Who will win NFL MVP? Josh Allen leads power rankings after Week 1

Week 1 is over. Sixteen games are in the books. Ten NFL MVP candidates (and two honorable mentions) have emerged as contenders in the wide field.

With the 2026 NFL season finally underway, there's no better time to start making declarative statements about players and teams than now. Surely, nothing will change or evolve over the next 17 weeks, right?

USA TODAY Sports has compiled a list of the 10 players we believe got off to the hottest starts in the race to win the NFL MVP award after the season. Many are quarterbacks, given the trend of the last 13 straight MVPs coming from the position. A handful of early MVP hopefuls are running backs after a particularly run-heavy week to open the season.

After one week of action, here's how MVP power rankings look:

There was reason to doubt Allen heading into his Week 1 matchup with the Texans in Houston. The Bills had never beaten the Texans in the Josh Allen era. Houston boasted one of the NFL's best defenses last year, particularly against opposing passers. Buffalo didn't do enough to address its pass-catching group in the offseason. This writer even argued Allen would be among the…

Original source: https://www.usatoday.com/sports/