Bryce Young and the Panthers aren’t good yet, but they could be soon

Why it’s okay to be bullish on Bryce Young and the Panthers .

The Panthers aren’t a good football team, but they’re far from a terrible one. Showing far more fight than a majority of three-win teams, Carolina gave a significant scare to the Chiefs on Sunday. Kansas City ended up needing a last-second field goal as time expired to ensure a 30-27 win, after betting lines had them as 11-point favorites.

For the Panthers it wasn’t a testament in success, but progress — especially from quarterback Bryce Young. The former No. 1 overall pick has been the catalyst for Carolina’s recent offensive success, finally showing flashes of the playmaking ability that enraptured so many from his time at Alabama. His performance against the Chiefs’ vaunted pass defense was about so much more than the box score, with Young showing anticipation and touch on deep throws, evading the pass rush, and routinely made plays out of nothing, often leaning on less-heralded members of the receiving corps like David Moore, who finished with a game-high 81 yards and a touchdown.

In fact, if we look at the numbers Young put up against Kansas City compared to other top quarterbacks it was a very favorite performance considering the talent of the Chiefs’ pass defense.

At the start of this season nobody would mention Bryce Young in the same breath as Josh Allen, Joe Burrow, Brock Purdy or Justin Herbert — but here we are. Sure, it’s just one week in isolation, but the second year passer showed that he’s developing the potential to be a difference maker in the NFL, and this is with a very inexperienced group of receivers with Adam Thielen as his No. 1 target.

The rest of the offense is built for the new-look NFL

One of the key features we’ve seen in 2024 is the return to prominence of the running game. Passing as a whole has been down around the NFL, and right now teams having the most success either have a generational quarterback, or a strong rushing offense. The best teams possess both.

It’s here the future is most bright for Carolina. The team invested big in its offensive line in 2024, and thus far the decision to work inside-out by signing two of the top guards in free agency in Robert Hunt and Damien Lewis has paid massive dividends. Chuba Hubbard has emerged as a top-tier running back, and now he’s being joined in the backfield by 2nd round pick Jonathan Brooks out of Texas, who has the potential to mold the backfield into one of the best committees in the league.

That inside-out line approach is helping Bryce Young as well, who struggled with interior pressure a year ago and now seems more comfortable in the pocket, where he has the athleticism needed to move inside the pocket to evade edge rush — which we saw against Kansas City.

Defensively there’s a lot of work to be done, but help is on the way

Perhaps the saving grace for Carolina is that they aren’t good this year. Losing Derrick Brown to injury more or less sunk their season on defense and took away their biggest impact player, but edge rush is a considerable problem after trading away Brian Burns.

Trading Burns appears to have been the right move, and he hasn’t been a tremendously impactful player for the Giants this season after getting a massive contract — but more importantly it will allow for the Panthers to take a top pass rusher on the board, which right now appears to be either Abdul Carter from Penn State, or James Pearce Jr from Tennessee.

The lack of a pass rush is the biggest factor for Carolina right now, and they have a way to get drastically better in one offseason. Factor in that they’ll have significant cap space to play with after the obvious releases of Adam Thielen and Miles Sanders, and this team could be on the upswing again quite quickly.

The NFC South will still be wide open in 2025

The Falcons’ Kirk Cousins experiment isn’t really working. The Saints will be on a coaching search and have cap issues. The Buccaneers are decent, but nothing special.

There are few divisions in football that feel as wide open in 2025 as the NFC South, and it’s here the Panthers could capitalize. We don’t want to put the cart before the horse, because a lot hinges on how well Bryce Young continues to develop — but for the first time in forever the future actually feels bright in Carolina.

Intelligent team building, some very solid draft picks, and a little luck when it comes to UDFA receiver Jalen Coker has transformed the Panthers into a team that’s actually worth watching. If they can actually hang with a team like the Chiefs in their current state, then there’s a serious chance they could surprise everyone in a year’s time.