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Brother, sister-in-law coming to Philly to help Wentz settle in

AN HOUR OR SO after being drafted second overall by the Eagles on Thursday night, Carson Wentz was joking with reporters about sleeping on an air mattress in the living room of a Fargo, N.D., house he shares with five roommates and their three dogs.

AN HOUR OR SO after being drafted second overall by the Eagles on Thursday night, Carson Wentz was joking with reporters about sleeping on an air mattress in the living room of a Fargo, N.D., house he shares with five roommates and their three dogs.

Wentz's life is changing in a hurry. He has talked about not being overwhelmed by going from Fargo to Philly, from quarterbacking in the Football Championship Subdivision to the NFL. But these early months as the franchise's savior-in-waiting will be chaotic, disorienting. Wentz can't bring North Dakota with him to help him cope, but he can bring his older brother, Zach, and Zach's wife, Andrea. They're going to uproot their lives in Bismarck, N.D., to live with Carson here, helping his adjustment.

"He's going to help me handle things off the field . . . So I can just focus on football," Carson Wentz said Friday evening, in a session with reporters in the NovaCare media quarters, after his introductory news conference in the auditorium. "My agents and financial advisers kind of just threw the idea out there, and then I thought about it a little bit. I proposed the idea to him."

Initially, Zach and Andrea were going to wait and see where Carson ended up, whether their relocation would be necessary. (Presumably, Tennessee or Cleveland might not have required their presence.) Then they decided it was a good idea, regardless.

"They decided a couple of weeks ago, no matter where it is, we'll make the most of it," Carson said.

Coincidentally, the last guy the Eagles drafted second overall did the same thing: Donovan McNabb initially brought his older brother, Sean, to Philadelphia from Chicago.

"My wife and I decided, just in the last few weeks, that we're going to move with him. He wants us out here," said Zach Wentz, 26, a high school coach and phys ed teacher in Bismarck. "If we can offer any support system possible, that's what we're going to be here for. This whole thing is a transition for everybody. We're going to be here to support him in whatever way we can."

Zach doesn't plan to seek a teaching or coaching job here, he'll just look out for his brother, who will get a four-year contract worth more than $26 million, under the terms of the collective bargaining agreement. That will allow him to buy a real bed, and maybe one for his dog, Henley, as well.

"We grew up in Bismarck. I like my job, I like what I do there. But anybody in their right mind would pack up and do this for a sibling, no doubt," Zach Wentz said.

Carson mentioned his brother early in his news conference, answering a question about his competitive spirit and work ethic.

"My parents and my older brother always pushed me. I always was competitive with him, and I just hate losing," he said. "It's just kind of how I'm wired, and hopefully I can bring that to Philadelphia."

Wentz said his brother has "really been my role model for a long time."

"Last summer at his wedding, I was giving him a bunch of crap, but at the end of the day, he's always been my best friend," Carson Wentz said. "He's been a role model for me. Always looked up to him, and as a kid, I always wanted to compete against him, and he was my standard. If I could even be close to beating him, that was important to me . . . He really helped drive me, and we're just so close with both athletics, academics throughout college and high school and everything, and then family things. We're just really close, so I'm very thankful he's in my life."

At 6-3, Zach Wentz looks like a slightly more compact version of his brother, but Zach was much taller when they were growing up. Carson grew from 5-8 to 6-5 during his four years in high school, he said Friday night.

"He was always bigger than me," Carson recalled. "I think I finally outgrew him when I was a junior in high school."

The rapid growth led to athletic injuries. A broken thumb kept Carson from playing quarterback as a high school junior, lowered a recruiting profile that was already low enough, with not that many big-time programs spending a lot of time in Bismarck.

Zach went to North Dakota State before Carson, planning to play both football and baseball, but ended up sticking with baseball, as a starting pitcher and infielder. He played a few games after graduation with the independent Fargo-Moorhead RedHawks before deciding that he wasn't going to make a living as an athlete, and that he should move on.

At the time, he didn't envision this role.

"We thought he'd have a chance to play in the NFL. We didn't know when or where. Things have just snowballed to this point," Zach Wentz said. "He's been a natural athlete since he was a young kid. It just took him a while to kind of grow into his frame a little bit, then he just took off."

@LesBowen

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