For most of the last two years, the conversation around Bryce Young has felt louder than the football itself.
Size. Arm strength. Whether the Carolina Panthers made a mistake. Whether the team needed to move on before things spiraled out of control.
Every Young performance seemed to come with an asterisk. Every mistake was magnified, every quiet step forward largely ignored. So when Jason Kelce, one of the most respected voices in football, summed up his current trajectory, it landed differently.
Jason Kelce believes Carolina Panthers finally have something in Bryce Young
“Hats off to Bryce,” Kelce said on the New Heights podcast. “Bryce Young continues to just improve and improve and improve… a guy that I think everybody was questioning whether he was going to be a bust or out when he got benched… has reemerged. And man, the Rams defense aren’t any slouches.”
The Panthers lost to the Los Angeles Rams in the wild-card playoff round. Still, the game itself only reinforced what Carolina has been building toward all year.
Young finished with 264 passing yards, one touchdown through the air, a 16-yard rushing score, and a fourth-quarter go-ahead strike to wide receiver Jalen Coker. There was an early interception, and the signal-caller will be the first to tell you he wants that throw back. But as has become routine in 2025, he responded.
Young led six game-winning drives this season. In one-score contests, his passer rating (101.2) ranked third in the NFL, behind only Josh Allen and Lamar Jackson. On fourth downs, a staple of head coach Dave Canales’ offense, the former Alabama standout led the league in passing yards.
Young’s third NFL season closed with career highs across the board:
- 3,011 passing yards
- 23 touchdowns
- 63.6 completion percentage
- 87.8 passer rating
And perhaps most telling of all, general manager Dan Morgan didn’t hesitate when asked about Young’s future. The Panthers will pick up his fifth-year option, keeping him under contract through 2027 with the possibility of a longer-term commitment still on the table.
"Bryce has shown flashes of greatness this year against high-level competition," Morgan said after announcing the decision to pick up the option.
Kelce’s praise wasn’t about raw numbers or highlight throws. It was about genuine growth. Young was benched briefly earlier in his career, but he came back.
Sure, there are still areas to clean up. The Panthers know consistency is the next step, and Young knows it, too. But the league-wide question of whether he is the guy has shifted by leaps and bounds.
Now it sounds more like: How high can this go if Carolina keeps building it right?