| Jay Scott Smith is perplexed: @JayScottSmithJust so I understand: The NCAA can retroactively vacate wins and losses that happened 5 years ago because a guy took a cheeseburger or made money off his image before NIL, but can’t vacate a very clear instance where the wrong team won a game after being gifted a free play!? – – -An update on an NFL team or teams being based oversesas. Mike Florio ofProFootballTalk.com: Last month, Commissioner Roger Goodell said he has “no doubt” that the NFL will have a team headquartered outside the United States. Appearing on Prime Video’s pregame show before Lions-Bills on Thursday night, Goodell was asked how soon it will happen and where the team would be located. “You know, that’s tough to say,” Goodell said. “I think if we continue to grow and continue to get the kind of reaction, I do think a franchise will be international at some point in time. I think Europe is the most likely, for a lot of reasons. One, the length of time we’ve been playing there. But also the scheduling is going to be a lot easier. Australia might create a few complications for us. But I also believe we could have more than one team. . . . The support is there.” It would make sense to have two teams, especially if the first destination is London, which has two NFL-ready stadiums. The lingering question is whether current teams would move, or whether the league would expand. Goodell has in the past hinted at a four-team European division. The best long-term vision could be four teams in Europe and four teams elsewhere (Brazil, Mexico, Australia, and Japan). Much of that hinges on the return of supersonic flight, a development the NFL is closely monitoring. Yes, the league has been dangling the carrot of an international team for years. Often, it’s about driving interest in the variety-pack of games played in other countries. At this point, it does indeed feel as if it’s coming, eventually. |
| NFC NORTH |
| CHICAGOThe goal of the Bears offense is to score 37 points against the Vikings. Andrew Siciliano: @AndrewSicilianoCan the Bears score 💯 points in their first two games? Bears scored 59 in Week 1. NFL record for most points in the first two weeks is 95. (1968 Raiders) A record that has stood for nearly a half century. |
| GREEN BAYThis: @packer_superThe Packers are now 7-5 in games when they have had a 9 point lead the past two seasons. The rest of the NFL wins 95% of games in which they have a 9 point lead.– – -Both parties say they want the video of RB JOSH JACOBS assaulting his girlfriend quashed where no one, not even and especially NFL Justice can see it. The judge ain’t buying it. Mike Florio of ProFootballTalk.com: A week after the judge presiding over the criminal case involving Packers running back Josh Jacobs signed an order temporarily sealing the evidence (including a video of the altercation that prompted a misdemeanor battery charge), the judge declined to sign an order that would have sealed the evidence permanently. Via Fox 11, the judge rejected a proposed order on procedural grounds, concluding it was in an “improper format.” A hearing on the issue has been set for next Thursday. At that point, the judge could decide to grant the request, made by the victim’s lawyer, to permanently seal the evidence. The NFL wants to see the video, as part of the effort to determine the proper discipline to be imposed on Jacobs under the Personal Conduct Policy. The league’s inability to get access to the video underscores the flaws in its in-house justice system. The NFL doesn’t have the power that a court of law possesses. It can’t compel witnesses to cooperate. It can’t subpoena records. It possibly will be stymied by a court order blocking access to important evidence. The league should nevertheless attempt to secure the ability to review the video, subject to the requirement of a protective order. It’s possible to balance the victim’s privacy rights with the NFL’s desire to ensure that it has the ability to effectively and accurately assess a proper penalty on Jacobs. Jacobs remains on paid leave while the NFL considers the proper suspension to be imposed. |
| NFC WEST |
| LOS ANGELES RAMSHope abounds in Rams camp that DT AARON DONALD can wreak havoc on the Giants Monday night. Sarah Barshop of ESPN.com: Rams defensive tackle Aaron Donald will practice in full Thursday and the team is “hopeful” he will play Monday night against the New York Giants, coach Sean McVay said. Donald, who initially retired in March 2024, came out of retirement Aug. 30. He did not travel to the Rams’ Week 1 loss against the San Francisco 49ers in Melbourne, Australia. When asked whether there are specific benchmarks the Rams are looking for when determining whether Donald plays this week, McVay said, “It’s more along the line of how does he feel?” McVay said Donald is “obviously chomping at the bit” to play, but that there haven’t been many opportunities