After a thrilling “Thursday Night Football” battle between the Baltimore Ravens and Cincinnati Bengals, Week 10’s Sunday slate delivered several more memorable and exciting moments.
Amidst the chaos, the Pittsburgh Steelers overcame a 10-point deficit to knock off the Washington Commanders, while the Kansas City Chiefs remained undefeated thanks to some improbable heroics.
Meanwhile, New York Jets fans can start firing up the mock drafts after watching their team humiliate themselves in the desert.
Here are some knee-jerk reactions from the 10th week of the NFL season:
Jets should hope they can cut ties with Aaron Rodgers this offseason
The Jets hoped their Week 9 home win against the Houston Texans would spark a miraculous turnaround. However, New York turned in its worst effort of the season on Sunday, suffering an embarrassing 31-6 blowout road loss to Arizona. While the defense bears part of the blame, the offense, which amassed a season-low 207 yards, and Rodgers deserve the brunt of it.
Rodgers, who still has one season remaining on his current contract, looks the part of a player approaching his 41st birthday, and he’s clearly limited by his 2023 Achilles injury. Through 10 games, he has completed just 62.4% of his passes for 2,258 yards, 15 touchdowns and seven interceptions, his sixth-most in a single season.
After firing its head coach, making numerous high-profile trades and underachieving with one of its most talented rosters in franchise history, New York has to ask itself where to go from here. The Jets have too much talent to fully rebuild, but it would be in their best interest if Rodgers retired.
Even so, if Rodgers chooses to play in 2025, the Jets should look to trade or cut him, eating $49M in dead money, and start building their future around a rookie quarterback.
Christian McCaffrey might not save the 49ers’ season
The reigning Offensive Player of the Year made his highly anticipated season debut during Sunday’s 23-20 road win over Tampa Bay after missing San Francisco’s first eight games due to bilateral Achilles tendinitis. The 49ers leaned heavily on McCaffrey, with the star tailback racking up 107 yards from scrimmage on 19 touches.
However, McCaffrey didn’t exactly provide the spark San Francisco has been searching for, as the team is still making similar mistakes that contributed to its rocky start to 2024.
While the offense once again looked sluggish, the special teams unit continues to cause issues, making things more complicated than they need to be. On Sunday, the unit muffed a punt that opened the door for Tampa Bay to score its first touchdown and kicker Jake Moody missed three field goals.
At 5-4, the 49ers have little room for error, and if these struggles persist, particularly across the team’s next three games, their playoff hopes could be in serious jeopardy.
Steelers’ Mike Tomlin is the Coach of the Year front-runner
Sunday’s thrilling 28-27 road win over Washington had several uncharacteristic mistakes from the Steelers, but 7-2 is 7-2, and Tomlin should be the leading candidate for Coach of the Year honors. What Tomlin has accomplished so far this season has been nothing short of remarkable, given that Pittsburgh sits atop the AFC North standings despite Baltimore being one of the NFL’s juggernauts.
The Steelers’ success is all the more impressive, seeing as though they’ve gotten where they are with Russell Wilson and Justin Fields at quarterback. Both signal-callers were considered outcasts heading into the season, yet Tomlin led Pittsburgh to a 4-2 record with Fields at the helm while Wilson nursed a calf injury.
It was somewhat shocking that Tomlin benched Fields, but it proved to be the right decision, as Wilson is undefeated as a starter and is averaging 245.7 passing yards per game, his most since 2017.
As long as Tomlin continues to press the right buttons for Pittsburgh, he could be well on his way to earning his long overdue Coach of the Year Award.
Vikings should be concerned about Sam Darnold’s turnover problem
Darnold emerged as a way-too-early MVP candidate after guiding Minnesota to a 5-0 record to begin his first season with the team. Despite this, the former No. 3 overall draft pick’s recent performance has raised doubts about Minnesota’s ceiling and is simultaneously costing the impending free agent millions in potential earnings.
Even though the Vikings moved to 7-2 on Sunday, they scored just 12 points in the road win over Jacksonville, all coming on field goals. Darnold was also picked off three times, giving him a league-leading five interceptions across his last two games and 10 on the season.
The Vikings are still finding ways to win ugly, and while impressive, it won’t be as easy against the likes of playoff-caliber teams. Ultimately, the Vikings will go as far as Darnold can lead them, which will be a major cause for concern come playoff time, considering turnover issues have plagued him throughout his career.
The Bears are failing rookie Caleb Williams
Chicago, losers of its last three games, is spiraling, and Williams has regressed in each of those contests after previously showing flashes of what made him the 2024 No. 1 overall pick. The Bears offense is averaging the fewest points per game in the NFL (nine) during the team’s losing streak and hit a new low in Sunday’s deflating 19-3 home loss to the Patriots.
In addition to going 1-for-14 on third-down conversations against New England, the Bears extended their unfortunate streak of 23 consecutive drives without a touchdown.
While Williams has disappointed in recent weeks, much of the offense’s struggles are due to the coaching staff’s ineptitude and numerous injuries to the Bears O-line, a unit that surrendered nine sacks on Sunday. It’s clear Chicago needs to replace Matt Eberflus with an offensive-minded head coach, but it’ll be just as imperative that GM Ryan Poles overhauls his offensive line this offseason.
If Poles fails to do so, Williams could end up being yet another talented quarterback prospect ruined by Chicago’s incompetence.
Colts shouldn’t have benched Anthony Richardson
Heading into Week 9, the Colts surprisingly benched Richardson for veteran Joe Flacco in an effort to keep the team’s relatively slim playoff hopes alive. The results couldn’t have gone any worse for Indianapolis, which finds itself on a two-game losing streak while averaging just 16.5 points and has now created an unnecessary distraction.
There’s no doubt that Richardson has struggled to transition to the NFL, posting a 50.2% completion rate with seven passing touchdowns and eight interceptions in 10 career starts. Still, Indianapolis spent the fourth overall pick in last year’s draft on the 6-foot-4, 244-pounder knowing that he was an extremely raw prospect.
With the team on the outside looking in at the playoffs, the Colts owe it to themselves to turn back to Richardson and see if he shows signs of developing into a franchise quarterback.
Chiefs will go undefeated if they beat the Bills in Week 11
There may be no other way to put it: the Chiefs are simply inevitable. It appeared that Kansas City would suffer its first loss of the season on Sunday, but linebacker Leo Chenal blocked a 35-yard field goal attempt by Broncos kicker Wil Lutz to seal a 16-14 victory.
The Chiefs are 9-0 for the third time in franchise history and are a legitimate threat to become the first team since the 2007 Patriots to finish the regular season undefeated.
Looking ahead at the two-time defending Super Bowl champion’s schedule, it’s possible Buffalo could be the only team capable of stopping Kansas City from achieving that feat.
According to data from The Athletic’s Austin Mock, the Week 11 clash is the only matchup Kansas City has a less than 50% chance of winning for the remainder of the season. If the Chiefs claim a road victory over Buffalo, they’re favorite to win every respective contest after that by more than 60%.
