6 NFL quarterbacks under pressure to perform this season

There is no position in sports with more pressure on it than quarterback. The face of the franchise, the difference between a winner and a loser, quarterbacks are often directly linked to a team’s success, whether that’s fair or not. This also makes them the first players to be axed when it comes time for a coaching change, with new staffs routinely wanting “their guy,” instead of fixing someone else’s problem.

The 2025 season is no different to any past year. There are a lot of teams with either shaky quarterback situations, or players who need to prove something this year to keep their careers moving forward. This isn’t a ranked list, as the pressure is equal for everyone.

We’re going to learn if Sam Darnold’s mammoth 2024 season with the Vikings was a fluke or not. The Seahawks went all-in on Darnold, signing him to a big contract and trading away Geno Smith to cement Darnold as the starter without a competition. That doesn’t mean this season is pressure-free.

Enter Jalen Milroe. The third-round pick out of Alabama deserved to go much higher in the 2025 NFL Draft and the dual-threat QB brings another element to the offense that Darnold simply doesn’t have. Milroe might technically be third on the depth chart right now, but he also feels like the most exciting quarterback on the roster at the moment. If Darnold doesn’t live up to expectations, then it feels like there’s a very real chance we could see Milroe get some starts around Week 10 or so.

Darnold got his bag, but this season will reveal if he can continue his resurgence like Baker Mayfield, or once again be resigned to a backup role.

It might not be fair to him, but Michael Penix Jr. starts this season on a very short leash. The Falcons decided to keep Kirk Cousins on the roster as a backup for a reason, and it sends a clear message that they’re ready to pivot if Penix can’t handle the job.

The few starts he made in 2024 were a mixed bag. At this point I don’t think anyone truly knows what Penix is as a quarterback. The one consistent was that his efficiency was not good enough to be a starting QB in 2025. A 58.1 completion percentage might have cut it in the league 10 years ago, but 60% is the baseline now, with high level QBs routinely completing over 65% of their passes.

There’s a silver lining here, and that’s a willingness by Penix to go deep. He had a ADOT of 10.1 yards in 2024, despite only having an average of 2.3 seconds in the pocket. That big play potential is what the Falcons need considering the receivers on their roster, but the pressure is still on for Penix to prove he can be the guy in Atlanta. If he can’t well, it wouldn’t be outside the realm of possibility that the Falcons go back to the well in 2026 in a deep QB draft.

It’s put up or shut up time for Trevor Lawrence. The risk at this point isn’t that he’ll be replaced, but rather than underperformance could lead to the Jaguars start to look elsewhere. In 2022 and 2023 he showed major promise that he could ascend into the top tier of NFL quarterbacks, but that was derailed in 2024.

Nothing has gone right since Lawrence joined the Jags. He’s been saddled with incompetent coaching and questionable weapons for the bulk of his career, but now with Brian Thomas Jr. being one of the best young receivers in the league, and the organization going big to secure Travis Hunter there aren’t any more excuses for Lawrence not to perform.

The pressure is real. It’s a different kind of pressure than the other players on this list, because he’s shown he can be an effective NFL starter. The question is whether or not he can live up to the monumental hype he entered the NFL with. 2025 will determine that.

We’re entering year seven of Kyler Murray in Arizona, and things have been solid, but unremarkable. This is a player who hasn’t truly looked “special” since his first two years with Kliff Kingsbury, as the Cardinals have been locked in a perpetual state of “decent,” but nothing more than that.

There aren’t many excuses left for Murray not taking that next step. He’s got weapons, the offensive line is easily good enough, and the defense has gotten much better in Arizona. It essentially comes down to decision making and maximizing players, which is where Murray has struggled. His 21 and 11 TD-to-INT ratio last season isn’t good enough with weapons like Trey McBride and Marvin Harrison Jr.

If this is another ho-hum season in Arizona then it’s probably time for the team to start looking elsewhere for it’s franchise QB. It’s not that Murray is bad, he just looks miscast in what this organization is trying to do on offense.

This is an odd one, because Tua is the perfect Mike McDaniel quarterback … when healthy. It’s that caveat that gives everything in Miami pause. Being injury prone and having concussions problems isn’t Tua’s fault, but there’s simply no way for the Dolphins to move forward effectively with uncertainty at quarterback.

That puts an immense amount of pressure on Tagovailoa this season. There’s an inherent knowledge that any big hit could end his season, and if that happens again in 2025 it might be the end of his career. If there’s any hope of salvaging the Mike McDaniel era it requires having a reliable player under center, and because of the injury worries Tua just isn’t reliable.

Even if he has a stellar season there’s always going to be that risk, which could lead the Dolphins to look for a quarterback in the 2026 draft, just to have in case.

Being the quarterback of the Dallas Cowboys is the highest-pressure job, at the highest-pressure position in football. There’s a constant expectation of brilliance, and last year was just bad for Prescott. Even prior to being hurt he struggled by throwing eight interceptions in eight games, leading the team to a 3-5 record.

Everything went wrong for the ‘Boys in 2024, and there’s not a massive deal of hope in 2025 — especially if Micah Parsons isn’t on the roster when the dust settles. That will weaken the defense so significantly that more pressure will be put on Prescott to take over games from the QB position, which isn’t the best recipe for success.

There’s a sense of a full rebuild looming in Dallas, it’s just a question of when that happens. A bad season from Prescott might accelerate that reality.

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