QB Notebook: Jordan Love Enters The MVP Race; C.J. Stroud Earning Big Extension

Welcome to the Quarterback Notebook, where I’ll cover the past week in NFL quarterbacking — from the most interesting passers, plays and storylines to some other stuff that caught my eye while watching film this week. This week, we’ll make an MVP case for Jordan Love, give C.J. Stroud his flowers, and take a look at the Eagles’ new starting quarterback. Let’s talk quarterbacks. The MVP odds, with Love sitting around ninth or 10th depending on the sportsbook, might make you think otherwise, but I’m calling my shot early here. Love doesn’t have the numbers you’d expect from a viable MVP candidate, but he has plenty of time to fix that after a slow start, mostly due to shoddy pass protection. The Packers’ offensive line is still an issue, but Love appears to have learned to mitigate it over the last few weeks. In Sunday night’s win over the Cowboys, he got a chance to show a national audience how a great quarterback can thrive under overwhelming pressure. Love did it in a number of ways. Like just standing there and running his reads as the pocket collapsed around him: Or by sidestepping the rush and creating a throwing window, as he does by looking off the linebacker on this audacious pass: Throwing a fadeaway that hits the receiver in stride to maximize YAC will also get the job done: Hitting an anticipatory throw before an unblocked rusher is another way to beat the pressure: Shifting the protection to pick up the blitz also works, but you still may have to throw it early in case your tight end whiffs on his block: It’s rare to see a quarterback play his best ball when the conditions around him are at their worst. But that’s what we’re seeing from Love, whose quick pressure rate (24.5%) and average time to pressure (2.35 seconds) are the worst in the NFL. Even more impressive, all that pressure hasn’t pushed Love into a conservative shell. He’s still as ambitious as ever and was bombing ludicrous passes downfield against Dallas—as he did against Chicago the previous week. I felt like I needed a cigarette after watching it. Love’s stat line on Sunday night would have looked even better if his receiver hadn’t forgotten how to catch. You could put together a sweet highlight reel just by compiling the deep passes they dropped. Love (with some help from the overachieving defense) is keeping the Packers in the NFC North race, and he’s receiving little help. Beyond the drops, the team has the league’s worst pass protection and a run game that ranks dead last in the NFL by a wide margin, averaging 59.8 yards per game. The next-worst rushing team, Dallas, averages 76 yards a contest. That this team is sitting at 4-2 and holding onto the fifth seed in the conference is a minor miracle. Replace Love with another quarterback not named Patrick, Josh, or Lamar, and they’d be headed for a top-10 pick. Whether Houston will give Stroud the big-money extension he’s seeking is no longer in question. Now it’s just a matter of how much the Texans will have to fork over to get him to sign. Before the two sides put off contract talks until after the season, Houston was reportedly willing to pay Stroud in the $50 million range, putting him somewhere in the top-12 of the highest-paid quarterbacks, but the 25-year-old decided he’d rather play through 2026 and see where the market was at next offseason. With quarterbacks like Lamar Jackson, Drake Maye, and Caleb Williams due for extensions, and the cap projected to jump again, $60 million per year will be the starting point for quarterbacks seeking a new deal. I don’t want to exaggerate Stroud’s improvement. I thought he was significantly better than the public perception. He did a lot of heavy lifting for a Houston offense with no semblance of a running game, a receiving corps ravaged by injuries, and a first-year offensive coordinator who was still searching for his own play-calling identity. After his return from a concussion in Week 13, Stroud put up solid numbers and even better tape. A horrific performance in the playoff loss to New England obscured how well Stroud had been playing. Since Week 13 of last season, Stroud has Pro Football Focus’ sixth-highest passing grade (right ahead of Maye), he ranks 11th in expected points added per play (right ahead of Joe Burrow), eighth in yards per attempt (right ahead of Patrick Mahomes), and fifth in PFF’s “big time throw” metric (ahead of Josh Allen, Dak Prescott, Brock Purdy and Justin Herbert). Only four quarterbacks have fewer “turnover-worthy plays,” according to PFF. Stroud has been playing good football for a while, but this season he’s leveled up in a few key areas. Playing out of structure is the big one. Stroud will never be a creative force, like a Mahomes or Allen, but he looks more comfortable throwing on the move now. His 13.8% completion percentage over expected on scramble-drill throws is a career high, per Next Gen Stats. He’s already generated 7.8 EPA on scramble runs, putting him on pace to shatter his career high (11.8), and Stroud hasn’t thrown an interception under pressure this season. Stroud has always been a solid performer in structure; now he’s becoming a reliable one when things break down. Sunday’s win over Jacksonville offered a glimpse at the progress