Phoebe Schecter NFL column: Bryce Young – can the 2023 number one pick recover from benching?

We’re just two weeks into the new NFL season and one quarterback has already been benched. Just over a year after being selected with the first pick of the 2023 draft, Bryce Young has been replaced as the Carolina Panthers’ starter by veteran Andy Dalton.

As Tom Brady has said,, external it’s a “tragedy” really, how rookie quarterbacks are handled, that so often they’re forced to play right at the start of their NFL career and don’t get time to learn and develop.

Being the NFL’s number one draft pick comes with a lot of pressure. You become the face of that franchise, that city, and there’s really no escaping it.

There’s a lot of weight put on your shoulders, and it’s not just the media or the football. There are many other new demands on you, there’s so much more than what you see on the field. But these guys are only 22, 23, and they’re only human.

In last year’s draft the Panthers went for Young rather than CJ Stroud, but then-head coach Frank Reich and team owner David Tepper were not on the same page. Tepper wanted Young and if you’re bringing somebody in that the head coach does not approve of – especially a quarterback who’s gone first overall – that was immediately a big red flag.

Both parties need to be aligned in on who you’re bringing in, who you’re planning to make your franchise quarterback, and that’s where it all started going wrong for Young.

His rookie year was a struggle. The Panthers’ wide receivers failed to get open and their offensive line was incredibly inconsistent. Across the season, 11 players started across the five offensive line positions.

For any rookie, as we’re seeing with this year’s first pick Caleb Williams at Chicago, you need to have a solid offensive line to protect the quarterback.

You can’t have your guy getting sacked at the rate Young was (68 sacks in 18 games). Houston took CJ Stroud with last year’s second pick and he was the offensive rookie of the year, but if he’d been drafted by Panthers he would have struggled as well.

There’s also been no continuity for Young with the head coach. Reich was fired after 11 games so he’s already on his third head coach – with Chris Tabor (interim) and now Dave Canales.

Coach Canales is supposed to be a kind of quarterback whisperer having helped Baker Mayfield get back to his best while Tampa Bay’s offensive coordinator last season.

Previously he worked with Russell Wilson so he has an understanding of that smaller kind of quarterback, which is something that continues to come up with Young, who’s 5ft 10in. People are concerned he can’t necessarily see over the offensive linemen, some of those guys are 6ft 7in, 6ft 8in.

On top of that, he’s not really seeing the field anymore. He’s made inaccurate throws and had poor footwork.

Remember when Simone Biles had the Twisties? In golf they call it the yips. This is the football equivalent of that. You don’t see the field, you’re not able to identify where the defensive blitz is coming from.