Panthers General Manager Dan Morgan made clear at his media availability on Tuesday that Andy Dalton will have to compete for his backup quarterback job. The 38-year-old, though, might not even make it out of the offseason program with the Panthers.
Adam Schefter of ESPN reports that the Panthers have received calls about a potential trade for the veteran quarterback.
Dalton has spent the past three seasons in Carolina, making seven starts. He has 10 touchdowns and seven interceptions.
The Panthers are seeking a younger quarterback to develop behind Bryce Young.
“Andy knows he’s going to have to compete,” Morgan said. “We are going to try to bring somebody in here. I don’t know who that is, whether through free agency or the draft or both, you never know. So I’m in constant communication with Andy. We’ve talked multiple times, and he’s aware of the plan, and we’ll see what happens.
“I think it’s really up to Andy, in terms of Andy competing. Andy’s not afraid of competition, so we’ll see what happens in free agency; we’ll see what happens in the draft; and then we’ll see how it plays out.”
Dalton has started 169 games in his career, but he has not been a full-time starter since 2022 with the Saints, when he started 14 games. He has made a living as a backup quarterback since leaving the Bengals after the 2019 season.
Bradley Chubb is available to sign with any team right now and the prospect of the Panthers pursuing him came up during General Manager Dan Morgan’s press conference at the Scouting Combine on Tuesday.
Chubb was released by the Dolphins earlier this month, which means a team can add him to their pass rush options before free agency opens at the start of the new league year. The Panthers had 30 sacks during the 2025 season and Morgan said that he doesn’t think a team can ever have enough strong pass rushers in general before answering a question about specific interest in Chubb.
Morgan said Chubb is “still playing at a really good level” and indicated the team is looking into the possibility of adding him to the defense.
“I don’t think anything is going to be off the table,” Morgan said, via the team’s website. “We’ll explore that, we’ll talk to his agent, but I wouldn’t say anything’s upcoming, but we’ll definitely stay on that, and we’ll see where that goes.”
Chubb missed all of 2024 with a torn ACL, but returned to record 8.5 sacks for the Dolphins last season. Derrick Brown and Nic Scourton tied for the Panthers’ lead by recording five sacks each during the 2025 campaign.
The Panthers are making a change in their offensive operation for the 2026 season.
Head coach Dave Canales told reporters at the Scouting Combine in Indianapolis on Tuesday that offensive coordinator Brad Idzik will call the team’s plays. Canales handled those duties the last two seasons, but announced the change at a press conference.
Canales said it was his idea to make the change and that it will allow him to “broaden my perspective” of the entire team in his third season as the head coach.
“His continuity with the system, his continuity with our players, being able to do that, I believe will be the best thing for us moving forward,” Canales said.
Canales said that the addition of Darrell Bevell to the coaching staff as associate head coach and offensive assistant will help with the transition because of Bevell’s experience as an offensive coordinator at other spots around the league.
The Browns are adding another veteran coach to their staff.
Per Jeremy Fowler of ESPN, Cleveland is hiring Dom Capers as an assistant.
Capers, the former head coach of the Panthers and Texans, had been back with Carolina serving as senior defensive assistant since 2023.
He’d recently served in that same role — senior defensive assistant — for the Jaguars (2019), Vikings (2020), Lions (2021), and Broncos (2022).
Capers was the Panthers’ first head coach, going 30-34 from 1995-1998. He was then the Texans’ first coach from 2002-2005, going 18-46.
Running back Javonte Williams bet on himself last year, signing a one-year, $3 million deal. He delivered, with a career-high 1,200 rushing yards.
His reward was a three-year, $24 million deal to remain with the Cowboys.
Since the Williams deal was the first significant contract signed by a looming free agent, it’s important to remember a few things as we approach new-contract season. The initial reports routinely overstate the true value of the contract. For example, the reported $16 million in guarantees for Williams surely aren’t fully guaranteed at signing, and there’s little about the structure of the deal. There could be a little fudging at play to make the deal look better than it is, with the reporters who rush to Twitter with the early information rarely if ever insisting on full and accurate details. (If they do, someone else gets the scoop.)
For now, even the potentially inflated initial reporting reinforces an important point: The running back position continues to be undervalued.
The deal, if it’s truly worth $8 million per year, puts Williams at 16th among all current running backs. And while he took the offer before the annual tampering festival in Indianapolis, it’s believed that the offer the took was the best one he was going to get.
It’s also possible the Cowboys tried aggressively to get Williams signed before he could hit the market, perhaps by trotting out their CBA-violating practice of negotiating directly with the player. Or by making it clear that they’ll find another cheap veteran running back in the second or third wave of free agency, when players sign modest one-year deals.
Still, what would Williams have gotten on the open market? The absence of state income taxes in Texas are a factor. (Most players only care about APY, and that’s often a mistake.) Only the superstars at the position get market value. Eagles running back Saquon Barkley leads the way, at $20.6 million per year. 49ers running back Christian McCaffrey’s current deal has a new-money average of $19 million.
It happens for one very simple reason. The supply of capable running backs outweighs demand. Teams can resort to the draft for a younger, cheaper, and usually healthier player in lieu of paying a veteran who may not be able to duplicate his performance in a contract year.
Every year, college football generates plenty of running backs who can play at the NFL level, if they can be trusted to hold onto the ball and if they are able to pick up blitzers in pass protection. Most of them have their best years under slotted rookie contracts. When those expire, teams look for another young player to replace them.
The Williams contract gives other teams a data point that will become relevant to their negotiations with running backs. The other players who’ll be trying to get paid (Kenneth Walker III, Breece Hall, Travis Etienne, Rico Dowdle, Rachaad White, Isiah Pacheco, JK Dobbins) will have to deal with the argument that a guy who rushed for 1,200 yards in 2025 got only $8 million per year. (The counter would include that Williams isn’t much of a factor in the passing game, and that he lacks breakaway speed.)
Then there’s Lions running back Jahmyr Gibbs. Currently eligible for a second deal, he has shown the kind of superstar ability that would justify a market-level contract.
And how about Falcons running back Bijan Robinson? Repeatedly called the best player in the entire league by his former head coach, Raheem Morris, Robinson will be in line for a superstar contract, too.
Will the Williams deal hold down what the Lions will offer Gibbs and what the Falcons will offer Robinson? It shouldn’t be a factor, at all. Gibbs and Robinson are far closer to Barkley and McCaffrey than the players who are hitting the market. Still, all running backs who are ready to become free agents will have to deal with the fact — as underscored by the Williams deal — that the running back market continues to be not what it could be, or perhaps what it should be.
