NFL World: Lamar Jackson is the best player on the planet

Ravens’ two-time MVP Lamar Jackson is being recognized as not one of the best, but the best

Following Monday, there was a great disturbance in the Force. As if millions of voices cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced. For no pundit, no stan, no critic could deny what Lamar Jackson has become: the greatest football player on the planet.

Jackson and the Baltimore Ravens’ offense eviscerated the the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ defense with 41 points. When the game ended, the offense finished with 41 points, Jackson became the betting favorite to win League MVP for a third time and he’s on a mission. Here’s what the NFL World had to say about him.

Colin Cowherd: “Lamar Jackson’s going to win MVP. Lamar Jackson right now is the best football player on the planet, not Patrick Mahomes. …On Monday Night Football he has 20 touchdowns and no picks. [On Monday] he has five touchdowns, no picks. The thing about Lamar Jackson that I was really noticing, they finally have given him Zay Flowers, they finally have weapons for him. I don’t know if anybody sees the field [like Jackson]. And I thought about this watching Lamar. A lot of times with young quarterbacks, a Justin Fields or a Zach Wilson, they have gifts. They move well, they have good arms. But they just don’t see the field. Is it anxiety? Is it a fear of getting hit, where they get tunnel vision? Whatever it is, the ability for Lamar Jackson to sit in the pocket and be able to see sideline to sideline. It’s like he’s always throwing to the right person.”

The Athletic’s Jeff Zrebiec: “All told, Jackson accounted for 333 total yards, had as many incompletions as touchdown passes and could have had an even more impressive statline had his second-quarter touchdown run not been nullified by a penalty. Yet, the most impressive thing Jackson may have done Monday was steadying the Ravens after a rocky start that featured breakdowns, penalties and two straight Buccaneers scoring drives.”

ESPN’s Ben Solak: “Vaulting Jackson into Mahomes’ air is a silly thing to do because Mahomes is the most talented quarterback to walk the Earth. But I’m going to do it anyway. And it’s not about stats, though Jackson is posting some preposterous numbers. It’s about gravity. We know what it is when a star player walks onto a field, court or pitch. They create new circumstances for their offenses, environments that can be neither replicated with similar players nor reproduced in the aggregate. They force defenses, who have drilled techniques, strategies and schemes for months, to play a slightly different version of the sport they’ve prepared to play — just different enough to break the math, destroy the scheme and negate the technique. Jackson has gravity.”

The Baltimore Sun’s Brian Wacker: “The Ravens have the best offense in the NFL led by perhaps the best player in the NFL. Coach John Harbaugh said last week that Lamar Jackson is playing the best football of his career, and he’s not wrong. Jackson was in total command. Even when Baltimore fell behind 10-0, he was unbothered and shredded Tampa Bay’s secondary.”

SB Nation’s Mark Schofield: “Lamar Jackson is playing some of the best football of his career right now. At first blush that statement might seem outlandish. After all, we are talking about a quarterback coming off his second MVP season, which he won a year ago when he secured 49 out of 50 first-place votes. That fell one first-place vote shy of making Jackson one of the rare “unanimous” MVP winners, a feat he did manage to accomplish back in 2019. … But right now Jackson, a two-time MVP and one of only two players — the other being Tom Brady — to win the award unanimously, is playing the best football of his career. That should terrify the rest of the NFL.”

Good Morning Football’s Kyle Brandt: “He is playing so well right now as a pure passer. I’ve never seen Lamar play this well as a passer. He threw five touchdowns last night! He has the most games with five-plus touchdown passes [and five or fewer incompletions]. I don’t see Drew Brees, Peyton Manning, Tom Brady or Ben Roethlisberger doing any of the other things Lamar can do. So when he’s — he’s got [one more] than them! Tom Brady, Peyton Manning, Lamar is looking down on them. Those are pure pocket guys, maybe with the exception of Roethlisberger, who was a scrambler. When he’s doing that type of stuff, forget about it, you’re not keeping him under 30, you’re probably not keeping them under 40. …It’s not just that he has Henry now, it’s that he’s his best game himself. I think he was playing better than he did last year as MVP. I really do.”