for the defensive tackle to take part in teams drills given the Rams’ Week 1 travel schedule. “But what we are hopeful is, is that we’ll have some good work today and tomorrow and then hopefully he’s feeling good enough and if he says he’s ready to go, then we’ll be excited to see him,” McVay said. McVay also said defensive end Myles Garrett is “feeling good” after his Monday knee surgery, but the coach said he still doesn’t want to put a timeline on his return. Garrett, the reigning NFL Defensive Player of the Year, missed most of training camp while dealing with what McVay called swelling in his knee. On Monday, McVay said the thought was Garrett could play though the injury, but it was obvious in Week 1 that was not the case. “You already see he had crutches yesterday and then he was walking without crutches today,” McVay said. “So he’s like Wolverine healing fast.” Garrett will miss at least the next four games on injured reserve. “We’re not going to rush him back,” McVay said. “We want to make sure that he’s feeling good, he’s able to get out on the practice field, do all the things that are necessary for him to perform at a level that he’s been accustomed to.” |
| SEATTLEJordan Rodrigue of The Athletic on how the Seahawks use analytics to “chase the edges.” In just a few seconds, it was over. Seattle Seahawks quarterback Sam Darnold collected the shotgun snap, and waited … waited … for tight end Eric Saubert to chip his defender before shedding him and leaking wide open across the middle of the end zone. Darnold fired the ball to Saubert; Los Angeles Rams defensive tackle Kobie Turner nearly got a hand on it. He didn’t. Saubert caught the pass as the stadium exploded, throwing his arms out in celebration with the ball in one hand. Game. The walk-off 2-point conversion — in Week 16, in overtime, against a division rival — lasted only a moment, but it was in many ways a product of months of conversations and situational and schematic investment that reflected Seattle head coach Mike Macdonald’s mantra: “chasing edges.” “The nerdy definition of it,” he said, laughing, while speaking to The Athletic recently, “we call it ‘the relentless pursuit of the hidden advantages that bring us closer to being the team and people that we want to become.’” Macdonald, the third-year head coach who led Seattle to a Super Bowl win last season, has a defensive-oriented mind in a sport where much is dictated to defense, by offense. But Macdonald has a knack for inverting that norm. His defensive scheme is built to neutralize offensive personnel changes and the corresponding spatial manipulation that typically forces defenses out of their preferred structure. Outside of scoring on defensive takeaways, Macdonald can’t necessarily dictate how many points his team gets. So he obsesses over other margins: how aggressive Seattle’s special teams unit will be (No. 3 in EPA last season); how he hires offensive minds out of established, competing systems (both his current and former offensive coordinator previously worked for the rival 49ers); how the Seahawks structure practices to prepare for close games; the technologies into which the team invests and how they’re applied; the way the coaching staff discusses analytics and situational management in the same breath as their players’ fundamentally sound, physically punishing style. Macdonald likes to say that Seattle is all about combining old school principles with new school methods. Every NFL team is so good, Macdonald said, that “what it takes to win is the accumulation of these small advantages, small things that you can find to set your team apart.” Brian Eayrs’ desk at the Seahawks’ practice facility is crowded with four screens. They all feature something different; cutups of plays, graphs he’s building or code for the analytical models he builds. Behind those screens is a larger one on which he can project any of this to whoever stops into his office. Macdonald does, often. Eayrs also always has open a digital dashboard that keeps him updated on league happenings — he calls it “watching radar,” a nod to the movie “Spaceballs” — and an Excel sheet he calls his “workbook” where he logs ideas and notes to himself about upcoming opponents as he studies them. The “Hot 100” playlist Eayrs builds and tweaks throughout the year is probably playing in the background. He has a rule: If he puts a song on the list, he must remove one, too, so it’s always exactly at 100. Eayrs is Seattle’s director of football analysis and special situations — a role that has evolved over his 14 seasons with the franchise to focus on team tactics, opponent film and tendency studies, leaguewide schematic trend studies and coaching strategies. (The Seahawks have multiple analyst groups across their strength and conditioning, health and player performance, scouting and talent acquisition and salary cap departments.) In short: Eayrs’ job is