With the NFL’s rules skewing heavily towards the offensive side of the ball, the need for a franchise quarterback is greater than ever. The result? Three of the worst trades in NFL history.
There is no bigger decision for an NFL franchise than picking the quarterback to lead your team into the future.
Pick the right guy and your team can enjoy a decade of championship contention. Pick the wrong guy, like the Carolina Panthers seem to have done with Bryce Young, and your fans start wearing bags on their heads at home games.
Carolina coach Dave Canales, the team’s third offensive play-caller since drafting Young, benched the former No. 1 pick for Sunday’s matchup against the Las Vegas Raiders. Eighteen games into his NFL career, Young has already found himself on an infamous list of disastrous quarterback decisions.
Carolina Panthers: The Bryce Young Experiment
As of Thursday, Bryce Young looked like the latest in a long line of quarterback busts for the Panthers. But this one may sting even worse for Panthers fans, given the circumstances surrounding his selection.
The Alabama product was, according to reports, hand-selected by owner David Tepper. With the exodus of former Washington Commanders owner Dan Snyder, Tepper, who bought the Panthers in 2016, may have taken over as the league’s most reviled owner.
The Panthers not only selected Young with the top pick in the 2023 draft — they emptied the pantry to acquire him. Ahead of the draft, Carolina sent Pro Bowl wide receiver D.J. Moore, two first-round picks and a pair of second-round picks to the Chicago Bears for the No. 1 pick. The results have been horrific.
Carolina has cycled through three different coaches since the trade, posting a 2-17 record as Young has looked like one of the worst quarterbacks in the league. To make matters worse, the Bears used the Panthers’ 2024 first-round pick to add Caleb Williams, one of the top quarterback prospects in recent memory.
Cleveland Browns: The Deshaun Watson Gamble
Grabbing the wrong guy doesn’t always look like a misfire in the draft. Sometimes it involves sending three first-round picks in a haul for a quarterback with 22 civil lawsuits centered around sexual misconduct.
That’s what the Cleveland Browns did when they sent a bushel of draft picks to the Houston Texans for quarterback Deshaun Watson.
It hasn’t paid off.
Due to injuries and a suspension, Watson has played just 14 games for the Browns since joining the team in 2022. Adding insult to the injuries (and suspension), the Clemson product has looked like a shadow of himself during his limited playing time.
Backup quarterbacks including Joe Flacco and Jacoby Brissett have outplayed Watson in Cleveland. The roster is built to contend for a championship, but despite all the capital they invested in the position, their quarterback is holding them back.
Denver Broncos: The Russell Wilson Era
The Browns’ recent quarterback issues took some of the spotlight off of the Denver Broncos, who had their own disastrous contract situation.
In 2022, the Broncos shipped a pair of first-round picks and a litany of players to the Seattle Seahawks for Russell Wilson.
In Denver’s dream scenario, Wilson maintained the Pro Bowl-caliber play he’d established in Seattle. Finally, the Broncos could step off the quarterback carousel that had hurled them around since Peyton Manning rode off into the sunset in 2016.
Denver’s brass gifted Wilson a five-year, $243 million contract to lead the Broncos to the promised land.
Instead, the Wilson era in Denver was a nightmare. From his much-maligned catchphrase (“Broncos country, let’s ride”) to the uninspired on-field performances, Wilson lost the support of fans almost immediately in the Mile High City.
The Broncos pulled the plug on Wilson after two seasons, opting to take an $85 million cap hit to drop Wilson into free agency.
The Washington Commanders: A History of QB Disappointments
When it comes to Washington, where to begin? No list of disappointing quarterbacks would be complete without a cameo by the Commanders and their former owner.
In 2019, Snyder handpicked Ohio State quarterback Dwayne Haskins Jr. to lead his franchise into the future. It was a great story on paper — Haskins was a Maryland native returning to the region to lead his childhood team back to the playoffs.
But football isn’t played on paper. It’s played on a field where the first-round pick never found his footing.
Haskins lasted less than two seasons in Washington, racking up 12 touchdowns and 14 interceptions in 13 starts. The Commanders unceremoniously waived him in December 2020.
One more for the local fans: Haskins wasn’t the first underperforming first-round quarterback for the Commanders. The storied franchise is chock-full of busts, disappointments and underwhelming passes, including Heath Shuler, the No. 3 pick in the 1994 draft.
Just two years after winning Super Bowl 26 against the Buffalo Bills, Washington selected the Tennesee product to lead the team back to the postseason. It didn’t work.
Ultimately, Shuler’s short-lived political career lasted longer than his NFL dream. He played five seasons in the league — three as a lackluster starter in Washington before he was traded to the New Orleans Saints — before spending six years representing North Carolina in the U.S. House of Representatives.
The Rest of the NFL's QB Busts
Every quarterback has pros and cons, but the valley between them might be steepest for JaMarcus Russell, the former No. 1 pick of the Oakland Raiders. His arm talent was the stuff of legend — the Louisiana native could toss a football more than 60 yards from his knees. But all that arm power doesn’t amount to much if he can’t find his receiver.
Russell’s tendency to take sacks and heave inaccurate passes led to his downfall in the league, but his off-field antics were just as legendary as his raw talent on the field.
Former offensive lineman David Diehl said the Raiders knew Russell didn’t study tape between practices. To prove it, the coaching staff once sent their quarterback home with a blank VHS tape. Russell came back to practice the next day, claiming he’d learned a lot about blitz packages from the blank film.
He flamed out of the league after three seasons of subpar play in Oakland.
Manziel’s mess: While Russell had to be fooled into confessing that he didn’t watch tape, Johnny Manziel admitted it of his own volition. The former first-round pick of the Browns said in a documentary that he never watched tape during his NFL career.
Fans could tell.
“Johnny Football” passed for seven touchdowns and seven interceptions in eight starts for the Browns. The former Heisman Trophy winner couldn’t beat out journeyman Brian Hoyer for the starting job in 2014 and was passed over for veteran Josh McCown in 2015.
But even worse than Manziel’s on-field play was his off-field exploits. The Browns benched him in 2015 after videos showed him partying in Texas during a bye week. Manziel missed a check-in before the 2015 season finale, with several reports noting that he was in Las Vegas the day before the game.
The Browns cut the controversial quarterback in early 2016, noting that the constant drama undermined “the reputation of our organization.” Oh, how history repeats itself.
These are just a few of the many quarterback trades that have gone wrong in the NFL. As the league continues to evolve, the need for a franchise quarterback will only become more important. But it’s clear that finding the right guy is no easy feat.
