The NFL MVP race is coming down to the wire. With three weeks remaining, there’s a real conversation to be had about who will take home the prize. Josh Allen is widely considered the favorite after locking up a division title in November and putting together massive back-to-back performances, but there’s a reasonable argument to be made for Lamar Jackson, who lit up the Giants on Sunday. Oh, and while he didn’t have an enormous day against the Steelers, Saquon Barkley has played a critical role in Philly’s 10-game winning streak and has a chance to challenge single-season rushing records down the stretch.

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With the two quarterbacks atop the race having had huge games Sunday, it is a good time to check in with the leaders and break down what needs to happen for them to claim the crown. The conversation has to start with Allen, who broke down the Lions and accounted for 430 yards and four touchdowns in the win over a team many believe to be the league’s best:

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Who’s Barnwell’s MVP pick?

Josh Allen, QB, Buffalo Bills

What he did Sunday: 23-of-34 for 362 passing yards with two touchdowns; 11 carries for 68 rushing yards and two rushing touchdowns in a 48-42 win over the Lions

MVP odds, via ESPN BET: -900

While the final score suggests this was a close game, Allen’s performance set a pace that even the mighty Lions couldn’t match. The Bills started the game with three straight touchdown drives, missed a field goal, went to halftime and then added another touchdown after the break. The Lions forced no turnovers and just one punt all game, as Buffalo racked up a whopping 559 net yards of offense. Much of that came either from Allen or was a product of the threat Allen posed.

It’s both understandable and quite clear that Allen already had the Lions concerned before the game even started. Since the Lions lost both edge rushers Marcus Davenport and Aidan Hutchinson to season-ending injuries by mid-October, defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn has survived by ramping up his team’s blitz rate and relying heavily on man-to-man coverage. Since Week 7, the Lions had blitzed on a league-high 41% of opposing dropbacks and played man coverage 57% of the time, trailing only the Chiefs. That’s a high-wire act. Given their injuries and the talent they have in the secondary, though, it’s a choice Glenn and the Lions had to make.

Allen is a nightmare matchup for that combination. One of his most underrated strengths is avoiding sacks, something he does as well as any other passer. He is able to extend plays and either run for positive yardage or get the ball out of bounds safely. And while defenses might like playing man coverage to lock down a Buffalo receiving corps without a true No. 1 wideout, turning their backs in man coverage opens up opportunities for Allen to scramble. He was coming off a game in which he racked up 76 yards on four scrambles against the Rams, and while defenses can theoretically try to play man with a dedicated spy on him, there aren’t many human beings on the planet who can handle those duties.

On the first three drives, Glenn tried throwing his changeup. The Lions blitzed on only 25% of Allen’s dropbacks and played man 33% of the time. They dropped seven and even eight into coverage and hoped they could either hold up and force an incompletion or get the Bills behind schedule.

To further the metaphor, Allen crushed the changeups for three home runs, leading 73-, 78- and 80-yard touchdown drives while facing all of two third downs in the process. The injury-riddled Lions pass rush had no hope of getting to Allen, who extended play after play before eventually finding an open receiver for a big gain. He hit receiving back Ty Johnson for three different receptions of 24 yards or more and James Cook for a 28-yard completion.

Offensive coordinator Joe Brady’s game plan seemed to be hell-bent on stretching Detroit’s linebackers in space and torturing them with eye candy before forcing them to run. The Bills repeatedly pulled guards and tackles, both for run concepts and to move defenders on play-action. Of Allen’s 362 passing yards, 251 came on throws to running backs and tight ends, the most any quarterback has had throwing to backs and tight ends in a game this season and 61 more than Allen had ever had in a pro game.

When Allen scored his second touchdown of the first quarter, the Bills ran a dart read concept, where the quarterback reads a defender on the end of the line of scrimmage and left tackle Dion Dawkins pulls across the formation. The only problem on the play for Buffalo is that so many front seven defenders scattered to the wind to cover potential receivers and ball carriers that Dawkins didn’t have anybody to block and sort of sheepishly watched an untouched Allen waltz into the end zone:

.@JoshAllenQB making it look easy.

