The undefeated Eagles have cruised to two easy victories over arguably the worst teams and defenses in the league. On Sunday, they face their first true test of the Carson Wentz era against the Steelers, and they'll need all hands on deck, especially Dorial Green-Beckham's.
The second-year wideout has caught just four balls for 32 yards since joining the club in the offseason from Tennessee. Green-Beckham's inability to master the playbook and his questionable work ethic soured his relationship with the Titans, who felt it prescient to swap the wideout for a young offensive lineman.
Green-Beckham isn't Wentz's favorite target yet despite Philadelphia's thin receiving corps; he ranks sixth on the team, behind tight ends Zach Ertz and Trey Burton, with six targets. But the Eagles are looking to get the promising, if not disappointing, wideout more involved in their attack on Sunday, especially in the red zone.
"He's coming along really well," coach Doug Pederson said Friday, per the Philly Voice. "We're giving him a little bit more each week. He's understanding things a little bit better and processing the information better. Again, this is something as we go forward we'd love to obviously get him a little more involved from a standpoint of getting more targets thrown in his direction.
"We actually had DGB targeted a couple of times from a play call standpoint in the red zone, it's just that the play design went to the other side of the field; I think Carson went the other way."
Green-Beckham is six-foot-five, so he's a natural fit to be a top red-zone target for the young Wentz. However, in Philadelphia's four red-zone possessions on which it has scored touchdowns, only one has been through the air, and it went to Burton.
If he wants to live up to his pre- and post-collegiate hype, Green-Beckham will have to become an all-around weapon for Philadelphia, and that starts with knowing the offense, something he has yet to fully achieve.
"Right now, I'd say I'm around 80 percent," said Green-Beckham, on his knowledge of the playbook. "75 to 80 percent of the playbook, which is a lot. Every week I try to prepare myself and come in and look more into the playbook, try to figure out more concepts. So when it's time to put those plays in, I'm already ahead of everybody and I already know what I need to do. So when it comes time to ask questions, I'm asking the right questions on those particular plays."
