Two weeks into the 2026 NFL season, it feels almost rude to call this a race. Josh Allen has nine touchdowns and zero turnovers, leads every quarterback in the league in total EPA by nearly ten points, and just became the first player since a Hall of Famer scored 40 points in a single Thanksgiving game in 1929 to do what he did in a roughly one-week span. The man is rewriting the historical record books while half the league’s supposed contenders are posting negative expected points added. Let’s do the math, because the math here is genuinely absurd.
The Raw Numbers, Which Are Not Normal
Through two games, Allen has completed 40 of 65 passes for 582 yards, five passing touchdowns, zero interceptions, a 125.8 passer rating, and a yards-per-attempt of 9.7 that leads the entire NFL. He has also rushed 20 times for 92 yards and four touchdowns. Total: nine touchdowns, zero turnovers, 674 yards, a 2-0 record, and a team that is averaging 38.5 points per game and leads the NFL in total points (77), total team EPA (+48.07), and touchdowns (10).
For context, the next closest quarterback in total touchdowns sits at six. Not seven. Six. Allen has a 50% lead on the field through two weeks. If your entire case against Allen for MVP starts and ends with “well, it’s only two games,” you are correct, and also you should acknowledge that it is only two games and the man already has nine touchdowns.
His average depth of target has jumped from 7.8 yards in 2025 to 10.5 yards in 2026, and he has four touchdown passes on 16 deep-ball attempts (15-plus air yards). He is being asked to do more than he was a year ago. He is doing more than he was a year ago. Usually those two things do not line up this cleanly.
The EPA Breakdown (Where It Gets Nerdy, Stay With Me)
Expected Points Added is arguably the cleanest way to evaluate quarterback contribution because it strips out garbage-time noise and weights plays by their actual game-state impact. Here is where Allen sits through Week 2:
- Total passing EPA: +29.58 — first in the NFL
- EPA per passing attempt: +0.455 — second in the NFL behind Purdy’s +0.503
- Rushing EPA: +7.22 — first among all quarterbacks
- Combined passing + rushing EPA: approximately +36.80 — nearly ten points ahead of the nearest competitor
That nearest competitor in combined EPA is Brock Purdy, who sits at roughly +34.5. Purdy’s per-attempt passing efficiency (+0.503) does edge Allen, which we will address shortly in the Purdy section because it is the one legitimate statistical argument someone can make against Allen right now. The key word there is “one.”
Now look at the guys the national media keeps mentioning in the same sentence as Allen:
- Patrick Mahomes: +0.143 EPA per attempt, 9th in the NFL. Zero deep touchdowns on eight deep attempts. The Chiefs offense is currently Kenneth Walker III’s football team, and Mahomes is along for the ride.
- Lamar Jackson: +0.223 EPA per attempt, three total touchdowns, one interception, and a Week 2 loss to the Saints that ended on a game-ending interception. His Ravens are 1-1.
- Joe Burrow: Negative passing EPA. Literally negative. He has absorbed six sacks, thrown for only three touchdowns, added zero rushing scores, and the Bengals’ 2-0 record is being carried by their defense. That is not an MVP quarterback start. That is a quarterback whose team happens to be winning.
The Bills’ team EPA of +48.07 is not even close to the field. San Francisco is second at +31.48. Kansas City is third at +22.51. Buffalo is lapping the competition before Halloween.
Two Records That Required Reaching Back Almost a Century
This is the section where we acknowledge that the NFL has been played professionally since 1920 and Josh Allen just did something that had not happened in 97 years.
Ernie Nevers is a Hall of Fame fullback who, on November 28, 1929, scored 40 points in a single game — six rushing touchdowns and four extra points against the Chicago Bears. Approximately one week earlier, he had scored all of his team’s points in a win over the Dayton Triangles. In roughly a one-week span, Nevers accounted for nine-plus total touchdowns and four-plus rushing touchdowns. The record sat untouched for nearly a century, which makes sense because the feat requires a player to be simultaneously one of the best passers and one of the most dangerous ball-carriers in football at the same time, and that player archetype did not exist in the modern NFL at this level until Allen.
Allen matched Nevers’ roughly one-week span from September 13 to September 17, 2026. He is now the second player in 97 years to accomplish it.
The second record is even more staggering in some ways: Allen is the first player in NFL history — not since some guy in 1967, not since the merger, but in the entire recorded history of the sport — with five-plus passing touchdowns and four rushing touchdowns through the first two games of a season. The combination of aerial volume and ground dominance at that level to open a year is genuinely unprecedented. There is no historical comparison point because it has never happened.
