Is Bryce Young Fixed Now?

Wide Left harassed Luke Braun into diving deep into stories of quarterback development, especially as it concerns mechanics. Breaking down Bryce Young is the first of several commissioned fever dreams

Photo by David Jensen/Getty Images

If you’re reading this, you’re probably a Vikings fan interested in quarterbacks’ capacity to improve from their rough starts. You know, for… reasons. This piece is the beginning of a series on several quarterbacks who are playing better than they did at the beginning of their careers, and how that improvement came to be. This article isn’t about the Vikings. But it kind of is.

In 2024, the Panthers lost at home to the Los Angeles Chargers, 26-3. Just 18 games into Bryce Young’s career, Charlotte had seen enough. Just listen to the boos.

To shreds, you say

The clown show was on. He’s losing the locker room. He’s at a career crossroads. The Panthers had already shown GM Scott Fitterer the door in the wake of a disastrous rookie year. Whether it was for the sake of Young’s development or the sake of getting on the board, the Panthers decided Andy Dalton was a better bet.

It wasn’t unfair. Young’s -0.21 EPA/dropback in his rookie season was the 162nd of 163 qualifying seasons over the previous five seasons, per TruMedia. He was going step-for-step with Zach Wilson (#163) and Dwayne Haskins (#161). I don’t blame Panthers fans for booing him off the field in a scoreless half at home.

It seemed to help. After five games, Young went back in, taking over for a doomed 1-6 unit. By December, the Panthers were out of playoff contention, but a good showing in a Christmas Eve loss to Green Bay gave Panthers fans a glimmer of hope.

In 2025, Young has distanced himself from Zach Wilson or Dwayne Haskins. He’s right in the middle. At 7-6, the Panthers are too, but that’s a welcome change from hometown boo birds and consecutive last-place finishes.

He’s basically the same as Hall of Famer Aaron Rodgers, if you think about it.

In week 13 against the Los Angeles Rams, Young was the best quarterback in the league by CPOE + EPA composite.

Don’t look at the bottom.

It’s one week, and we know we shouldn’t overreact to small samples. But it would have been hard for those booing Panthers fans to imagine Bryce Young outgunning the Super Bowl favorite just 14 months later.

So is it real? Is Young going to start living up to his #1 overall pedigree? To examine this, we need to look away from aggregated results and understand why Young was struggling in the first place. You know the first place I’m going to look.

Young, Raw Feet

In Young’s rookie year, the 0-3 Panthers faced the 0-3 Vikings and Harrison Smith. You may remember this play, a strip sack returned for a touchdown by, ironically, current Panthers hero D.J. Wonnum.

This sack was a long time coming. A very long time. All the way to high school.

First, a baseline of comparison. In a normal dropback, a quarterback will have their feet aligned straight ahead at their first read. If they have to move to the next read, it’ll be easy to move a bit right or a bit left since things start out centrally.