AFC North QB power rankings: Deshaun Watson needs to step it up in 2024

The AFC North is a gauntlet. All four teams finished the 2024 season with winning records and three made it to the playoffs. The head coaches were quite difficult to rank so now let's take it another step further and rank the quarterbacks.

Unfortunately, the Cleveland Browns are in a division where they have to play Joe Burrow and Lamar Jackson twice a year. Those guys also make it difficult for the Browns to win the division and that's why the front office was so aggressive in trading for Deshaun Watson two years ago.

Watson has not lived up to the billing so far, playing in just 12 games since joining the Browns two years ago. Meanwhile, the Bengals have reached two AFC Championship Games under Joe Burrow, and the Ravens made it to the AFC title game this past season under Lamar Jackson and he was named MVP.

There's also the Steelers, who have been trying to find their next franchise quarterback since Ben Roethlisberger retired. They don't expect Russell Wilson to be that guy but he was brought in to help them compete and not blow games.

With all of that said, let's rank the quarterbacks in the AFC North from worst to first.

4. Russell Wilson

When the Seahawks traded Wilson to the Broncos, many thought it'd be a nice reset for Denver, who had struggled to find a consistent signal-caller following Peyton Manning's retirement in 2016. Wilson was awful in his first year with the Broncos and while he had a decent year in 2023, he's clearly not the same guy he was in Seattle.

The Steelers brought Wilson in to help keep their offense afloat and he might be able to help them avoid a losing season but likely won't do much beyond that.

3. Deshaun Watson

The Browns swung for the fences two years by trading for Watson and giving him a ridiculously expensive contract right off the bat, especially with the sexual assault charges against him. So far, the trade hasn't looked good with Watson starting just 12 games in two seasons and not looking like the same guy he was in Houston.

This team is talented enough to do great things but their 2024 season hinges on what version of Watson is going to show up. Will it be the guy who led the Texans to division titles and playoff appearances or the one who has underwhelmed in Cleveland?

2. Lamar Jackson

Numbers one and two were really hard to rank and I'd hear arguments for flipping these two but I went with Lamar Jackson in the second spot. Jackson is a two-time MVP winner but something he doesn't have to his name is playoff success, something that Joe Burrow has had.

Let's stay focused on Jackson though. The former first-rounder out of Louisville is a dual-threat quarterback with the ability to crush teams in the passing game or dominate them on the ground. This makes him incredibly difficult to plan for and is why he's been a two-time MVP winner. He rushed for over 800 yards last season and found the end zone with his legs five times if that's any indication of how difficult he is to stop.

If Jackson can get over the playoff hump and lead the Ravens to a Super Bowl appearance, maybe he can move up here but right now, two seems like a good ranking for him.

1. Joe Burrow

The Bengals had the worst record in the 2019 season, which gave them the right to draft Burrow with the number one overall pick in the 2020 draft. In the two seasons where Burrow has been healthy and played a full season, the Bengals have made it to at least the AFC Championship Game.

The problem is that Burrow has struggled to stay healthy, missing chunks of the 2020 and 2023 seasons due to injuries. Lamar Jackson has also been injury-prone during his career though so that canceled out for those two.

The argument Burrow has over Jackson despite playing in two fewer seasons and landing zero MVP awards to Jackson's two is that he has the playoff wins. In just four seasons, Burrow has gone 5-2 in the postseason compared to Jackson's 2-4 record. That's the tiebreaker I used to determine who got first place in these rankings.