📺: @paramountplus & @NFLonCBS#BUFvsDET | #ProBowlVote pic.twitter.com/w0b0qqLiKS

— Buffalo Bills (@BuffaloBills) December 15, 2024

The Lions turned up the blitzes after that point, but they never found a solution that reliably worked. Allen finished 14-of-18 for 202 yards and two touchdowns against man coverage, aided in part by the injury-enforced departures of cornerback Carlton Davis and defensive tackle Alim McNeill, who could miss the rest of the season. Allen was 9-of-13 for 134 yards and two scores against the blitz. He carried the ball 10 times for 69 yards, and eight were successful in terms of adding expected points added (EPA).

Cook hit a 41-yard touchdown run on a long trap early in the game, and when the Bills needed a first down later, they ran the same concept but instead had Allen read the defensive end on the weakside of the play and keep it for a 21-yard run. There might still be linebackers and defensive linemen running around on the field in Detroit, chasing ghosts, totally unaware that the game is over.

The Lions have thrived by making life difficult and pressuring quarterbacks. Allen has simply been impervious to pressure this season. Detroit didn’t sack him once in 38 tries, dropping his sack rate to an absurd 2.7%, in a virtual tie with Derek Carr of the Saints for the lowest in football. Just 9.2% of pressures on Allen even turn into sacks, which is the lowest rate and the best mark any quarterback has produced in a single season over the past decade. And while most Carr pressures turn into throwaways or incompletions, Allen can produce big plays under pressure with his arm and legs.

That has led to one of the more stunning numbers I can share about a quarterback this season. As you can probably guess, most quarterbacks have their performances collapse under pressure. Leaguewide, passers have collectively posted a 67.3 QBR without pressure and a 32.8 QBR under duress this season, with their performance dropping off by 34.5 points of QBR. (Remember that Total QBR includes both sacks and scrambles.)

Allen, somehow, has been better under pressure than he has without it. He has posted a staggering 89.1 QBR under pressure; just two other starting quarterbacks have posted a QBR better than 62 against pressure, and neither is within 16 points of Allen. He’s averaging 7.8 yards per attempt and has thrown 10 touchdown passes without a single interception against pressure. Some quarterbacks can’t do that against air.

That 89.1 QBR is the best anyone has ever posted under pressure in a single season by a considerable margin going back through 2009, when ESPN started to track pressure data. It’s probably telling that the guy he’s beating who previously had the single-season mark for QBR under pressure is … Josh Allen, who posted a 77.7 QBR mark against pressure two seasons ago. We’re seeing an even more impressive version of Allen in terms of mitigating pressure and avoiding the sorts of negative plays that sink drives for other teams.

For much of the season, that high floor was driving Allen’s success, even if we more commonly associate him with highlight-reel plays. He still had a few of those, but he was generating value by avoiding sacks and interceptions, having made it through the first seven weeks of 2024 without throwing one. The picks eventually came, with five over a four-game span between October and November, but he still did enough to win all four of those games.

What was missing instead were the chain-movers for first downs, the stuff between the checkdowns and the big gains. Before the Rams game, Allen ranked 14th in yards per attempt and 12th in yards per completion, figures we don’t typically expect for a player with Allen’s explosiveness. Just 34.8% of his pass attempts were turning into first downs, which ranked 19th. He was running the sixth-highest off-target rate of any quarterback, which can be a product of throwing the ball away into safe places, but the Allen we think of when we picture the superstar quarterback isn’t middle-of-the-pack when he throws the ball.

After the past two weeks, those numbers are on the move. Allen is up to eighth in yards per attempt (8.0), and when factoring in his sack avoidance, he is third in yards per dropback (7.7), trailing only Jackson and Jordan Love. He’s now seventh in yards per completion (12.3), although he is still somehow only 13th in first down rate (35.8%). That figure isn’t as concerning if the first downs he produces are generating huge gains, which has been the case for Allen; he’s tied for the league lead alongside Sam Darnold with 52 gains of 20 yards or more. And he’s back on the turnover-free track, having gone three games without an interception or lost fumble.