to literally find and apply these “edges” Macdonald seeks. “It’s a little bit coaching, it’s a little bit analytics, it’s a little bit dealing with the players (and) it’s a lot dealing with the coaches,” Eayrs told The Athletic. “(And) a key function of my job is overviewing the NFL to everybody, all the time.” Brian Eayrs, the Seahawks’ director of football analysis and special situations, watches a Seattle practice.Brian Eayrs, the Seahawks’ director of football analysis and special situations, shares the franchise’s obsession with small advantages.Courtesy Seattle SeahawksA significant area of focus for Eayrs is situational analysis and in-game decision-making. Macdonald made this a priority when he became the Seahawks’ head coach in 2024. “(He) really created a lot of time and space for this concept, because we’re working with the understanding that there’s gonna be a lot of close games,” Eayrs said. Seattle’s coaches game plan as though they will face 10 to 13 one-score games in the fourth quarter in a season (a little more than half of all regular-season games were decided by one score in 2025). “We kind of work backwards. We say, ‘well, if that’s gonna be close, how soon do we need to start talking about how we’re gonna finish the end of the first half and finish the end of the game?” Eayrs said. “For our head coach, that’s probably earlier than anybody in the NFL as part of the weekly process.” NFL teams typically build their game plans on Tuesdays, and get them to players by Wednesday morning, when the first full meetings, practices and walkthroughs take place. Eayrs and Macdonald have meetings as early as Tuesday evening to map out what Eayrs refers to as “critical variables that are going to impact the coaching decisions in the game.” These include tendency and situational research on that week’s opponent, plus examples from around the league and in college football of how teams made decisions in key scenarios. “He’s so passionate about it, he’s so good at it,” Macdonald said. “Some analytics guys, they kind of just live in their brain. Brian … he can explain (and) simplify things in a way that makes it functional for us in terms of how we operate and how we make decisions.” Instead of waiting to hold separate situational meetings later in the week (some teams wait as late as Friday), Seahawks assistant coaches build the information they receive Tuesday into their installations, walkthroughs and practices on Wednesday and Thursday. Eayrs said that they go over everything again with coordinators and players on Friday and Saturday, including tape on situational strategy used in practice. Between this film study and his opposition research for the schemes and tendencies that help Macdonald and the coaching staff build a game plan, Eayrs has to process and organize an enormous amount of information — and make it teachable to coaches, who then do the same for players. “The living hell that I’m in is that every single football game played (that) has a clock, I have to be watching it. And I’m not gonna miss it,” he said, smiling. “Every single game is an opportunity to think this through.” In Macdonald, Eayrs has not just found a thought partner in prioritizing strategy and analytics, but also someone who shares his belief that technology can help in the pursuit of small advantages. Last offseason, the NFL expanded its partnership with Microsoft, the technology and software company co-founded by the late Paul Allen (who owned the Seahawks until his estate sold the team to tech billionaire Vinod Khosla and his family and investor group in August). As a result of this expansion, some teams — including the Seahawks — are more deeply integrating AI tools like Copilot into their day-to-day operations. (Some teams use other AI software as well.) Eayrs uses this, alongside other technologies, to help organize his buckets of film and other information, sort new and old data, and run models for any scenario Seattle may face. Meanwhile, Macdonald has specific ideas for how he eventually wants Copilot to be a regular part of the team’s workflow. The Seahawks, who are a partner of Microsoft AI, are already testing some of those ideas. For example, Macdonald records all of his meetings and uses the tool to package specific notes and highlights from the recordings so he can be clearer in his delivery and ensure players and coaches are receiving consistent messaging week over week. More time, for a football coach, can become a massive advantage during a season in which one day of strategy and planning blends into another until suddenly, it’s January. Macdonald came up through the coaching ranks as a college graduate assistant and Baltimore Ravens coaching intern, when he was often relegated to grunt work such as logging and filing statistics, play charts and other time-consuming tasks. Such staffers around the NFL who use AI and other digital programs