Philadelphia Eagles star quarterback Carson Wentz returned to action in Week 3 of the NFL season, leading the reigning Super Bowl champions to a 20-16 win over the Indianapolis Colts.
 
It was Wentz’s first regular-season action since 2017 after the former No. 2 pick out of North Dakota State tore his ACL and LCL during a Week 14 clash with the Los Angeles Rams Dec. 10. Against the Colts, he completed 25 passes for 255 yards while tossing a touchdown and an interception.
 
During training camp – in which the 25-year-old signal caller reportedly looked sharp – the Eagles utilized Zebra’s RFID player-tracking technology to track the performance of the entire team and use the information the system generates to monitor Wentz’s recovery.
 
RFID chips are furnished into players’ shoulder pads, as well as the football. The former captures players’ speed (accelerations, deceleration, sprints, etc.), distance traveled (aggregate and/or specifically within a specific practice session, period, and/or drill), and location and/or proximity from other players on the field, according to John Pollard, VP of Zebra Sports.
 
The chip-enabled football tracks both the velocity and RPM for passes and kicks, Pollard noted.
 
“In the case of a player coming off an injury – but also all players – a team’s strength and conditioning, performance, and coaching staff will utilize our tracking system and our reporting and analytics software (i.e. our Live Practice Dashboard) to monitor their players’ workload throughout a practice session,” Pollard said. “The near real-time availability of the tracking data and performance metrics (accelerations, decelerations, sprints, practice reps) allows staff members to closely monitor and manage the amount of work and type of work for a player coming off an injury.”
 
Using this RFID technology since  2016 – Wentz’s rookie season – allowed Philadelphia’s coaching staff to compare the quarterback’s data pre- and post-injury.
 
“Teams can develop both a performance baseline and a performance history for the players on their roster using the Zebra Practice System,” Pollard told Printed Electronics Now. “For instance, strength and conditioning, performance, and coaching staffs can reference practices tracked within current season and they can also reference practice sessions tracked from past seasons.”

ESPN’s Tim McManus reported that the team monitored his acceleration as he dropped back, planted, cut and threw – and that Wentz was throwing the ball harder than ever in August.
 
“And you can see, potentially, if there is a decrement in acceleration from the previous time prior to his injury or see if ‘X’ amount of reps actually affects his stopping capability, his cutting capability,” Pollard told ESPN. “And then, of course, the experts on the football performance side can determine, does that potential change or adaptation that he’s making in his footwork, does that affect his actual throws themselves? They start to marry that information together and interpret it.”
 
Nearly one-third of the league is using and/or in the contract phase regarding the practice system.
 
“Player tracking data provides teams with a unique information resource that can help support teams’ efforts in player development, performance, scouting and evaluation, and game-planning,” Pollard said. “We are pleased that our technology and the information it provides has helped support a number of teams in the NFL including the Eagles. We are seeing more teams take an interest in using player tracking data.”
 
The 2017 season was the first season in which all balls during all games were tracked. The chip melded into the bladder of the football and located just beneath the NFL shield.  
 
Earlier this year, the NFL made the determination to release the data from both sides of the ball to all the teams on a weekly basis throughout the regular season.