The Panthers have picked up quarterback Bryce Young’s fifth-year option, meaning he’s under contract through 2027 and is guaranteed a salary of $25.9 million that year. Now the question facing Panthers General Manager Dan Morgan is how many more years, and how much more money, he wants to commit to Young.
Morgan told Adam Schein of SiriusXM that a long-term contract is being discussed, although Morgan didn’t sound like he’s in a hurry to get a deal done.
“I’m actually signing his fifth-year option today, we’re picking that up. In terms of long-term contract, that’s something that we’re talking about here internally, and we’ll do it at the right time,” Morgan said.
Morgan said the Panthers are pleased with Young’s growth through Year 3.
“Getting back to Bryce, obviously he came into a really rough situation in terms of coaching staff, maybe you could say the talent around him wasn’t great as well,” Morgan said. “So to come in as a rookie and come into a really tough situation where we had a coaching change, a lot of shuffling around the building, so for Coach Canales to come in here and provide stability, for him to be in the system now going on three years in a row, I think you see him just getting better and better every single year. Understanding the offense, he’s such a good processor, and a guy that’s just a pleasure to have around the building every day. As you see him mature, you see him become a better leader every single year. And the operation’s getting faster every year. So we really feel like the arrow is up with Bryce.”
With two more years on Young’s current deal, the Panthers don’t need to rush to get a long-term contract done. They’re pleased with his progress to this point, but they may want to see more from him before they’re willing to pay him like a franchise quarterback on his second contract.
Panthers Clips
Former NFL quarterback P.J. Walker has announced his retirement.
Walker had been playing for the CFL’s Calgary Stampeders and the team announced on Thursday that he was stepping away from the game. Walker’s agent confirmed to 3DownNation.com that Walker is retiring.
Walker signed with the Colts in 2017 after going undrafted out of Temple and spent time on their practice squad for three years before starring in the XFL during the 2020 season. He returned to the NFL with the Panthers and made his first NFL start that year.
Walker would start seven times over three seasons in Carolina and he made two starts for the Browns in 2023. He was 185-of-339 for 2,135 yards, six touchdowns and 16 interceptions in 21 overall NFL appearances.
Calgary signed Walker after he was released by the Seahawks in 2024 and he appeared in 13 games for the team last season.
Bryce Young is officially under contract for the 2027 season.
The Panthers announced on Wednesday that they have exercised their option on the quarterback’s contract for next year. The team indicated earlier this month that they planned to make that move once the draft was over.
Young is now set to make a guaranteed salary of $25.904 million in 2027.
Young was the first overall pick in 2023, but had a rough rookie year and was benched early in 2024. He returned to the starting lineup after Andy Dalton was involved in a car accident and played well enough to cement his hold on the job for 2025. There were ups and downs last year, but the Panthers won the NFC South and lost a squeaker to the Rams in the Wild Card round in January.
The next big question for Young and the Panthers concerns a multi-year contract extension. Young is eligible to sign one at any time, but it remains to be seen if the team will wait to push for one until they have more on-field information to use in their decision to tie their future to the quarterback.
Panthers running back Jonathon Brooks is continuing to make progress in his bid to return to action.
The Panthers took Brooks in the second round of the 2024 draft after tore his right ACL during his final season at Texas and he made his debut in the middle of his rookie season. Brooks tore the same ACL again in his third NFL game, however, and he missed all of last season while recovering from his second injury.
Brooks progressed to the point that the team was making plans for him to take part in the offseason program this year and he provided an update on how he’s feeling at a Tuesday press conference. Brooks said that he’s been “cleared by my surgeon” and is closing in on feeling all the way back to full strength.
“Feels good getting back to the football movements,” Brooks said. “Obviously it’s something I have to work on. Feel close to 100 percent, getting there. Still just going with the plan they have for me.”
Chuba Hubbard and Trevor Etienne are back with the Panthers from last season and they signed AJ Dillon as a free agent. How Brooks will fit into that backfield mix will be one of the things to watch as the Panthers’ offseason continues to play out.
The Panthers are adding an undrafted quarterback to their roster.
Tom Pelissero of NFL Media reports that they have agreed to terms with former Georgia Tech quarterback Haynes King. King will reportedly receive $250,000 in guaranteed money as part of the deal.
King, who visited the Panthers during the pre-draft process, was a three-year starter at Georgia Tech after transferring from Texas A&M. He was 252-of-361 for 2,951 yards, 14 touchdowns and six interceptions last season. He also ran 185 times for 953 yards and 15 touchdowns.