now run hundreds if not thousands of queries to get to answers that he remembers used to take him days to find. “You might get to the same answer, but if you get to it three days earlier, that’s super valuable,” Macdonald said. “Now you can rep those things and you can give those (players) extra experience and extra looks going into the week.” Could AI learn his defensive system? Could it understand how the scheme needs to be taught? More importantly, could it learn others’ schemes well enough that it could help Macdonald and his coaches in their game planning? These are questions Macdonald wants answered. “I think one of the things we’ve learned in the AI space is you just have to go. You have to dive in headfirst,” he said. “There’s going to be (bad) queries. Sometimes you’re gonna have bad data in, bad data out. … This is a process that we’re gonna adopt and buy into, and really be able to build this thing for the long haul, and that includes revising how we’re going to drive the AI in terms of the data we’re looking for.” Macdonald, said Eayrs, has been very clear with the organization that he wants to be at the forefront of the league in applying newer technologies to football and constantly evaluating the team’s processes. The head coach admitted to a bit of an obsession with improvement. “That was something that always bothered me about my experiences coming up,” Macdonald said. “‘Why is there so much resistance to trying — why are we not trying to find the absolute best way to do things?’ It still drives me crazy to this day. How can you live with yourself if you’re just squeaking by? “A cuss word around here is, ‘well, this is the way we’ve always done it.’” Seahawks coach Mike Macdonald during a season-opening win over the Patriots. Seahawks coach Mike Macdonald wants to be at the forefront of the league in applying newer technologies to football.Steph Chambers / Getty ImagesThe strategy of a football game is often built out of a long string of ideas, attempts and errors. Macdonald believes that any worthy process should come with the risk of error; that a person should accept this risk because any error will probably lead to a new answer. Football coaches, he said, always want to be right. But the process of first being wrong, then becoming right, is important. It informs his willingness to try new things. It also informs his mantra for his team. “There’s more energy behind that. There’s more excitement. There’s more unknown,” he said. “When we talk about ‘chasing edges,’ you’re implying there is an edge and sometimes you’ll go over (it). Part of our culture is that we try to make it a space where if you do go over, that’s OK. If our intent is right, we are able to learn from it and move forward. “That’s where you make those marginal gains. That’s what we’re trying to create.” |
| AFC NORTH |
| BALTIMOREJeff Zrebiec of The Athletic on the greatness of RB DERRICK HENRY: All of the names resonate with Derrick Henry. Eric Dickerson was a big back with a unique combination of power and speed. He just played in a different era. Adrian Peterson was coming off a near-1,500-yard season when Henry entered the league and was the quintessential home-run threat who also wore defenses down with his physicality. Barry Sanders was Mr. Consistent, a true generational talent who was devoted to his craft. And Henry knows all about Emmitt Smith. Fourteen years ago, Henry broke Smith’s Florida prep rushing mark. He also spends time in the offseason training and running hills in Dallas with Smith’s son, E.J. Yet even on a list of legends, one name stands out to Henry. “LaDainian Tomlinson, for sure,” Henry said in a recent interview. “I had his bobblehead. I had his jersey. I wanted to be just like him until I got older and I (thought), ‘Maybe I’m not the same size as LaDainian, and maybe I have a different skill set.’ That was my guy. If my name gets close to his and the accolades that he has, and the history he’s accomplished playing the game, that will definitely be cool.” Tomlinson looks at Henry these days and thinks of another legendary running back. “To me, he’s the modern-day Jim Brown,” Tomlinson said to The Athletic. “That’s what he is.” Henry, Baltimore’s venerable 32-year-old running back, is occupying rarefied air. With his 144-yard, three-touchdown performance in the Ravens’ season-opening 41-23 victory over the Indianapolis Colts, Henry moved into third on the league’s all-time rushing touchdown list with 125, passing Marcus Allen. Only Smith (164) and Tomlinson (145) are ahead of him. If he runs for more than 97 yards Sunday against the New Orleans Saints, Henry (13,162) would surpass Dickerson (13,259) and move into ninth place all time in rushing yards. With a 1,500-yard season — and that’s a conservative estimate after he rushed for 1,595 yards last year and 1,921 in his first season as a Raven in 2024 — Henry would move beyond Dickerson, Jerome