For Bryce Young, this may only be the beginning of what could become a successful NFL career

Coming out of college, Bryce Young looked ready to take the next step in his football career. The quarterback had a successful collegiate career at Alabama and looked the part of someone who could have success in the NFL. Selected by the Carolina Panthers with the No. 1 overall pick in the 2023 draft, Young has now been benched after playing in just 18 NFL games.

Young’s stats last year were not great. In 16 games, he threw for 2,877 yards and 11 touchdowns while throwing 10 interceptions. His quarterback rating, according to ESPN, was 33.4 – well below the “okay” quarterbacks of the league.

The roster around Young in 2023 wasn’t good. He didn’t have the kind of support a player in his position needs to be successful, especially in the early stages of their career, let alone as a rookie. Panthers’ first-year head coach Frank Reich was fired 11 games into the season. Carolina quickly became an unstable environment in the midst of trying to develop a young quarterback.

After a 2-15 season – the worst in the NFL – the Panthers hired a new head coach in Dave Canales for 2024 and, they hope, beyond.

Canales spent 2023 as the offensive coordinator for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers after spending 13 years on the offensive staff in Seattle with the Seahawks. Canales was credited with helping Geno Smith’s resurgence in Seattle. The same goes when it comes to Baker Mayfield, who enjoyed a bounceback season in Tampa Bay in 2023.

In two games this season, Young completed 31 of 56 pass attempts for 245 yards. He has three interceptions and no touchdowns. His QBR is 9.1.

Stability is important for young quarterbacks. So is having the proper talent and coaching around them. Learning to play the position in the NFL is hard enough. Some organizations tend to make it even harder. Carolina looks like one of those right now.

There’s a lot that goes into the success of a quarterback. There are independent variables. There are dependent variables.

Quarterbacks need to take ownership. They have to work hard, both physically and mentally, to succeed. Work ethic is personally controlled. Quarterbacks physically working on their game is on them. Making sure they’re mentally prepared falls on them. Quarterbacks have to be open to coaching and making adjustments. Those things are independent of others. But those aren’t the only things at play.

Quarterbacks rely on a lot of things out of their control. Their success is dependent on others. They rely on having an offensive line that blocks well enough for them to stay in the pocket to deliver a clean throw. They rely on a good receiver being there to catch that throw. They rely on coaches putting them in the best positions possible in order to succeed. They rely on coaches learning and knowing how to coach them, too.

Those are not all the variables at play. There are more. That’s a limited look at what quarterbacks need to succeed.

Young’s inability to perform well so far can be for a variety of reasons. Maybe he needs more talent around him. Maybe he needs to do a better job at things he can control. Maybe Carolina’s coaching staff hasn’t done enough to put him in the best positions to succeed. Maybe Young can’t do what the coaches are asking of him. Maybe he’s not the type of quarterback Canales is looking for to run his offense.

There are a lot of other scenarios that could have led to Young’s early-career failures. It’s not just one thing. Most likely, it’s a lot of things adding up. It’s hard to play quarterback in the NFL. It’s even harder as a 23-year-old who hasn’t had a chance at having a stable environment around him not even two years removed from being drafted.

It’s too early to say if this is the end of Young’s shot at living up to the hype that surrounds any first-overall pick. Canales helped Smith and Mayfield turn their careers around. Maybe Young just needs time to get more comfortable in Carolina’s new offense. Or, maybe he ends up somewhere else, and a few years from now, he’s looking like a guy who just needed some time, or better coaching, to get acclimated to the NFL. After all, we’re seeing that situation play out in other places right now.

In Minnesota, Sam Darnold, a former first-round pick of the New York Jets, led the NFL in passing touchdowns through the first three weeks of the season with eight. His 73.5 QBR ranked fifth. Darnold is 27 and in his seventh season in the league. For the first time in the NFL, he’s playing at a very high level.

Before the Vikings, Darnold played for the Jets, Panthers, and San Francisco 49ers. Early on, he looked like a bust. Now he’s being coached by Kevin O’Connell, who is considered one of the NFL’s top young coaches. For Darnold, it may have just taken some time, while also being paired with a coach who is capable of getting the most out of his players, to find success.

In Pittsburgh, Justin Fields looks comfortable and better than when he was with the Chicago Bears. Fields, a former first-round pick like Darnold, is leading the Steelers’ offense, which is coordinated by Arthur Smith. He looked better each week through three games. Smith, along with head coach Mike Tomlin, might be a great pairing to get the most out of Fields, who doesn’t lack talent.

Both of those examples come with small sample sizes. Three games isn’t enough to say Darnold and Fields are finally going to live up to the hype that surrounded them coming out of college. But it does provide some context into the idea that a quarterback’s failures aren’t always just their own fault.

In most cases, quarterback development isn’t linear. It’s also not the same for each quarterback. Each case is different. Some teams choose to play their guys from the jump. Others don’t.

Drake Maye, selected in the first round back in April, isn’t playing for the Patriots. Caleb Williams, the first overall pick back in April, is playing for the Bears. Jordan Love didn’t play for the Packers early in his career. CJ Stroud looked like an MVP candidate at times last year – his first in the NFL. Patrick Mahomes didn’t play during his rookie season. The list goes on and on. Young played a lot in his rookie season. Maybe he wasn’t, and still isn’t, ready.

The story of Young’s career isn’t close to over. Maybe he’s not helping himself. Maybe the organization is failing him. It’s probably a combination of both. Either way, a lot of quarterbacks need time to fully develop. It doesn’t happen overnight. And, as we’ve seen, it doesn’t necessarily happen on the team they were drafted by.

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