While everyone else is predicting who's going to start at quarterback for various teams next month, we're looking beyond this entire 2026 NFL season to figure out where the QB questions are going to be next year.
Several of the NFL's teams are entering critical seasons with their quarterback situations. Some have no idea how they'll make it through this season with what they have on the roster. Some feel confident about this season but don't know how things will shake out for 2027. The smart teams are thinking ahead, even as they prepare for 2026. So every year, we try to pick a dozen or so teams whose long-term QB situations appear to be in flux and examine what's most likely to happen in the short and long terms.
We try to stay away from situations in which contracts make change extremely unlikely. For example, you might say this is an important year for Dak Prescott to break through in the postseason for Dallas. And in some ways you might be right. But in terms of Prescott's long-term future with the team, that is not the case. He's signed through 2028, he has $45 million in fully guaranteed salary for 2027, and various restructures have created a dead-money situation that makes him virtually uncuttable or untradeable. He's not on this year's list.
Lamar Jackson wasn't on last year's list, because at the time he had three years left on his contract with the Ravens, and there wasn't any doubt he'd be on the team in 2026. This year, however, he has two years left on his deal. And while the Ravens said they wanted to get him extended this offseason, they could not reach an agreement. That ratchets up the uncertainty on Jackson for 2027 and beyond, so we included him just to flag the circumstances and examine them a bit. If Jackson signs a new extension with the Ravens in the next few days, things change. But unless and until that extension gets done, we have license to wonder. That's just a fact.
Last year we started with Arizona... and we're starting there again.
Jump to a team: ARI | ATL | BAL | CAR | CLE | DET HOU | IND | LAR | MIA | MIN | NYJ PHI | PIT | SEA | TB
Arizona Cardinals
Current starter: Jacoby Brissett Signed through: 2026
The Cardinals have a new head coach in former Rams offensive coordinator Mike LaFleur. He inherits Brissett, who finished the 2025 season as Arizona's starter and played well under previous offensive coordinator Drew Petzing. But Brissett and the Cardinals spent the spring and summer in a contract standoff that resulted in a roughly $10 million raise over the roughly $5 million he had been scheduled to make this season under his previous deal.