The soft factors also favor Allen. His team has already clinched a division title and has a shot at the best record in the AFC and a first-round bye, especially if Patrick Mahomes is sidelined for any length of the time by the high ankle sprain he suffered Sunday. Allen has a signature moment in a key game, with his fourth-and-2 scramble to score and seal up Buffalo’s victory over the previously undefeated Chiefs two weeks ago. Blowing out the Lions gives him another signature win. Barkley has to battle the running back stigma, while Jackson already has two awards and is the reigning champ. If Allen continues to star in Buffalo victories down the stretch, he’s going to win this award.

Lamar Jackson, QB, Baltimore Ravens

What he did Sunday: 21-of-25 for 290 passing yards with five touchdowns; six carries for 65 rushing yards in a 35-14 win over the Giants

MVP odds, via ESPN BET: +650

Jackson fumbled at the end of a 15-yard run on the second snap from scrimmage, handing the Giants the football. If it felt like the opening for the heavily favored Ravens to lose in the same way they fell to the Raiders earlier this season, well, Jackson closed that door quickly. Baltimore punted on its next possession before rolling off five straight touchdown drives, four of which went for 75 yards or longer. After it went 97 yards in nine plays to go up 35-7 in the fourth quarter, coach John Harbaugh gave his quarterback the rest of the game off.

While the Giants are competing for the No. 1 pick, what Jackson did to a team that has one of the league’s highest sack rates was uncommonly spectacular. He posted the highest completion percentage (84%) and yards per attempt (11.6) marks of any passer against New York this season. He threw five touchdown passes when no other quarterback had topped two in a single game against this defense.

Jackson also did all that amid quiet games from his two top playmakers. Derrick Henry ran for 67 yards and didn’t have a catch. Zay Flowers finished with six catches and 53 yards. Jackson’s passes went to four different players, with Justice Hill and Devontez Walker among those catching scores. He converted eight of the 10 third downs he faced and nearly outran Henry on six carries. The fumble was the only blemish on what was close to an otherwise perfect day for the two-time MVP.

Sunday was another example of a reality some people refuse to admit: Jackson has become the NFL’s most devastating downfield passer. He was 7-of-9 for 155 yards with four touchdowns and a perfect QBR on throws traveling 10 or more yards in the air on Sunday. Across the entirety of the season, his 95.7 QBR on those throws leads all full-season starters, in part because the 2016 Heisman Trophy winner has 16 touchdowns and one interception on those throws.

Jackson’s footwork and arm strength have always been underrated, but under coordinator Todd Monken, his mechanics have gotten that much more consistent and allowed him to make just about every single kind of throw imaginable this season. He worked the back line of the end zone with a pair of touchdown passes Sunday, with the throw to Rashod Bateman for his second score as my favorite of the day. This looks easy because he’s capable of getting the velocity needed on the football to split two zone defenders and anticipates the opening quickly enough to get the ball out before the Giants’ defense can close down the space:

ANOTHER TOUCHDOWN!!!@Lj_Era8 find @R_bateman2 for his second TD of the day!!! Tune in now on CBS and @paramountplus!! pic.twitter.com/lzcQoFHIN3

— Baltimore Ravens (@Ravens) December 15, 2024

It might not be a surprise that Jackson leads the league in QBR on throws from outside the pocket. What might be surprising, given the long-standing book on how to slow him down, is what he’s doing inside of it. His 75.2 QBR on pass plays from inside the pocket ranks No. 1 this season. Even last season, in his second MVP campaign, he ranked 13th in QBR on throws inside the pocket.

In fact, by just about every passing metric, Jackson is having a much better season than last year. His QBR has jumped from 65.6 to 76.0. He’s up from 8.0 yards per attempt in 2023 to 8.9 yards per attempt in 2024. His touchdown-to-interception ratio, a solid 24-to-7 a year ago, is a ridiculous 34-to-3 this season. His sack rate is down from 6.6% to 4.6%. And while it isn’t quite at the historic rates we saw earlier this season, he’s converting more than 41% of his attempts into first downs, up from 36.5% last season and second in the NFL behind Jared Goff.

So, with Jackson playing better than he did in a season in which he won 49 of 50 votes a year ago, why is he comfortably second to Allen in the MVP race? The factors that hurt Allen in the race between these two a year ago are instead hurting Jackson this time around. Allen’s team wasn’t leading its division for most of the season and spent the vast majority of the season in the wild-card picture before getting hot late and eventually clinching the AFC East in Week 18. Jackson’s Ravens have spent virtually all of 2024 behind the Steelers in the AFC North, and it’s tough for a quarterback who doesn’t win his division to win the MVP.

