Holding a clipboard for Patrick Mahomes is a different position than most backup quarterback roles in the National Football League. For many backups, the QB2 role is a chance to wait in the wings for a coveted starting role—a real chance to show off one's skills in meaningful action on any given Sunday.
For the Kansas City Chiefs, the chance to back up Mahomes is all about providing mere stabilization until he comes back. If, for any reason, a backup quarterback would be needed for a significant amount of time in K.C. these days, you can rest assured the wheels have come off for fans and that everyone is wearing sackcloth and ashes to tailgate around Arrowhead.
Perhaps that's why the team has chosen to go the veteran route time and again, even as Mahomes has matured and is no longer in need of some player/coach behind him to mentor him into the position. Now as one of the greatest to ever take the field, Mahomes' backups are likely taking notes from him.
Current backup quarterback: Carson Wentz
Wentz is by far the most accomplished and talented of any backup quarterback playing behind Mahomes so far going into his seventh NFL season. While no one wants to lean on Wentz's abilities, it's' good to know there's some real security there in case of emergency.
While Wentz has hardly lived up to the early season expectations of him and the loaded contracts handed to him up until this point, it should be noted that Wentz's days as a starting quarterback in the NFL don't have to be behind him—as you might assume for anyone playing QB2 in K.C.
That's not exactly how Wentz envisioned things when he was drafted second overall in the 2016 NFL Draft by the Philadelphia Eagles. In just his second season he finished third in MVP voting and the Eagles won a Super Bowl, but Wentz also went down after having led the team to an 11-2 record, and his health would remain a concern alongside a drop in production over the next few seasons.
In 2021, the Indianapolis Colts became the first team to take a flyer on Wentz to solve their own quarterback issues. While he started all 17 games and threw 27 touchdown passes, the Colts weren't convinced he was the answer and flipped him to the Washington Commanders to recoup what draft assets they could.
From there, Wentz would lose his starting role in the nation's capital due to a broken ring finger and Taylor Heinecke's emergence. Washington released him after a single season and Wentz would finally accept his first backup role with the L.A. Rams last year. He looked solid in a single start in the team's regular-season finale having clinched a postseason berth.
Carson Wentz Career Stats
Year | Starts | Record | TDs | INTs |
|---|---|---|---|---|
2016 | 16 | 7-9 | 16 | 14 |
2017 | 13 | 11-2 | 33 | 7 |
2018 | 11 | 5-6 | 21 | 7 |
2019 | 16 | 9-7 | 27 | 7 |
2020 | 12 | 3-8-1 | 16 | 15 |
2021 | 17 | 9-8 | 27 | 7 |
2022 | 7 | 2-5 | 11 | 9 |
2023 | 1 | 1-0 | 1 | 1 |
Chiefs Depth Chart Analysis
Other than Wentz, the Chiefs have two other quarterbacks on the roster: Chris Oladokun and Ian Book.
Oladokun is entering his third preseason with the Chiefs, a testament to his hard work to stay with the team this long despite being a former seventh-round pick from South Dakota State. The Pittsburgh Steelers selected him in the draft's final round back in 2022 but he landed with the Chiefs fairly quickly and has staved off competition from other developmental arms to remain the scout team QB.
This year's competition for "developmental arm" is former Notre Dame quarterback Ian Book, a former fourth-round pick of the New Orleans Saints in 2020 who lasted two years with the team before being released. Since then he's gotten some preseason looks from the Eagles and Patriots but nothing has stuck before signing a futures deal in Kansas City.
Oladokun is likely the favorite once again to be brought back after roster cuts to land a role on the practice squad, but there's no great upset happening here either way. It's a precipitous fall after Wentz on the depth chart.
Looking at Past Backup Quarterbacks
Earlier, we mentioned the Chiefs' penchant for veterans behind Mahomes and that's because there's never been a single anomaly to that qualifier. The team loves lots of experience (lots of it) behind Mahomes at QB2 and that was even modeled during his rookie season when he was forced to sit and learn behind Alex Smith for the first 16 regular season games of his career.
From the beginning, the Chiefs invited Chad Henne to be the backup for Mahomes once he was given the starting role and the team brought on Matt Moore behind him when Henne injured his ankle. Just last year, the team had Blaine Gabbert as the new backup and then they brought in Wentz this year.
Every time, the candidate has been at least 30 years old to sit behind Mahomes, which is an interesting call because Mahomes himself is going on 30 and is no longer in need of someone to help him understand the rigors of the NFL season. At this point, Mahomes is a walking encyclopedia who has much to share with those around him, yet the Chiefs refuse to alter their approach.
While it would make more sense organizationally for the team to turn the corner and start to draft-and-develop a quarterback pipeline in the same way that the Packers and Patriots have done in the past to great effect (often being able to flip those prospects for future assets), the Chiefs seem okay with their own pipeline of experience.
Carson Wentz's Future Prospects
Despite being a backup quarterback for two straight seasons, Wentz should come out of this single-season deal he's signed with the Chiefs looking like a decent veteran stopgap for some team wanting to make a long-term change at the position.
By next year, Wentz will have spent two seasons with Matthew Stafford and Patrick Mahomes while learning from the coaching trees of Sean McVay and Andy Reid. With his body of work, his initial draft story, and the moments of success in years past, there's every reason to view him as a Jameis Winston or Gardner Minshew level of quarterback who can hold down the starting role until an emerging young talent is deemed ready for the role.
As for the Chiefs, they knew going into this season that Wentz would likely be one-and-done, unless Wentz becomes enamored with winning Lombardis and is okay playing second fiddle in order to start collecting rings. It might be anyone's guess who the backup will be in 2025, but you can guess it will be someone who already has plenty of candles on their cake.s