The story following Aaron Rodgers’ first start against the Green Bay Packers ended up being about the former understudy, not the aging icon. Jordan Love — who at one point completed 20 consecutive passes Sunday night, the longest such streak for a Packers quarterback in 18 years — led a second-half surge to outshine his one-time mentor in Green Bay’s convincing 35-25 victory against Rodgers’ Pittsburgh Steelers.
A Packers team that looked dominant early in the season, then seemed to level off for a few weeks (somehow stumbling to a loss against the Cleveland Browns), had every answer down the stretch. Love was excellent. Tight end Tucker Kraft was unstoppable. Micah Parsons had his fourth sack in two games. Green Bay is now 5-1-1 and atop the NFC. Pittsburgh, now 4-3, has dropped two straight.
Elsewhere in the AFC, it feels like 2014 again: The New England Patriots, Indianapolis Colts and Denver Broncos — all division winners that year — are among the hottest teams in football. Big wins on Sunday over the Cleveland Browns, Tennessee Titans and Dallas Cowboys, respectively, spoke to all three teams’ legitimacy as contenders in 2025.
In Atlanta, the Miami Dolphins scored the upset of the day by routing the Falcons 34-10. This looked like the Dolphins — and the Tua Tagovailoa — of 2023 and 2024, back when Mike McDaniel’s offense was outrunning and outscoring teams. A week after getting benched in an ugly loss, Tagovailoa responded with his best outing of the year, throwing for four touchdowns in a game that was never close.
As for Atlanta, a disappointing midseason slide continues: Sure, the Falcons were without starter Michael Penix Jr., who sat with a knee injury, but when your backup quarterback accounts for $40 million against the salary cap, as Kirk Cousins does, this team should have been more competitive. That’s two double-digit losses in a row for Raheem Morris’ club.
In Baltimore, Tyler “Snoop” Huntley outdueled Chicago starter Caleb Williams as the Ravens snapped a four-game losing streak to beat the Bears 30-16. Williams threw for 285 yards but didn’t find the end zone, tossing a costly interception deep in his own territory late that set up the game-sealing score.
In what was a golden opportunity for Chicago to move to 5-2, the Bears wasted it, losing to a backup quarterback and a team that hadn’t won since Week 2. In the victory, Derrick Henry moved into fifth place on the all-time rushing touchdowns list with 112, passing Hall of Famer Walter Payton. Chicago’s four-game win streak is history. The Bears are 4-3, the Ravens 2-5, with Lamar Jackson on his way back.
In Philadelphia, Saquon Barkley played like it was 2024 right from the opening snap in the Eagles’ 38-20 win over the New York Giants. Barkley, last season’s Offensive Player of the Year, took his first carry 65 yards to the end zone, and finished the day with 150 rushing yards, his first time over 100 yards rushing all season. After piling up a league-best 17 runs of 20-plus yards last season, Barkley had his first two of the year Sunday. New York, now 2-6, lost a key offensive piece in running back Cam Skattebo, who left Sunday’s defeat with a season-ending dislocated ankle. The Giants were already without star receiver Malik Nabers for the rest of the year.
In Charlotte, the Buffalo Bills ended their two-game skid with a convincing 40-9 rout of the Carolina Panthers, who were without starting quarterback Bryce Young. James Cook was electric with 216 rushing yards, the most by a Bills running back since O.J. Simpson in 1976. Josh Allen scored three touchdowns as the reigning MVP found his form ahead of next week’s AFC Championship Game rematch with the Kansas City Chiefs. Allen also became just the second quarterback in history with 70 rushing touchdowns in a career, joining Cam Newton.
In Houston, C.J. Stroud had his finest performance of the season and the Texans’ defense stated its case as one of the best in the league in a 26-15 win over the San Francisco 49ers. Stroud threw for 318 yards and two touchdowns, while Houston held Mac Jones and the 49ers to just 221 net yards and earned a near-23-minute advantage in time of possession. “I feel bad for the defense,” Jones said after the loss, citing how many snaps the 49ers’ unit was forced to play. Jones is now 4-2 in reserve duty for Brock Purdy. The Texans improved to 4-3, while the 49ers fell to 5-3.
In New Orleans, another starting quarterback was benched when the Saints pulled Spencer Rattler in favor of rookie second-round pick Tyler Shough. It didn’t make much difference, as the Tampa Bay Buccaneers rolled 23-3 to move to 6-2 and stay atop the NFC South. The Saints are the NFC’s only one-win team.
Are Packers hitting their stride?
For a half, the Steelers were in control, and Rodgers was showing his old team he can still sling it at 41. He was trying to become just the fifth quarterback in NFL history to beat all 32 teams, joining Peyton Manning, Tom Brady, Drew Brees and Brett Favre, his one-time teammate.
Then something shifted. The Green Bay offense flipped a switch, and this one turned into a rout.
