{"id":767797,"date":"2026-02-22T00:55:12","date_gmt":"2026-02-22T00:55:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/767797\/"},"modified":"2026-02-22T00:55:12","modified_gmt":"2026-02-22T00:55:12","slug":"bryce-young-reveals-he-almost-quit-the-panthers-after-benching","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/767797\/","title":{"rendered":"Bryce Young reveals he almost quit the Panthers after benching"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Feb. 21, 2026, 7:04 p.m. ET<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\"><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/sportsdata.usatoday.com\/football\/nfl\/teams\/carolina-panthers\/364\" data-autotag=\"8afac4d1-41b4-4302-b154-b45f5b48a0d2\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" data-t-l=\":b|e|k|\u2691u\" class=\"gnt_ar_b_a\">Carolina Panthers<\/a> quarterback Bryce Young has come a long way since he was benched for backup Andy Dalton a couple of years ago.<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">During the 2023 season, Young struggled and was benched. When he was benched, he had no idea what his future held and almost left the team, he revealed on Ryan Clark\u2019s podcast \u201cThe Pivot.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">\u201cThat night I drove around. I didn\u2019t want to go back home. I just drove for like hours. I didn\u2019t know where I was going,\u201d Young said. \u201cI put Atlanta in my GPS. I knew I wasn\u2019t going to go all the way to Atlanta, but I just didn\u2019t know what was up, what was down in that time, as I was driving to clear my mind.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">\u201cThat was a place (benching) I\u2019d never been at before. Obviously not something you\u2019re expecting. You never think things could turn out that way,\u201d Young said. \u201cIn the moment, obviously, it was a lot. It was hard. It was really difficult. At that time, obviously, you\u2019re working through the emotions in real time. You\u2019re figuring it out.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">Rather than throw himself a pity party, Young decided to look at his benching as a challenge and a blessing.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Expert NFL picks: <a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" data-t-l=\":body nav (nfl)|e|auto spike click:5|\u2691u\" class=\"gnt_ar_b_sp_a\" href=\"https:\/\/sportsdata.usatoday.com\/football\/nfl\/picks\">Exclusive betting insights only at USA TODAY.<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">\u201cI made a conscious decision to challenge myself to be as consistent as I could be during that time and to grow from it\u2026I\u2019m human. I was upset. I was confused. I was mad at myself\u2026A bunch of people reached out and texted to show support. I was super grateful for it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">The Heisman winner would bounce back from his return from the bench at the end of the 2024 season and lead the team to the playoffs in 2025, and almost upset the Los Angeles Rams in the playoffs.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Feb. 21, 2026, 7:04 p.m. ET Carolina Panthers quarterback Bryce Young has come a long way since he&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":767798,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2075],"tags":[95878,235,260,2567,7,6,236,99115,99116,95882,99259,96165,96059,95888,95895,95897,95883,95881],"class_list":{"0":"post-767797","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-carolina-panthers","8":"tag-accessfree","9":"tag-carolina","10":"tag-carolina-panthers","11":"tag-carolinapanthers","12":"tag-football","13":"tag-nfl","14":"tag-panthers","15":"tag-sstssportsnfltouchdown","16":"tag-sstsntouchdown","17":"tag-tagamerican-football","18":"tag-tagandy-dalton","19":"tag-tagbryce-young","20":"tag-tagcarolina-panthers","21":"tag-tagnfl","22":"tag-tagnfl-hub","23":"tag-tagoverall-negative","24":"tag-tagsports-news","25":"tag-typestory"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116111561568658359","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767797","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=767797"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767797\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/767798"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=767797"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=767797"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=767797"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}