{"id":918508,"date":"2026-07-09T05:17:38","date_gmt":"2026-07-09T10:17:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/09\/nfl-quarterback-battles-2026-ranking-all-5-camp-competitions-and-predicting-the-winners\/"},"modified":"2026-07-09T05:17:38","modified_gmt":"2026-07-09T10:17:38","slug":"nfl-quarterback-battles-2026-ranking-all-5-camp-competitions-and-predicting-the-winners","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/09\/nfl-quarterback-battles-2026-ranking-all-5-camp-competitions-and-predicting-the-winners\/","title":{"rendered":"NFL Quarterback Battles 2026: Ranking All 5 Camp Competitions and Predicting the Winners"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Football <\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Five NFL teams will open training camp this month without a settled quarterback, and Pro Football Network\u2019s Jacob Infante sees the same force deciding four of them: how close each team is to winning now.<\/p>\n<h2>Football Why the NFL\u2019s Quarterback Battles Favor the Veterans<\/h2>\n<p>Arizona barely qualifies. Infante ranks the Cardinals fifth because the real question is Jacoby Brissett\u2019s contract, not the depth chart. Brissett was a functional starter in 2025, Gardner Minshew arrived as insurance, and Arizona spent a third-round pick on Carson Beck. If Brissett holds out, Minshew has the experience to open the season.<\/p>\n<p data-video_id=\"u_9cajSE5dw\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Shedeur Sanders vs. Deshaun Watson, and More Top 5 NFL QB Battles\" width=\"696\" height=\"392\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/u_9cajSE5dw?feature=oembed&#038;enablejsapi=1\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Infante doesn\u2019t expect it to come to that. \u201cI do think Brissett is gonna come back,\u201d he said on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/@PFN365\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow noreferrer\">PFN\u2019s The Hot List<\/a>. \u201cI think they\u2019ll figure out some sort of pay raise, even if it\u2019s minor, and then he\u2019ll start for Arizona this season.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Raiders present the cleaner version of the same logic. Las Vegas took Fernando Mendoza first overall, then signed Kirk Cousins, and Infante would let the rookie wait. \u201cThat starting job should belong to Kirk Cousins, at least to start,\u201d he said. \u201cI think it makes a lot of sense to start Cousins to slowly ease Mendoza into things. There\u2019s no need to rush.\u201d A team not built to chase January can afford patience.<\/p>\n<p>Atlanta is where the pattern gets interesting. Michael Penix Jr. enters his third season coming off a partially torn ACL, and the Falcons added Tua Tagovailoa on a one-year deal to push him. Infante still gives Penix the opening job, but not much rope.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think [Penix] will end up winning this quarterback battle, but I do think that [Tagovailoa] is gonna end up starting sooner rather than later,\u201d he said, adding that \u201chis leash is gonna be very tight.\u201d In a soft NFC South, Atlanta has enough talent to make the margin for error slim.<\/p>\n<p><strong>BE THE GM OF YOUR FAVORITE TEAM:<\/strong> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.profootballnetwork.com\/mockdraft\">PFN\u2019s FREE NFL Mock Draft Simulator<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Minnesota carries the highest stakes on the list. J.J. McCarthy\u2019s second season was rough, yet the Vikings still went 9-8, and they signed Kyler Murray to compete. Infante isn\u2019t hedging. \u201cI think this is Kyler\u2019s job to lose,\u201d he said. \u201cI think McCarthy is gonna be on a short leash.\u201d With the Bears and Packers both in the playoffs a year ago, the Vikings can\u2019t afford another lost year at the position.<\/p>\n<h2>Football The Cleveland Browns Quarterback Battle Breaks the Pattern<\/h2>\n<p>Cleveland tops the ranking, and Infante\u2019s read on it flips the whole framework. He calls it the most contested battle and the bleakest, between Deshaun Watson, who missed 2025 after an Achilles tear, and Shedeur Sanders. By <a href=\"https:\/\/www.profootballnetwork.com\/nfl-hq\/rankings\/quarterback\">Pro Football Network\u2019s QB Impact metric<\/a>, Watson graded as the worst starter in football in 2024, and Sanders ranked as the second-worst quarterback in the league as a rookie.<\/p>\n<p>Infante doesn\u2019t dress it up. \u201cWatson sucks. I hate to say it,\u201d he said. \u201cWatson just isn\u2019t that guy anymore.\u201d His case for Sanders isn\u2019t about production. It\u2019s about direction. The Browns traded Myles Garrett to the Rams for [Jared Verse] and draft capital, then spent the offseason getting younger, double-dipping at receiver with [KC] Concepcion and Denzel Boston. Cleveland is not a roster chasing a playoff spot.<\/p>\n<p><strong>MORE HOT LIST:\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.profootballnetwork.com\/ranking-the-5-greatest-nfl-super-teams-the-hot-list-puts-a-surprise-forgotten-champion-at-no-1\/\">Ranking the 5 Greatest NFL Super Teams<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>That is exactly why the Browns are the outlier. Everywhere else, proximity to contention argues for the steadier veteran. In Cleveland, the absence of it argues for the opposite. \u201cI think you go with the upside,\u201d Infante said. \u201cYou give [Shedeur] Sanders the reps to develop, and then you go from there.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Four of these jobs should tilt toward experience by Week 1. The one that shouldn\u2019t belongs to the team with the least to lose.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.profootballnetwork.com\/nfl-quarterback-battles-2026\/\" class=\"button purchase\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Read More<\/a> Ryan Gosling<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Five NFL teams will open training camp this month without a settled quarterback, and Pro Football Network\u2019s Jacob Infante sees the same force deciding four of them: how close each team is to winning now. Why the NFL\u2019s Quarterback Battles Favor the Veterans Arizona barely qualifies. Infante ranks the Cardinals fifth because the real question<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":918509,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23439,3790,27719],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-918508","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-battles","category-football","category-quarterback"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/918508","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=918508"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/918508\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/918509"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=918508"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=918508"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=918508"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}