The Carolina Panthers are on the verge of the biggest upset of the 2026 NFL playoffs. Granted, there are still a dozen games left, but it’s hard to imagine any other team trailing by 10.5 points at home.
That’s where Bryce Young landed, but after a swarming defense, unpredictable special teams play and some ill-timed throws by the Los Angeles Rams, he threw a 7-yard touchdown pass to Jalen Coker for a 31-27 lead with less than 3 minutes left. It was a quiet, confident moment for one of the most inconsistent quarterbacks in the league. Despite failing to post a passer rating of over 100 in two straight games, Young still climbed to the top of the NFC South. He’s backed up by a defense that ranks 23rd in the league. Yet here he is, with the Panthers on the verge of earning their first playoff win since Cam Newton nearly won the Super Bowl for the team following the 2015 season.
This is not the case. Matthew Stafford did Matthew Stafford things and elevated Colby Parkinson to temporary star status with a nifty sideline throw and a go-ahead touchdown. This set the stage for Young to fulfill his potential and prove he could become the superstar Carolina envisioned it would be after giving up multiple first- and second-round picks and wideout DJ Moore for the privilege of drafting him.
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Young had 32 seconds left and three timeouts to trail 34-31. He needed to gain 35 yards to keep the Panthers’ season alive with a long field goal.
He gained zero.
Young dropped back three times in a row, leading to a scramble and an eventual pass that went nowhere. On fourth down, he threw a low, catchable ball to rookie Jimmy Horn Jr., a player who finished 2025 with 11 fewer targets than Hunter Renfrow, who played six games. Horn couldn’t corral it. The Rams escaped.
Such is Yang’s duality. He occasionally does great things. He thrives when targeting receivers he trusts, like Te’Telloa McMillan or Coker. He completed eight passes for more than five yards downfield. All eight were for those two wide receivers.
However, he struggled when asked to improve other players on the roster. The duo accounted for 215 of his 264 passing yards Saturday (81 percent). Even if you win, this situation is always difficult to maintain. But as the season approached, Young failed to make other players on the depth chart more than just backup players.
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The question now is whether this is Young’s flaw or the Panthers’ front office. Carolina won gold with McMillan and Coker exceeded expectations when healthy in his second season after joining the team as an undrafted rookie. But 2024 first-round pick Xavier Legette ended his postseason with four catches for eight yards; three of those targets were 10-plus yards downfield. No one was caught.
The Panthers tight end totaled 638 receiving yards this regular season; if you combined all four of them into a football Voltron, he would still rank 12th among all players at the position. In the Wild Card Game, they had three catches for 22 yards, all from Tommy Tremble.
Meanwhile, Young’s average gain on average is just 0.02 expected points per putback (EPA). His first-quarter interception in Rams territory was the most impactful play of the entire game in terms of EPA. It was a promising opportunity to escape the pressure and he could crawl into the pocket before eventually firing an inaccurate shot into congested space in the middle of the field.
A play like this goes a long way toward unlocking the goodwill of a third-and-10 touchdown run:
Or take a nice hit on a deep ball on first read:
This is the razor’s edge for Yang Xingxing. He showed enough accuracy and talent to back up his draft credentials. Then he found a way to give himself enough room to trip over his own feet. After a season in which flawed playoff quarterbacks like Tua Tagovailoa and Kyler Murray signed massive extensions that resulted in their head coach being ousted and the team struggling with the salary cap hitting the bottom hard, the Panthers have a lot to think about.
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Bryce Young is a quarterback you can convince yourself of. Bryce Young is a quarterback you can talk yourself out of. He displayed both during a chaotic 60 minutes in the wild-card game.
He’s under contract for at least one more season, and likely two more once the Panthers pick up the fifth-year option on his rookie deal. Two years to prove he can be better than the guy who kept throwing ghost passes as the season was about to end on Saturday.
This article originally appeared in To Win: This moment is too big for Bryce Young