Bettis (13,662), Tomlinson (13,684) and Curtis Martin (14,101) into sixth all time. Smith’s hallowed mark of 18,355 rushing yards is probably safe for a while, but with Henry continuing to post eye-popping numbers well into his 30s, it suddenly doesn’t seem out of the question that he could at least threaten it. “If he can stay healthy, he could do it,” said Barry Sanders, who is fourth all time with 15,269 rushing yards. “He’s going to get the carries in Baltimore. It will be fun to watch either way, and I will be rooting for him and all of the RBs. There is kind of a resurgence of that position right now, and it’s fitting to have King Henry at the front of it.” When the Ravens signed Henry during the 2024 offseason, it felt like the perfect fit — a Super Bowl-caliber team that prides itself on running the football adding the workhorse back of his era and pairing him with Lamar Jackson, one of the most dynamic quarterbacks the league has seen. From a production standpoint, it’s probably worked out even better than the Ravens could have hoped. Since joining Baltimore, the 6-foot-3, 252-pound Henry leads the NFL in rushing yards (3,660) and rushing touchdowns (35). Each year brings the question of whether he will finally slow down in a league that is typically unkind to 30-plus-year-old backs, and each game seems to present contrary evidence. “As Derrick keeps getting older, you start thinking, ‘He cannot do this forever.’ Then he kind of does (what he did Sunday), and it’s like, ‘Maybe he can,’” said Ravens cornerback Marlon Humphrey, who was also Henry’s teammate at Alabama. Henry hasn’t missed a game since turning 30. During that span, he’s gained 5.6 yards per carry and 104.6 rushing yards per game on an average of 18.7 rushing attempts. He’s also totaled 37 touchdowns. “He’s my favorite back in the league,” said Dickerson. “I like his physicality and everything he brings to the game. To me, if he’s not the top back, he’s one of the top two or three backs in the NFL. Not every back could play in any era, to be honest with you, but he could. You could put him in the ’50s, the ’60s, the ’70s, ’80s, ’90s and right now. His game transcends time.” Dickerson, who is 6-foot-3 and played at 220 pounds, remembers meeting Henry several years ago and his first thought was, “Damn, you make me look little.” Dickerson’s appreciation grew from there. His son, Dallis, is an eighth grader, and his youth football coach instructed him to get lower when he runs. Dickerson pointed out to the coach that not only did the upright running style work for him, but it’s working just fine for Henry, too. “I don’t think he’s a good back; he’s a great back,” Dickerson said of Henry. “And the thing about a great back, they have to game plan for you. Teams can’t just show up and say, ‘We don’t have to worry about (No.) 22.’ You better worry about 22.” Sanders has gotten to know Henry while filming the Nissan Heisman House commercials. Henry has made a major impression on him not only with his size and physical traits, but with his “throwback mindset” and respect for the game and its history. Sanders has long predicted that Henry will become the 11th Heisman winner to go to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. “I just admire his consistent greatness,” Sanders said, describing Henry as a throwback in the mold of Brown or Earl Campbell. “From high school to the Heisman and soon to the Hall, he has been great at every level, and it’s hard to be consistent at such a high level over so many years. I did not start at running back until the fourth game of my senior year in high school. “What Derrick has done from a young age until now is just incredible. I love to watch him run.” Sanders retired after 10 NFL seasons with the Detroit Lions, 153 games and 3,062 carries. Henry is one game into his 11th season and has played 154 games, plus nine in the postseason. He’s had 2,884 career carries. For many legendary backs, maintaining good health and producing consistently into their 30s was a challenge. Dickerson played four seasons in his 30s, and his best was a 729-yard campaign for the then-Los Angeles Raiders in 1992. Peterson led the league with 1,485 rushing yards and 11 touchdowns in 2015 as a 30-year-old with the Minnesota Vikings, but he reached the 1,000-yard plateau just once over his final six seasons. In Bettis’ four seasons as a 30-plus-year-old back, he posted 666, 811, 941 and 368 yards for the Pittsburgh Steelers from 2002 to 2005. Henry’s years at 30-plus, meanwhile, have more closely mirrored other greats like Smith, Martin and Frank Gore. Martin, the league’s sixth all-time leading rusher at 14,101 yards, rushed for an NFL-high 1,697 yards as a 31-year-old for the New York Jets in 2004. Gore, third all time with 16,000 rushing yards, averaged over 1,000 yards from age 30 through 34. Smith played until he was 35 and gained over 900 yards in all