The Packers seized control in the second half thanks to an incredibly accurate Love (29-for-37, 360 passing yards, three touchdowns), a huge night from Kraft (seven catches for 143 yards and two scores) and a play-calling heater from coach Matt LaFleur. Trailing 16-7 at halftime, Green Bay ripped off three straight touchdown drives after the break to put this one away. The Packers ultimately outscored the Steelers 28-9 after halftime.
It was quite a flex from a Super Bowl contender that remains the lone team in the NFC with one loss. A Monday nighter against the Eagles on Nov. 10 and a Thanksgiving Day trip to Detroit will go a long way in determining the NFC’s top seed in the playoffs.
Rodgers finished 24-for-36 for 219 yards and two touchdowns but couldn’t lead a touchdown drive in the second half until after Green Bay pulled away. The Steelers have cooled after starting 4-1, but thanks to a very mediocre AFC North, they remain in pole position in the division.
AFC’s new (old) blood
Does the AFC have a new feel to it — that feels like an old feel?
The Bills and Chiefs are still very much contenders, but as we near the midway point of the season, three challengers have emerged, two out of nowhere.
Mike Vrabel’s New England Patriots are the hottest team in the league, winners of five straight after overpowering the Cleveland Browns 32-13. Second-year quarterback Drake Maye threw for three touchdowns and was being serenaded with “MVP” chants. The Patriots’ 6-2 start is the best since Tom Brady was under center in Foxboro.
In Indianapolis, Jonathan Taylor continued his case for league MVP honors — forget, for a moment, a running back hasn’t won the award since Adrian Peterson in 2012 — in a 38-14 rout of the Tennessee Titans. Consider this: Taylor’s 14 touchdowns this season are more than the Titans have piled up as a team (nine). Taylor is also the first player in 12 seasons to amass 500 scrimmage yards and 10 or more touchdowns in a four-game span. The last was Jamaal Charles in 2013. Thanks to Taylor, the Colts aren’t showing any signs of slowing down. Indianapolis has scored 30 or more six times already this season.
Some stiffer tests await in the coming weeks and months, which should offer a truer gauge of just how good this team is: Indianapolis is at Pittsburgh next week, will play in Kansas City at the end of November and will see both Seattle and San Francisco in December.
A third AFC contender, the Denver Broncos, entered the season with higher expectations than the Patriots and Colts, and Sean Payton’s team has quietly lived up to them. The Broncos are now 6-2 after a convincing 44-24 victory over the Dallas Cowboys on Sunday, Denver’s fifth in a row. It was an impressive response given last week’s wild comeback, a testament to what Payton is building in the Mile High City. Facing one of the league’s hottest offenses — and hottest quarterbacks — Broncos starter Bo Nix outshone Dak Prescott, throwing for four touchdowns (Prescott didn’t throw one), and Vance Joseph’s defense pitched one of its best outings of 2025.
Denver leads the NFL with 36 sacks and has allowed a league-low eight this season. And whatever happened in last week’s wild comeback over the Giants seems to have sparked something in the offense: Across their last five quarters, the Broncos have piled up 77 points.
While the Chiefs have owned the AFC West for a decade and are again hitting their stride midseason, the Broncos look like a team that could make the division race interesting down the stretch.
Jets lose a great, win a thriller
On Sunday morning, the Jets announced that former center Nick Mangold had died due to complications from kidney disease at 41. Mangold was one of the cornerstones of the Jets’ last great era, the Rex Ryan teams that made back-to-back trips to the AFC Championship Game in 2009 and 2010. It was the last time New York made the postseason.
This season’s first seven games were, for the most part, everything the Jets have been since: a disaster. Just last week, owner Woody Johnson essentially threw quarterback Justin Fields under the bus, telling reporters, “It’s hard when you have a quarterback with a rating that he’s got. I mean, he has ability, but something just is not jiving.” First-year coach Aaron Glenn repeatedly bristled with the local media, refusing to announce who his starting quarterback would be after benching Fields in a Week 7 loss to the Carolina Panthers.
Then Sunday arrived. At various points, the Jets trailed the Bengals 17-3, 24-10 and 31-16. Glenn’s team was staring 0-8 in the face.
Then somehow, they won.
Breece Hall ran for a 27-yard touchdown with 8:01 left to cut the lead to 38-30, then Glenn elected to go for a two-point conversion. Fields — who earned the start with Tyrod Taylor injured and finished with 244 yards, one touchdown and no interceptions — hit Isaiah Davis for the score. On the Jets’ next drive, Hall threw a touchdown to Mason Taylor with less than two minutes left, and after the defense held firm, Glenn had his first win as a head coach.
Professional athletes rarely get as candid as Fields did after the win — evidence of how trying the last few weeks have been on the fifth-year starter who’s now on his third team.
“I’m going to get pretty vulnerable right here,” Fields said. “This week I found myself in my closet crying on the ground, laying down … I was praying over and over.”
No doubt, this season has been a grind for Fields and the Jets. Sunday meant a lot for a quarterback and a franchise.
“When I was on the field (after the win),” Fields added. “I was about to start crying.”
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