Stroud has made in that area. The Texans put up 34 points against a strong Jaguars defense, largely thanks to Stroud’s play under duress. The Jags defense generated five unblocked pressures. Stroud didn’t take a single sack and went 5-of-5 for 69 yards. He also made one of the season’s throws with a defender right in his grill. Stroud has also performed better against the blitz, which isn’t surprising. The Texans brought in offensive coordinator Nick Caley last season to put more on Stroud’s plate before the snap. It was the first time he controlled the protections and could change plays at the line of scrimmage. There were some growing pains early last season, but the plan is starting to bear fruit. Now Stroud can put out fires before they erupt after the snap, which was the goal when the coaching staff handed him the keys to the offense last offseason. “I’ve never played quarterback,” Caley told me last August. “I’ve coached offense for well over a decade, but you learn things and see things from a quarterback’s perspective. We [as coaches] can prepare all we want, but the pictures could change … When you have a quarterback who understands the intent of what you’re doing, he can solve problems for you. He can get you out of bad situations and get you into favorable ones.” Stroud is now fully capable of solving problems for Houston’s offense—at least the ones he can control. This idea that Stroud hasn’t improved since his rookie season is mostly nonsense. While he did take a step back in his second season, his numbers have improved since then. Based on advanced metrics (which are generally more informative than traditional stats), Stroud’s third season was even better than his rookie campaign. In 2026, he’s on pace for his best season yet, and it’ll make him a lot of money. It doesn’t matter who’s starting at quarterback; the Eagles offense stinks. With Jalen Hurts out on Sunday against the Panthers, Philadelphia turned to their prized backup, Tanner McKee, and the results were the same: a lethargic performance in a low-scoring loss. It wasn’t fair to blame Hurts for all the offensive woes, and the same goes for McKee, who made his first meaningful start on Sunday. The 2023 sixth-round pick didn’t stand much of a chance. A faulty run game and a frustrating number of penalties kept him behind the chains all game. The pass protection remains subpar, and offensive coordinator Sean Mannion doesn’t know how to work around it. Even with that in mind, McKee’s weaknesses were apparent. He doesn’t have a strong arm—it looked like he was throwing a weighted ball—and he’s a bit of a statue in the pocket. That combination of factors makes performing under pressure a tall task for McKee. Carolina picked up on that and cranked up their blitz rate. But there were positives as well. While McKee lacks Hurts’ mobility and arm talent, he doesn’t shy away from targeting the middle of the field, and he gets rid of the ball quickly. McKee’s 2.42-second average time to throw was the second lowest of the season for Philadelphia, which contributed to the Eagles posting their second-lowest pressure rate allowed. If this were a high-functioning offense, those aspects of McKee’s game might have helped. But this unit isn’t in shape to prop up a quarterback like McKee, who needs a strong run game and an effective play-action attack to do his best work. He’s a good fit for what Philadelphia wants its offense to be, but he can’t provide what it needs right now. It needs a quarterback comfortable with playing out of structure and creating when plays break down. Those are hard to find on the trade market, and you certainly won’t find one in the pool of available free agents. If I’m Eagles general manager Howie Roseman, I’m calling Indianapolis to see what it would cost to get Anthony Richardson, the former first-round pick who lost his job to Daniel Jones last offseason. Richardson may lack familiarity with Mannion’s system, but he should be well-versed in Nick Sirianni’s, having played for Shane Steichen, who worked under the Eagles head coach before taking the Colts job. Either way, I still don’t count Philadelphia out of the NFC East race. The division-leading Giants are down to their third quarterback, the second-place Cowboys might have the league’s worst defense, and the Commanders are headed in the wrong direction. Justice for the former journeyman backup! Fitzpatrick wasn’t wrong when he unloaded on Bo Nix on Thursday night, though some Broncos fans, including Aqib Talib, took exception. “Bo Nix is not playing competitively,” he said. “It’s almost disrespectful to the quarterback position how he’s playing football right now.” To be fair to Nix, the Seahawks defense didn’t give him many downfield opportunities, but his aversion to throwing downfield fits the season’s broader pattern. And with Nix refusing to scramble, he’s bringing nothing to the Broncos offense. As Fitzpatrick says, the third-year quarterback needs to be more competitive and take more chances. Could Fitzpatrick have been nicer about it? Sure, but his analysis was spot on. Justin Herbert had another rough go on Sunday, but this bomb to Quentin Johnston reminded everyone how talented he is. And if you’re wondering: no, the Chargers did not score a touchdown on that drive. Just take the sack, Justin.