And then there is the career record that people are sleeping on. Allen’s 2-yard rushing touchdown in the third quarter of the Lions game was his 83rd career rushing score. That tied Hall of Fame running back Jim Taylor for 18th place on the NFL’s all-time rushing touchdown list across all positions. Not the quarterback list. Not a positional leaderboard with an asterisk. The main one, where the names above him are running backs with names like Emmitt Smith and LaDainian Tomlinson. Allen also holds the NFL record with ten career games of two-plus passing touchdowns and two-plus rushing touchdowns. Steve Young is second on that list with four such games. Allen has 2.5 times as many as anyone who has ever played.
Week 1: A 96-Yard Drive and a 20-Year Drought Broken
The Bills had not won at Reliant Stadium in Houston since 2006. Twenty years. The game had seven lead changes, Allen was staring at a 31-30 deficit with 1:36 remaining, and the Bills needed to travel 96 yards to win.
He completed the drive in exactly 1:36 and finished it with a 34-yard touchdown strike to Joshua Palmer on third-and-11 — a throw that generated +4.59 EPA, the highest single-play value in the game. Palmer’s first catch of the game was a game-winning touchdown. Allen finished 20-of-29 for 334 yards with two passing and two rushing scores, a 130.5 passer rating, and a performance that included a 43-yard dime to DJ Moore with 18 seconds left in the first half that would have been the highlight of most quarterbacks’ weeks on its own.
It was a road win against a 2025 playoff team in a stadium Buffalo had not won in for two decades, won on the final drive. The first game of the season. File that away.
Week 2: First TD in the Building, Best Blitz-Beater in Football
The Bills opened their brand-new Highmark Stadium on a Thursday night against the Detroit Lions, and the narrative wrote itself when Allen scored the first touchdown in the building’s history — a 1-yard plunge following a 14-yard scramble just under six minutes into the game. He then threw a 43-yard deep ball to Palmer on third-and-11 later in the first quarter that generated +5.46 EPA, the highest single-play value of either game this season. Buffalo led 27-10 at halftime.
The Lions threw everything at Allen in this game. Detroit’s blitz rate was 55.3%, the third-highest Allen had faced over his last five seasons. This is a relevant detail because blitzing Allen has historically been a bad idea and apparently the Lions wanted to confirm that firsthand. Against the blitz in Week 2: 12-of-17 for 137 yards, two passing touchdowns, two rushing touchdowns, and two scrambles for ten yards. He was better under pressure than he was when given a clean pocket. The Bills scored on five of their first six possessions and converted nine of twelve third downs through the first two weeks combined, which is an efficiency rate that would make Shanahan blush.
The one notable injury from this game was DJ Moore, who suffered an AC joint sprain and is being monitored for Week 3. That is a real concern given Moore had five catches for 100 yards and a touchdown in Week 1. The good news is that Dalton Kincaid is third in the NFL with 225 receiving yards through two weeks and Joshua Palmer has two touchdowns on exactly two catches, both on critical third downs. The supporting cast is deeper than the Moore injury makes it look.
The Joe Brady Effect Is Real and Statistically Measurable
Sean McDermott is gone. Joe Brady — who called plays for Allen starting in mid-November of 2023 — is now the head coach and still calling plays, and the offensive identity shift is not subtle. The Seattle Seahawks lead the NFL with a 40.7% play-action rate; Buffalo sits at 21.2%, ranking 18th in the league. But it is the directional shift in Brady’s scheme that stands out: Allen’s average depth of target has jumped from 7.8 to 10.5 yards in a single offseason, and the percentage of pass attempts targeted at 20-plus air yards has climbed from 11.5% in 2025 to 16.7% in 2026.
Brady’s philosophy since taking over the play-calling duties has been documented: designed runs on 59% of first-down plays, up from 42% before his arrival. The run game creates the play-action. The play-action creates the deep shots. The deep shots create the touchdowns. It is a coherent system and Allen is running it at maximum efficiency. When asked about Brady, Allen said: “Brady is giving me the freedom to be aggressive.” The data confirms this is not a post-win quote designed to make the head coach feel good.
Brady also won the coin toss at the Highmark Stadium opener and took the ball rather than deferring, which is a small but telling signal about what kind of offense he wants to run and what kind of tone he wants to set. The Bills scored a touchdown on that opening drive.
