. From several recent interviews, we can assume Daniel believes himself capable of doing much more than that.

So it's a crowded room, maybe not so uncomfortable right now, when the OTA reps are more or less equal. The (ornate, mosaic-muraled?) walls might start to feel a bit too close once the Eagles go the way of all NFL teams and give almost all the practice reps to the starter, with the other two guys either standing around or mimicking some other team's offense for the scout team.

Even on Tuesday, when everything was still sunshine and rainbows, Wentz acknowledged that one of the adjustments is, "I haven't been a 'three' for a long time."

This was reporters' first chance to talk to the QBs since offensive coordinator Frank Reich went on 94WIP last week and said that it was "probably not" accurate to say that Bradford is the Eagles' unquestioned starter. In outlining the need for a "culture of competition," Reich wasn't really saying anything Pederson hasn't said, but he phrased it a bit less delicately - Pederson has emphasized the part about Bradford being the starter, and downplayed the competition part.

It's important for the 2016 Eagles that the competition convey a certain tone, not one of behind-the-scenes grumbling and one guy working the locker room for support at the expense of another.

"The relationship we have with us three is huge," Wentz said Tuesday. "We're not out there to get each other, we're out there to make the team better . . . If we're all pushing each other, working together . . . it only makes the team better, and I think that's something we have going here that's really special."

When Bradford ended his two-week OTA exile and abandoned efforts to be traded, he said he owed it to the team and to the game to help Wentz, even though, as Bradford's agent Tom Condon has noted, Wentz's presence probably means this will be Bradford's final year with the Eagles. Bradford seems to be walking that walk.

"So far it's been great, working with Sam, working with Chase," Wentz said. "A lot of really good discussions, about the playbook, about life . . . and then on the practice field they've both given me some help with some nuances to the system, some little things as far as some timing aspects . . . they've been great for me, we've had a really good relationship."

Overall, Wentz said, his biggest NFL surprise has been the locker room, the lack of cliquishness from what he called "a bunch of great dudes" who foster "a team atmosphere, a family atmosphere."

Bradford was asked about getting to know Wentz and Daniel.

"Having Chase in the room, I think for me and Carson both, has been great, because he's been in this system . . . this is his fourth year in the system," Bradford said. "He understands some of the smaller details . . . 'In the past, this play's looked like this vs. this coverage,' or 'You can shortcut this read and get back here vs. this coverage.'

"Then obviously Carson, he's been great. He's a great kid. He's really talented. It's been fun working with him, trying to help him, just trying to share bits of information that I've picked up along the way."

Daniel told reporters that he, too, has enjoyed his work with the rookie.

"Sometimes these rookies come in and think that they know everything and you sort of have to put them in their place. That has not been the case with Carson at all," Daniel said. "He's got a strong arm, he's a big son of a gun, and you can see why they wanted to take him at No. 2."

One of the things Bradford can share with Wentz is what it's like to be the QB a team drafted to elevate the franchise. That was him six years and two ACL tears ago, in St. Louis.

"It was all a blur, it seemed like it all happened so fast," Bradford said. "You go through the draft process, you get drafted, you're in a new city, you're trying to learn an offense, you're trying to get acclimated to the speed of the game. You're trying to figure out so many things. I look back at that time, and it feels like it went like that."

Wentz seems to want to savor the experience. "I enjoy the teammates, enjoy the locker room, enjoy this time," he said. "This rookie year only happens once."

Later, in response to another question, about getting acclimated, he said: "It's starting to sink in that this is home."

Bradford can also talk to Wentz about the process of learning a new offense. Even if he hasn't learned Pederson's scheme, he has spent many an OTA trying to make sure those three receivers arguing over which one is the slot on this play get it ironed out and the play gets run. Bradford had a different offensive coordinator each of his first three NFL seasons.

"I feel really good with it," Bradford said of Pederson's setup. "Unfortunately, I feel like this is offense five, or six? You know, it's a process I'm familiar with, it's something I've done before. I think the biggest thing is reps, but also just terminology. Learning to speak this language, learning to speak the same language as our coaches, so that when we talk about it on film or we talk about it on the field, we're on the same page as far as what's being said and what we're seeing."

Like the first Rams offense he ran, this is billed as a West Coast scheme, but Bradford said the 2010 Rams ran a lot more two-back stuff than he has seen from Pederson thus far.

"I think this is West Coast-based . . . but I think it's almost more into a little more spread," he said.

Wentz played in a pro-style offense at North Dakota State. The difference, he said, is "more stuff, more verbiage. More detail."

@LesBowen

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