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NFL Honors: Saquon Barkley wins Offensive Player of the Year, while Jayden Daniels is top rookie

frank schwab
Senior writer
·5-min read

NEW ORLEANS — Saquon Barkley couldn't make NFL Honors on Thursday night to accept his Offensive Player of the Year award. He has a game to play Sunday.

Barkley's monster first teason with the Philadelphia Eagles, which will end in Super Bowl LIX on Sunday, now includes the award for the top offensive player in the NFL. Barkley was one of the big winners at NFL Honors on Thursday, the league's annual awards show.

Offensive Player of the Year is becoming the top non-quarterback award, and there wasn't much question who would win it.

Barkley rushed for 2,005 yards this season, turning in one of the all-time great seasons a running back ever had in NFL history. He became the sixth straight running back or receiver to win the OPOY award.

Barkley signed with the Eagles as a free agent this offseason after six seasons with the New York Giants. With every 100-yard game for Barkley — there were 14 of them, counting playoffs, including a 255-yard game in Week 12 against the Los Angeles Rams — the Giants' decision to not sign Barkley to a long-term deal before he hit free agency looked even worse.

Barkley got 35 first-place votes. Lamar Jackson, who finished second, got 12 first-place votes. Derrick Henry, Josh Allen and Joe Burrow got one first-place vote each.

When none of the NFL's elite pass rushers had a big season, it opened up the door for Surtain to take the league's top defensive award.

Surtain, who was phenomenal in coverage all season for a Broncos team that made the playoffs for the first time since the 2015 season, won his first career DPOY award.

Surtain is just the second corner cornerback to win DPOY since 2009, joining Stephon Gilmore in 2019.

"This is a surreal feeling honestly," Surtain said backstage after receiving his award. "This is something I worked for this offseason, I manifested it, and it's a dream come true."

Surtain won comfortably but eight different players got first-place votes. Surtain got 26, Trey Hendrickson was second with 11, Myles Garrett got five, T.J. Watt got three, Zack Baun got two and one each went to Kerby Joseph, Andrew Van Ginkel and Jonathan Greenard.

Daniels had big moment after big moment as a rookie while he transformed a Commanders franchise.

Daniels announced to the NFL world he had arrived when he completed 21-of-23 passes for 254 yards in a 38-33 upset win over the Cincinnati Bengals on Monday Night Football in Week 3. Daniels also had a Hail Mary touchdown to beat the Chicago Bears with no time on the clock, threw five touchdowns including one with six seconds left to beat the eventual NFC champion Philadelphia Eagles and led playoff wins over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Detroit Lions.

Daniels had 3,568 passing yards, 891 rushing yards and even though other rookies like Caleb Williams and Bo Nix had promising rookie seasons, there was no doubt who was the NFL's top rookie. He was asked what allowed him to have so much success right away.

“I just think my coaching staff and the whole organization making it as comfortable for me to just allow me to be myself,” Daniels said.

Daniels got 49 of 50 first-place votes, with the other going to Las Vegas Raiders tight end Brock Bowers.

Verse was the 19th pick of the draft and helped the Rams move to their next phase on defense after Aaron Donald's retirement. Verse had 66 tackles and 4.5 sacks.

He's the first Rams Defensive Rookie of the Year since Donald in 2014.

Verse got 37 first-place votes, Eagles cornerback Quinyon Mitchell got seven and four other players got one each.

Burrow's 2023 season ended with a wrist injury but he came back strong. He was an MVP finalist and led the NFL in passing yards and touchdowns.

Burrow also won Comeback Player of the Year in 2021 when he returned from a torn ACL.

The Vikings weren't expected to be playoff contenders this season, then lost first-round pick J.J. McCarthy to a season-ending knee injury in December. But the Vikings went 14-3 with Sam Darnold having a resurgent season at quarterback, and O'Connell was rewarded with the NFL Coach of the Year. O'Connell has a 34-17 record over his three seasons as Vikings coach.

It was a close vote. O'Connell got 25 first-place votes, Detroit Lions coach Dan Campbell finished second and got 19 first-place votes, Andy Reid of the Kansas City Chiefs got four votes and Denver Broncos' Sean Payton and Washington Commanders' Dan Quinn got one each.

Lamar Jackson was the first-team All-Pro quarterback but the same 50 voters selected Allen over Jackson as the MVP. It's Allen's first MVP award after he had a stellar season with the Bills. It was one of the closest MVP votes in many years, with Allen getting 27 first-place votes to 23 for Jackson.

Armstead, who spent the first nine seasons of his career with the 49ers before joining the Jaguars last offseason, won the NFL's award for community service. In 2019, he established the Armstead Academic Project (AAP), which has a focus on improving literacy rates.