Carolina Panthers quarterback Bryce Young provided us with one of the very best stories of the 2024 campaign. But was it, by rule, a comeback story?
The finalists for the Associated Press’ Comeback Player of the Year award were officially announced on Thursday morning. This season’s group includes five notable nominees—Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow, Minnesota Vikings quarterback Sam Darnold, Los Angeles Chargers running back J.K. Dobbins, New England Patriots cornerback Christian Gonzalez and Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin.
What—or who—that group didn’t include, however, was Young.
Why?
Didn’t he make a successful comeback of his own?
Um, yeah—he most certainly did.
After a relatively disappointing rookie year, the 2023 No. 1 overall pick entered 2024 with a bit of buzz and a whole lot of optimism. The Panthers paired him with a “quarterback whisperer” in first-year head coach Dave Canales, hooked him up with two new starting guards and three offensive weapons through the draft and apparently saw the much-anticipated growth begin throughout the spring and summer.
That progress, unfortunately, wouldn’t show up to start the regular season. In fact, Young regressed.
Young turned in the worst two games of his short NFL career in Weeks 1 and 2—passing for just 245 yards, no touchdowns and three interceptions while leading Carolina to all of 13 points and two third-down conversions. Those alarming performances, needless to say, came in a pair of humiliating blowout losses.
His disturbingly poor play to kick off the campaign then led to one of the most shocking moves in the recent history of the franchise—his benching. Young, after those two offerings, was sat in favor of 14th-year veteran Andy Dalton—who proceeded to guide the Panthers to a 36-22 win in his very first start of the season.
As the weeks piled up, rumblings of an early divorce between Young and the Panthers stewed. And considering the organization parted with a king’s ransom to select him atop the draft a year earlier, a swift parting of ways may have solidified that gamble as the worst (and most embarrassing) trade in NFL history.
But that’s not how this story ended.
Thanks to an unforeseen setback to Dalton, who sprained his right thumb in a car accident after Week 7, Young was reinserted into the starting lineup for Week 8. From then on, he wouldn’t look back.
The 23-year-old not only (and finally) realized some growth, but he took a step…
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