The Backup Bowl: Seven Stand-In Quarterbacks Will Start Across the NFL in Week 9

There is a strange feeling around the NFL this weekend, and it starts under center. Seven teams will send out a quarterback who was not their starter when the season began, and the list reads like a roll call of everything that can go wrong at the most important position in the sport.

It started on Thursday night, when the Baltimore Ravens turned to Joe Fagnano, a third-string rookie, against Jacksonville. Lamar Jackson and Tyler Huntley were both out, and Fagnano made his first NFL start in a 33-10 loss that left the Ravens at 4-5 and drifting. The Jaguars, for their part, barely had to break sweat.

From there, the weekend only gets stranger. In Seattle, Drew Lock will start against Arizona after Sam Darnold was ruled out with quadriceps and rib injuries, and Lock himself has been nursing an elbow problem for weeks. He has been cleared, but he was the emergency third quarterback two games ago. That is the kind of sentence that tells you everything about where the Seahawks are right now.

The Cardinals, meanwhile, made their change on purpose. Gardner Minshew replaced Jacoby Brissett, sparked four touchdown drives against Dallas, and earned the job on merit rather than by default. He will start the return fixture in Seattle, which gives Sunday's game the odd distinction of featuring two backups, neither of whom began the season expecting to play.

In New York, the Giants will start J.J. McCarthy for the second time after Jaxson Dart was lost for the season. McCarthy won his first start before the bye, and he now walks into Philadelphia, where the Eagles are on their fourth quarterback of the year. Jalen Hurts is on injured reserve, Tanner McKee lost three straight starts and was benched, and Joe Milton — signed off the Dallas practice squad in the middle of October — gets the ball against the team that just beat his new one.

Minnesota's story is quieter but no less disruptive. Kyler Murray is out with a hamstring strain, week to week, and Carson Wentz steps in for a 6-1 Vikings team heading to Buffalo on Monday night. Wentz has already won in relief this season, throwing three touchdowns after Murray was hurt in the opener, so the Vikings are not panicking. But a team that good does not want to be finding out how good its backup is in November.

And then there is Cleveland. Shedeur Sanders will start at New Orleans on Sunday, confirmed by head coach Todd Monken on Friday, with Deshaun Watson still in the concussion protocol after a helmet-to-helmet hit in Pittsburgh. Watson returned to practice on Friday and is listed as questionable, but the Browns prepared Sanders with the first team all week, and Monken made the call. Sanders has thrown three passes all season. All three were complete. None of them went anywhere.

Seven backups, seven different stories, one weekend. Some of them are injury replacements, some are performance decisions, and one or two are plain acts of desperation. The betting markets have noticed, with lines swinging by double digits in some games, and the league has noticed too, because this is what a season looks like when the quarterback position starts to break down all at once.

Most of these men will be back on the bench within a fortnight. This weekend, though, the NFL belongs to them.