The Purdy Problem (And Why It Is Not Actually a Problem)
Brock Purdy is the most legitimate statistical counterargument to Allen’s MVP candidacy right now, and he deserves to be taken seriously rather than dismissed. Through two weeks: 45-of-56 (80.4% completion rate), 492 passing yards, five passing touchdowns, one rushing touchdown, one interception, a 125.6 passer rating, and a per-attempt passing EPA of +0.503 — the best in the NFL. He has taken zero sacks. He is 2-0. The 49ers have outscored opponents 62-20 through two weeks.
The efficiency argument for Purdy is real. On a pure per-play basis, he has been marginally cleaner than Allen through the air. However, three things pull Allen ahead in the overall accounting. First, total production: Allen leads Purdy in total touchdowns (nine to six), total yards (674 to 551), and combined EPA (+36.80 to roughly +34.50). Second, degree of difficulty: Allen is throwing a deeper ball with a higher blitz rate, while Purdy benefits from Kyle Shanahan’s system architecture in a way that compresses the decision-making required. Third, the interception: Purdy has one, Allen has zero. In MVP voting, clean floors matter, and Allen’s floor through two games is spotless.
None of this is to diminish Purdy. If Allen gets hurt in Week 6, Purdy is going to sprint into the lead and this article will age poorly. But right now, based on the evidence available, Allen is the clear answer.
The Betting Market Is Saying the Quiet Part Out Loud
Sportsbook consensus has Allen at +250 (approximately 28.6% implied probability), which is two to three times higher than the nearest competitor. The Kalshi prediction market has him at roughly 25%. This is the widest early-season gap in MVP implied probability since Mahomes opened 2022.
For reference, Mahomes — who is somehow still in the national conversation — is sitting at +180 on some books, but his actual on-field production through two weeks is ninth in the NFL by EPA per attempt and he has zero deep touchdowns. The Mahomes MVP candidacy right now is almost entirely narrative-driven, which is fine, narratives are real, but narratives do not score touchdowns. Jackson is at +650 to +738 depending on the book. Burrow is at +900, which tracks for a quarterback with negative passing EPA.
The market is essentially pricing in Allen as the only player who has meaningfully separated himself from the field. The math agrees with the market.
The Real Tests Are Still Ahead
The honest version of this analysis has to acknowledge what comes next. Weeks 3 and 4 are against the Chargers (0-2) and Patriots (0-2) respectively. Those are the kinds of games where a quarterback can stack up numbers against soft competition and have it mean very little when December arrives. Allen’s statistical totals will climb in those games, but the MVP story will not truly be written until Weeks 9 through 11, when the Bills face Baltimore on the road, Minnesota at home, and Kansas City on Thanksgiving.
There is also the sack concern. Allen absorbed a career-high 40 sacks in 2025, which contributed to his sliding to third in MVP voting despite solid numbers. He has already taken four sacks through two games in 2026. If that rate holds, he is on pace for 32 sacks this season, which is an improvement but not a solved problem. And DJ Moore’s health bears watching, because losing a weapon of that caliber changes what defenses have to account for.
But here is the thing about sustainability concerns in early October: they are relevant and worth tracking, and they are also being applied to a man who just posted the greatest two-game statistical opening in quarterback history. You can hold both thoughts simultaneously. The schedule concerns are real and the early production is historically unprecedented.
The Verdict
Josh Allen is the NFL MVP frontrunner, and it is not particularly close. He leads the league in total touchdowns by 50%, leads all quarterbacks in combined passing and rushing EPA by nearly ten points, has set two NFL records that required reaching back 97 years for historical context, and is doing it in a new offensive system that is actively asking more of him than any previous scheme. His team leads the NFL in points scored, total team EPA, and touchdowns.
The counterarguments — Purdy’s efficiency, Mahomes’ narrative equity, the soft early schedule — are real enough to engage with and not strong enough to overturn the case. Two games is a small sample. Nine touchdowns and zero turnovers with a +36.80 combined EPA is not a small number regardless of the sample size. The historical record books do not lie, and right now they are being rewritten in Buffalo.
The MVP race will be decided somewhere between Baltimore in November and Kansas City on Thanksgiving. Between now and then, you are watching the most statistically dominant opening two weeks any dual-threat quarterback has ever produced. That is worth documenting, even if the award is still seventeen weeks away.