The Carolina Panthers traded two first-round draft picks, two second-round draft picks and wide receiver D.J. Moore to be able to acquire Alabama quarterback Bryce Young with the first selection in the 2023 NFL Draft. He’s in the second season of a guaranteed, four-year, $37.955 million contract.
Quarterback Andy Dalton is a 14-year NFL veteran who’ll be a free agent after this season.
After the second game of this season, the Panthers replaced Young with Dalton as their starting quarterback. And after Young got his first playing time on Sunday since being benched, Carolina coach Dave Canales said protecting Dalton was among the reasons that Young went in to play behind an offensive line missing two starters who had gotten hurt during the game.
With Carolina trailing the Chicago Bears 36-10 with 4:23 to play on Sunday, Young took over at quarterback for the Panthers’ final possession.
“Just saw it as an opportunity there,” Canales said at his postgame press conference about playing Young. “We had a couple of injuries on the offensive line, and then again just wanted to get him in there to get some live reps, and he did a fantastic job playing with energy, extending plays, finding some completions down the field, which was all fantastic, so it’s a hard situation, but at that point, it was just like, OK, just with the different things happening on the offensive line it was something where I wanted to get Andy out of there and then just give Bryce an opportunity to just continue to put some good football on there while we had time.”
