The 2026 NFL season saw 15 Black quarterbacks start for their respective teams, but these three QBs – Jordan Love, Bryce Young and C.J. Stroud- could be the three to watch.
Jordan Love
Few quarterbacks entered 2026 carrying more weight than Green Bay’s Jordan Love. The Packers handed him a four-year, $220 million extension in 2024, yet he’s 1-3 in the playoffs since succeeding Aaron Rodgers, including a three-interception wild-card loss in Philadelphia in January 2025. Last season ended with five straight defeats, the last a wild-card collapse at Chicago after leading 21-3.
September made it worse. The Packers led 22-10 in Minnesota and lost 39-22. Lambeau booed through a 35-14 home loss to Atlanta, with Bleacher Report grading Love a D as he completed just 52.4% of his passes through three games.
Context matters, though. Love took 31 quarterback hits in those three games behind a battered O-line, and Green Bay ran for 17 yards against the Falcons.
The recovery started with a 17-14 win at Tampa Bay, where Love took just two hits. Then, the rebirth burst into life in Week 5 against a Bears side that had won each of its last two games. Love went 25 of 31 for 367 yards, the most by a Packers quarterback against Chicago at Lambeau, dropping deep balls of 42 and 53 yards to Christian Watson for both touchdowns in a 31-7 rout.
At 3-2, with Dallas visiting soon, the negativity around Love is fading, and the bookies have taken note. Online NFL odds providers had made the Packers a +230 outsider to reach the playoffs prior to the visit of the Bears. Now, they’re at +150, and with Micah Parsons set to return shortly and give Love a helping hand on the opposite side of the ball, those odds could well be slashed further.
Bryce Young
Remember when Carolina benched 2023 number one overall pick Bryce Young for Andy Dalton two games into his sophomore season? Even last season’s playoff berth, the club’s first since 2017, came as an 8-9 NFC South champion, ended in a three-point wild-card loss to the Rams, and arrived alongside a PFF passing grade ranked 27th. No extension followed. This is a prove-it season in the purest sense.
He’s proving plenty. Young threw for 361 yards and three touchdowns, and ran for another, in a 59-37 opening day loss to Chicago, earning an A from Bleacher Report’s Brent Sobleski. He followed with a win at Atlanta, played through injury in a loss to Cleveland, then owned Sunday Night Football. Without two of his top three receivers, Jalen Coker and Xavier Legette, he went 29 of 41 for 329 yards in a 32-26 win over Detroit, with Tetairoa McMillan catching 14 passes for 192 yards and both touchdowns.
Nine touchdown passes through four games is a franchise record. He led the league with 1,268 passing yards entering the bye, and Carolina is scoring 30.3 points a game. At 2-2, a trip to Philadelphia awaits, and the extension case continues to build itself.
C.J. Stroud
Was C. J. Stroud’s rookie brilliance under DeMeco Ryans the outlier? That question hung over Houston after two playoff games produced seven turnovers, including four interceptions in a 28-16 divisional loss at New England. Andre Johnson called his body language “bad” on a podcast, and ESPN’s Adam Schefter reported that extension talks were shelved until after the season. Contract year, then.
The losses piled up regardless throughout the opening weeks of the new campaign: Buffalo, Cincinnati, Indianapolis, then a 34-30 defeat to Dallas in which Stroud threw for 347 yards and two touchdowns. ESPN’s Dan Orlovsky said Stroud had “no business being 0-4.” He had a point; 151 attempts through four games hadn’t produced a single interception.
Week 5 finally delivered the result. In a 26-3 win at Tennessee, Stroud completed 26 of 34 for 261 yards, showed real pocket presence by escaping pressure to find Kayshon Boutte for 23 yards along the sideline, finished that drive with a 2-yard keeper, and later hit Jaylin Noel for a 9-yard score. That’s six touchdown passes, no interceptions, and no turnovers since Week 1.
Houston crawled out of 0-3 last year to finish 12-5. Marvin Harrison Jr. has arrived by trade, and Jacksonville awaits in London next up. Win that AFC South grudge match, and the Texans are very much alive in the playoff race, while Stroud’s extension argument only continues to grow stronger.