but one of his six seasons after turning 30. “They didn’t have the resources that we have,” Henry said, dismissing the idea that putting up big rushing numbers in today’s pass-happy NFL should be singled out. “Everything we have access to now helps us reach our full potential every single day. Those guys didn’t have that, and they were still able to accomplish everything that they were able to accomplish. “I look at it that way, not to diminish or look down on what those guys accomplished in that era. It’s a different type of game, and I think it’s more cool the things that they accomplished.” From sprinting up hills with chains around his neck to pushing oversized tires, Henry’s offseason workout regimen is the stuff of legend, and so is his commitment to his diet. That probably best explains his longevity and consistency, even though he nearly had 1,400 carries at Yulee High School in Florida, just over 600 at Alabama and now almost 3,000 in the NFL. “He has natural gifts, obviously, as a running back. He has the size/speed combination,” Tomlinson said. “But with all that being said, I’ve been really impressed with how he prepares to play the game. “That’s really what it takes to be great for a long, extended period of time. You have to put yourself through grueling offseason workouts to prepare your body for what you’re going to go through during the season, and Derrick has never slacked on that. He’s faced it like a champ.” When Tomlinson worked for NFL Network, he visited Tennessee Titans training camp for a sit-down with Henry. The two exchanged numbers and have remained in touch since. Tomlinson said if he’s not traveling on Sundays, he makes sure to tune in to the Ravens because he enjoys watching Henry. “To me, it’s the stamina of being able to get better throughout the season. That’s what’s so impressive,” Tomlinson said. “He gets better the more carries he gets throughout the game. He’s always better in the fourth quarter. And then, later in November and December, he seems to be running his best. Even late in the season when it gets cold and you’ve got the bumps and bruises, Derrick doesn’t seem fazed by that stuff at all.” Henry, who will turn 33 in January, has made it clear he hasn’t even thought about retiring. He’s signed with the Ravens through the 2027 season. He also maintains that his motivation is winning a Super Bowl and not breaking any records. However, the attention will become unavoidable if he continues on this trajectory. Even Smith, the legendary Dallas Cowboys back, recently told DraftKings he believes Henry could unseat him as the NFL’s all-time leading rusher, just like he did in 2012 when Henry shattered his high school mark. It would take remarkable consistency and durability. Henry enters Week 2 trailing Smith by 5,193 yards. If Henry rushes for 1,500 over the next three seasons, he’d still be a little over 500 yards short of Smith’s mark. “I wouldn’t put anything past that dude. I just wouldn’t,” Tomlinson said. “The way he looks now, he has another three, four strong years even. If that’s what we’re talking about and he’s going to be in an offense hopefully with Lamar Jackson, that can ease some of the pressure off the running game. You have to think it’s possible.” For now, just hearing his name in that company is enough for Henry. “Seeing how long they did it and the success that they had, I just wanted to be like them,” Henry said. “It really comes down to idolizing them.” |
| AFC SOUTH |
| JACKSONVILLEJaguars PR with a stat that makes the case that Jacksonville is currently the NFL’s most dominant team: @JaguarsPRThe Jaguars own a +177 point differential since their nine-game win streak began in W11 of 2025. This is the highest point margin in the NFL over that span by over 80 points, and the highest over a nine-game span by any NFL team since 2021 (BUF, +179 from W16, 2020 to W8, 2021). Besides Cleveland in Week 1, here is who they played: 11 November 16 Los Angeles Chargers W 35–6 12 November 23 at Arizona Cardinals W 27–24 (OT) 13 November 30 at Tennessee Titans W 25–3 14 December 7 Indianapolis Colts W 36–19 15 December 14 New York Jets W 48–20 16 December 21 at Denver Broncos W 34–20 17 December 28 at Indianapolis Colts W 23–17 18 January 4 Tennessee Titans W 41–7 The Titans and Colts twice each, as well as the Jets. Nice win at Denver. The tightest game? The Cardinals! |
| AFC EAST |
