A month after the 2026 UFL season ended, the dead period has Dallas Renegades fans wanting more football in the spring and looking forward to the 2027 campaign.
It wasn’t the ending to the year the Renegades wanted after a fiery 3-0 start, which ended with a 4-6 record. They might have won the last game of the season against the St. Louis Battlehawks, but it left fans with more questions than ever.
So far this offseason, the Renegades have lost just two players to the NFL, with quarterbacks Austin Reed and Luke Lehnen still on the roster. It does raise the question of whether both quarterbacks stick around in 2027, should there be a legitimate competition at the position.
Potential QB competition with the Dallas Renegades in 2027?
Renegades head coach Rick Neuheisel made it clear that he wanted Reed to start from Week 1 of the regular season. Reed showed a lot of promise in his first season after breaking the UFL record for passing yards in a game in that first week. He finished the season with 1,923 yards, 21 touchdowns, and nine interceptions, completing 56.3% of his passes in 10 games.
Lehnen never really had a chance to win the job, and it took a bit for him to even become the backup after the Luis Perez trade, as Greg Ward Jr. got QB snaps over him before finally earning the backup job. At the end of the season, Lehnen completed just one of two passes for 38 yards and added 12 carries for 77 yards.
Many Renegades fans wanted to see more of Lehnen at the end of the season, since the team was already out of the playoff hunt and they were curious to see if Lehnen could start in this league. He has already shown that he’s got the athleticism to be successful in the UFL.
It’s clear, though, that Reed has the build and mechanics to make him an NFL quarterback. He just needs more development in going through his reads and progressions during plays, rather than going with the first option that may or may not be open.
Neuheisel ultimately will most likely roll with Reed if he wants to come back to the UFL for another season next year, but there really should be more of a competition at quarterback to push Reed to be more accurate. Lehnen has been in the UFL long enough to deserve a shot to prove he is no slouch.