Jackson derailed Brock Purdy as a candidate and became the overwhelming favorite to win the MVP when the Ravens blew out the 49ers in prime time on Christmas night a year ago. In that game, Purdy threw four picks and Jackson went 23-of-32 for 252 yards with two scores and no turnovers. This season, it’s Allen who has had the big games against the best teams, as he led the Bills to wins over the previously undefeated Chiefs and oft-dominant Lions.

The same concerns that surround Jackson when the Ravens have struggled against top-tier competition in the playoffs have grown to impact his regular-season expectations, too. Jackson has had great games against the 49ers and Chiefs in the past and even outplayed Allen when the Ravens blew out the Bills earlier this season. When he struggled in a loss to the Steelers and wasn’t able to consistently move the ball in the pre-bye loss to the Eagles, though, that perception of him beating up on weaker teams and coming up short against great ones was only reinforced. I’m not sure this performance against the Giants, as incredible as it was, is likely to sway voters accordingly.

If Jackson does this next week at home against the Steelers, it would be much tougher to ignore his case. If the Ravens win out, they can reclaim the AFC North with a victory over the Steelers and another Pittsburgh loss to either the Chiefs or Bengals. A dramatic finish from Jackson and some impressive numbers would have to open up his candidacy. There’s a realistic chance he finishes with 4,000 passing yards, 40 touchdowns and less than 10 interceptions. There have been only six other instances of a quarterback accomplishing that feat in league history, and five of those six seasons resulted in an MVP award.

Despite what Lions fans chanted early in Sunday’s game, it’s tough to see Goff or any other quarterback getting into the MVP conversation, which would leave the race between Jackson and Allen for the second consecutive season. This season, though, there’s a player with the potential to set multiple records still in the race with three games to go.

Saquon Barkley, RB, Philadelphia Eagles

What he did Sunday: 19 carries for 65 rushing yards; two catches for nine receiving yards in a 27-13 win over the Steelers

MVP odds, via ESPN BET: +1500

While Allen and Jackson posted monster games Sunday, Barkley’s performance was far quieter. He was mostly bottled up by the Steelers, as his streak of games with 100-plus rushing yards ended at four. He averaged just 3.4 yards per carry, posted a 31.6% success rate on the ground and generated minus-19 Rush Yards over Expectation (RYOE). There’s no questioning it set back his MVP candidacy, especially amid the competition posting huge games.

Did the Steelers sell out to stop Barkley? Not at first glance. Pittsburgh is typically the second-heaviest single-high coverage defense of any team, but it actually played two-high shells on 45% of Jalen Hurts‘ dropbacks, up from 35% during the rest of the season. The Steelers certainly felt a need to try to confuse the Eagles on offense, as they disguised their coverages at more than double their usual rate. That can serve to both change the box counts on RPOs and affect where a quarterback looks to go with the ball if he has defined reads based on whether the middle of the field is closed (with one safety) or open (with two safeties).

When the Steelers played single-high coverage, Hurts picked them apart (though it wasn’t great news for Barkley). He went 13-of-16 for 179 yards against single-high shells. He used play-action on only four of his 32 pass attempts, going 4-of-4 for 30 yards with a touchdown, which means Philadelphia wasn’t as worried about Pittsburgh’s pass rush as most thought.

From Barkley’s perspective, this quiet game might be a blip. As it stands, he has separated from the rest of the running back pack over the past month. He is averaging 120.6 rushing yards per game. Derrick Henry is more than 15 yards behind his fellow free agent addition, and nobody else is topping 84 rushing yards per game. Barkley is 214 rush yards and 365 scrimmage yards ahead of Henry, who ranks second in both categories. There’s no serious conversation about any other backs here. Barring a collapse over the final three weeks of the season, Barkley should be the first-team All-Pro.