The Panthers signed Kenny Pickett and Will Grier as free agents to back up earlier this offseason. They also traded last year’s backup Andy Dalton to the Eagles.
The Panthers have selected offensive tackle Monroe Freeling with the No. 19 overall pick in the 2026 NFL Draft.
Freeling played his college ball at Georgia. He started 18 games at left tackle in his career, including the final five games of the 2024 season and 13 contests in 2025.
He was a second-team All-SEC honoree last season.
The Panthers had a need at offensive tackle with Ikem Ekwonu suffering a ruptured patellar tendon in the club’s playoff loss. Now Freeling can be a candidate to replace Ekwonu while he heals.
There’s been speculation in recent weeks about the Panthers using their first-round pick on a wide receiver and they’d be hoping for the same kind of results they got when they added a wideout at the top of the draft in 2025.
Tetairoa McMillan was named the offensive rookie of the year after catching 70 passes for 1,014 yards and seven touchdowns. A repeat of that production would be welcome in Carolina, but the wideout believes there’s room for more.
McMillan said this week that he lost weight over the course of his rookie season, but has added about 10-15 pounds this offseason to get closer to his college weight.
“I wasn’t used to playing that small, I felt pretty weak,” McMillan said, via the team’s website. “I didn’t have my power back, so that was pretty much the main focus this offseason for me.”
McMillan said he believes that change “allows me to be faster, stronger” than he was last season and that prospect should be a pleasant one for the Panthers regardless of what they do on Thursday night.
The Panthers couldn’t snap their streak of losing records last season, but the year still marked a step forward for the franchise.
Carolina’s 8-9 record was good enough to make them the NFC South champions and put them in the playoffs for the first time since the 2017 season. They were knocked out of the postseason by a Rams touchdown in the final minute of a wild fourth quarter and that performance provided more reason to believe in the Panthers as a team on the rise heading into 2026.
Quarterback Bryce Young didn’t take any issue with that assessment on Tuesday, but he did say that it is important for the team to remember that last year’s results don’t provide any guarantees that the team will continue to follow the same path.
“Obviously, we want to make sure that we can be consistent with some of the positives from last year, but also we understand that last year was last year,” Young said, via the team’s website. “This is a new season. We all start 0-0. There’s no carryover; we’re not entitled to anything, so I’m super grateful for that being our mindset as a team. Everyone knows we can’t take our foot off the gas. We have to work just as hard, if not harder, as we have these last few years. Everything’s earned, and now it’s not the time to be thinking about records or anything like that. It’s just about the work. Coach talks about that in the meetings. Now is just the time to win every single day, capture our best, so we’re focused on that.”
Young’s position puts him in a leadership role and the message is likely one that fits Panthers head coach Dave Canales’s desired mindset for the team. Canales said in February that he wanted to see Young “continue to grow in the ownership” of the team’s offense. Young said his offseason focus has been on that “mastery” of the scheme and on-field evidence of it will help ensure the Panthers don’t take a step backward this year.
In 2019, quarterback Will Grier arrived in Carolina as a third-round drdaft pick. Now he’s returning to the Panthers as a free agent signing.
Grier will sign with the Panthers, according to Adam Schefter of ESPN. It will be Grier’s second stint in Carolina, where he spent two seasons but didn’t do much. His only regular-season action came in the last two games of his rookie year, both of which were ugly performances in blowout losses.
Those are still the only two regular-season games Grier has played, but he has managed to stick around in the NFL as a backup. He has spent time mostly with the Cowboys but also had brief stays on the Bengals, Patriots, Chargers and Eagles.
Grier is the third quarterback on the Panthers’ roster, and he’ll join a quarterback room that also features starter Bryce Young and backup Kenny Pickett.
The 31-year-old Grier was born and raised in the Charlotte suburbs, and after a journey that has seen him hold clipboards around the NFL, now he’s getting a homecoming.
The start of the Panthers’ offseason program marked the official return to the roster for wide receivers Jalen Coker and Brycen Tremayne.
Coker and Tremayne both signed their exclusive rights free agent tender offers on Monday. Both players were barred from negotiating with other teams once the Panthers tendered them, so their return was all but certain well before the deals were formally finalized.
Coker had 33 catches for 394 yards and three touchdowns in 11 regular season appearances last season. He also had nine catches for 134 yards and a score in the team’s playoff loss to the Rams.
Tremayne had 14 catches for 160 yards in 16 games last season. He also made 15 tackles on special teams.