| BUFFALOJudy Bautista of ESPN.com marvels at the atmosphere in the new Hallmark Stadium that produced an overwhelming start for the Bills on Monday night: The Buffalo Bills threw a heck of a housewarming party for their new Highmark Stadium on Thursday, launching fireworks to open the night and then piling up points in a 41-31 victory over the Detroit Lions that felt more dominant than the final score indicated. The Bills are 2-0, making Joe Brady the first coach in franchise history to win his first two games. Brady said he felt little emotion during the festivities — that was on purpose; he wanted his players to remain composed, too — but that wasn’t the case for everyone else in Orchard Park, New York. Fans spent hours tailgating before the game and erupted when Hall of Famer Bruce Smith led them in a “Let’s Go, Buffalo” chant. Josh Allen said he got emotional during the national anthem, thinking about how lucky he is to play in Buffalo. “To be the first quarterback to open this stadium, it’s a special spot,” Allen said. The 60,000-plus fans there for the stadium christening roared as Allen accounted for five touchdowns (three passing, two rushing), with the first chants of “M-V-P” echoing in the din. Allen scored the night’s first TD on a 1-yard run, then found a wide-open Joshua Palmer on a 43-yard bomb for the next. Each time, the sound was so loud it felt like a roof would have blown off — had there been one on the new, $2.1 billion building. It was part of a nightlong party, aided by the Bills’ dominant performance. Their 41 points were the most in a team’s home stadium debut since the Dolphins scored 42 at Joe Robbie Stadium in 1987, per Elias Sports Bureau. “I don’t really get starstruck, but there were a few times I looked up and I thought, ‘Oh, s—,'” defensive tackle Deone Walker said of the atmosphere. Entering the game, Brady said he didn’t want his team to put on a show for the stadium opener; he wanted the Bills to put on a clinic. They did that, and it fueled the festive atmosphere. They raced out to a 21-0 lead and never let the Lions draw too close. With every Allen pass and James Cook run, the fans screamed. If there had been concern that the luxury of a new stadium might quiet one of the NFL’s most overwhelming home-field advantages, that is probably no longer a worry. The old stadium is now in ruins across the street, but the successes of recent seasons have transferred over, along with the late-game sing-along of “Mr. Brightside” and the cacophony that has cowed so many opponents. In the end, even Brady was a little wowed. “That place was electric,” he said. How good is that Bills offense? The Athletic: Thirty-six points last week against the Texans and 41 this week. How good is this Buffalo offense? Buffalo’s offense has been a juggernaut against two quality opponents. True, the Lions’ defense is banged up, but the Bills looked unstoppable against professional football players. Didn’t matter who or how, the Bills did pretty much whatever they wanted. Any conversation begins with Allen, who had Highmark Stadium chanting “M-V-P! M-V-P!” from the opening possession until the end. He overcame an Aidan Hutchinson strip-sack to produce an otherwise flawless game. Allen had a hand — and in some cases his entire body — in Buffalo’s first five touchdowns: two by air, three on the ground. Cook had 100 rushing yards 3:30 before halftime and finished with 21 carries for 135 yards, including a 1-yard TD to ice it with 2:50 to play. Dalton Kincaid, one game after posting the most receiving yards by a Buffalo tight end in 61 years, logged seven catches for 95 yards and a TD. Wide receiver Joshua Palmer waited 18 months since he joined the Bills to score his first touchdown last week and then scored another on his very next reception. The lone groan was receiver DJ Moore’s injury. His impact was obvious against Houston, and Allen was looking for him in the end zone when Moore dove, hurting his shoulder and neck with 2:56 left in the second quarter. Moore went straight to the locker room and didn’t return to the game. One play later, Allen fired a 16-yard TD to Kincaid instead. — Tim Graham, senior writer |
| NEW ENGLANDRB TREVYON HENDERSON says he is good to go Sunday against the Steelers. — New England Patriots running back TreVeyon Henderson, who missed the season opener due to an ankle injury, is set to return for Sunday’s home opener against the Pittsburgh Steelers. “I’m ready to go. Thank God I’m healed up now,” Henderson said Thursday. “I’m excited to be back out here with my teammates.” The speedy Henderson, who totaled nine rushing touchdowns in his 2025 rookie season, injured his right ankle in practice Aug. 24. He complements starting running back Rhamondre Stevenson, who was on the field for 60 of 71 offensive snaps in the season-opening 13-10 loss to the Seattle Seahawks. Henderson returned to practice this week. He was a full participant Wednesday and his ankle responded well. “I’m thankful. It just continued to draw me closer to the Lord, and I’m thankful for the time, thankful for the growth,” he said of the time on the sideline. “I wanted to be out there [last week] pretty bad, it was a good matchup, good game, I think we competed really hard.” Henderson played in all 17 regular-season games last season and totaled 180 carries for 911 yards and nine touchdowns, while adding 35 receptions for 221 yards and one receiving touchdown. |