The advanced metrics are also fond of Barkley’s work. His 461 RYOE are 22 ahead of Henry and the most any running back has posted in a single season since NFL Next Gen Stats started modeling running back performance in 2018. The highlight-reel runs are what would propel him to a potential MVP, but he hasn’t strictly been a boom-or-bust runner, as his 44.2% success rate ranks seventh. The other two backs in the Eagles’ offense, Kenneth Gainwell and Will Shipley, have combined to post minus-5 RYOE and a 29.9% success rate. Barkley is unquestionably getting help from the gravity of Hurts as a ball carrier and an excellent offensive line, but he’s also been much better than his backups.

There are a few factors that could hurt his case. One is an argument I brought up in preferring Henry to Barkley during my awards columns earlier in the season, that Barkley had come up conspicuously short in some key moments. His drop against the Falcons on third down turned a play that would have ended the game into a field goal and an eventual Atlanta touchdown and victory. He fumbled away a ball untouched against the Jags for a defensive score, then later slid down prematurely on a play and failed to pick up a first down that gave Jacksonville a chance to try to win the game. Against the Browns, he wasn’t able to pick up a second-and-1 catch for a first down, then missed on a pass block to allow a sack on third down, with Cleveland blocking a field goal attempt on the next play for a defensive score. Those moments either happened early enough in the season for voters to forget or didn’t make enough of a difference to cost the Eagles a game, so I don’t think they’ll mean much in the actual voting.

Another is touchdowns. When backs have won this award in the modern era, they’ve often always needed to bring a gaudy touchdown total to the table. Marshall Faulk took 26 plays to the house in 2000. Shaun Alexander scored 28 times in 2005, and LaDainian Tomlinson followed with 31 the following season. Barkley is on pace for 16 scores, and that’s with an extra game to work with. Unless he goes on a touchdown-scoring spree to finish the season, he won’t separate from the pack there, which won’t help his chances.

The exception to that group was Adrian Peterson, the last back to win the MVP. He did so with a 13-touchdown season in 2012. Peterson also won in a season in which his team failed to win its division, another exception to league tradition; no player, quarterback or otherwise, has won the AP MVP award without winning his division since Peterson. The only other player over the past 20 years who won the award on a wild-card team was Peyton Manning in 2008.

Peterson won the award by carrying the Vikings to a playoff berth with one of the most impressive stretch runs we’ve ever seen. The future Hall of Famer had six different 150-plus rushing yard games in the final eight weeks of the season, including a 212-yard game in Week 15 and a 199-yarder in Week 17, with the latter propelling the Vikings into the postseason by beating the Packers. Green Bay won the postseason rematch the following week, but by then, the voters had already selected Peterson as MVP.

Peterson’s dramatic close to the season was enough to both top the 2,000-yard mark and come within shouting distance of Eric Dickerson‘s league record of 2,105 rushing yards, a mark that has stood since 1984. Henry is the only back to top 2,000 yards since then, but that wasn’t enough to earn the then-Titans star a single MVP vote in 2020. With an extra game to work with, 2,000 yards would be the bare minimum to get Barkley MVP consideration, but I’m not sure it would be enough to land him a significant number of votes.

The bar, then, has to be the record: 2,106 rushing yards. With another decade-plus between Peterson’s run at the crown and 2024, Dickerson has now held the single-season rushing record for 40 years. While there would be some portion of the electorate that would grumble about a player using 17 games to break a record set in 16, Barkley might have a realistic shot at winning MVP if he becomes the single-season rushing champion. If he can blow that number away and get to 2,200 yards, he’d have an even stronger case.

Who’s my pick to win NFL MVP?

With three games to go, Allen has done enough to convince me he should move ahead of Jackson, whom I had atop the MVP race at the season’s halfway point. While one of his two big performances in December happened in a loss, he has been the most spectacular player in the league over the past two weeks, adding another level to the ridiculously high floor he has sustained all season.

I would also say the race isn’t over. And while the odds might point toward Jackson as the candidate with the best shot of unseating Allen, I’d argue Barkley actually has a better chance. Barkley plays for a more successful team, doesn’t have the voter fatigue element of already winning multiple awards or the stigma of losing to the best teams, and he has the chance to do something nobody has seen in 40 years. If Allen doesn’t drive the hammer down and take the award away from Jackson with his play over the final three weeks of the season, Barkley might be able to beat Allen to the punch.