Carolina Panthers quarterback Bryce Young on Monday was benched in favor of Andy Dalton, less than 24 hours after coach Dave Canales declared that the top pick of the 2023 draft would remain his starter for Sunday’s game against the Las Vegas Raiders.
Young, 23, becomes the first quarterback selected No. 1 in the common draft era (since 1967) to be benched for noninjury reasons in his second season.
Former NFL quarterback Ryan Leaf went bananas on the Panthers Organization for the benching.
“They screwed this thing up from the get-go, though. I mean, this organization is horrible,” Leaf said. This organization has done nothing to try to help and develop a player that has so much expectation on him. And so, I laid this at the feet of the organization completely. He has zero confidence right now. No one believes in him and no one has his back. And I know what that feels like. You don’t want to go into the office. You don’t want to be around anybody. Football seems so toxic to you because you’ve always had that. You’ve always had success. And you’ve always been the guy that everybody loved to lift up and follow and everything like that. “And right now, there’s no one in that locker room that seemingly feels that way. And that is a hard place to be as a leader of men when you’re 22, 23 years old.”
Leaf was the second overall pick in the 1998 NFL Draft. Many debated whether Leaf was better Peyton Manning in 1998, he has cleaned up his life, and this is pretty interesting.
Do you think the situation is bad? Will this ruin Bryce Young’s career?
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