Every week in the NFL season brings a host of new questions … and answers to some old ones, too. Let’s run down what we learned in Week 8 … and what we’ll be wondering about in Week 9 and beyond.
ANSWERED: Jayden Daniels is the truth
We always want to believe we’re seeing generational greatness the moment it happens, and this week, I’m confident in saying we did in fact see an NFL highlight we’ll see in replays as long as there’s an NFL:
With one Hail (to the Commanders) Mary, Jayden Daniels reversed the fortunes and perception of an entire franchise, wiping off the final stains of the Daniel Snyder era, and established himself as one of the must-watch QBs of his generation. Playing with sore ribs, Daniels threw for a tidy 326 yards — 75 of which came in the final 12 seconds and 52 on that final play. Now that is a game-winning drive.
Everything about this moment — defeat to victory, the cinematic arc of the football, the explosion of the home crowd, even the instant karma of the Bears’ trash-talking Tyrique Stevenson — this is as perfect as football gets. The euphoria, the exultation — whenever anyone tries to denigrate sports with one of those condescending little “sportsball” slags, don’t get mad, just feel a little sorry for them that they’ll never get to experience this kind of unmitigated joy in their lives.
Oh, and apologies to Bears fans. But if the tortured Washington franchise can get a moment like this, yours is coming, too.
ASKED: Could Jameis Winston be … a franchise savior?
Look, literally anything in Cleveland would have been better than the ineffective, expensive quarterback play the Browns have gotten out of Deshaun Watson this season. But when noted weirdo Jameis Winston rolls up, you know something memorable will happen, one way or another, even before the game begins:
And lo and behold, Winston threw for 334 yards and three touchdowns — with no interceptions! — to lead Cleveland to an upset of the mighty Ravens. Even by the Any Given Sunday standards of the NFL, this might have been the Any Given Sundayest game of the year, a team that had shown no discernible pulse all season stepping up and punching the AFC North bully in the face.
Is it sustainable? Probably not; Winston is likely to come back and throw three INTs and no touchdowns. Could Winston lead the Browns to the playoffs? Nope; only Tennessee has a worse record in the conference.
ASKED: Is Kirk Cousins ready to lead the Falcons on a run?
There was plenty of justifiable skepticism about the Falcons’ future-altering plan to go all-in on Kirk Cousins. An underachieving franchise taking on an underachieving quarterback? What could go right? So far, a lot — the Falcons are now in two steps forward, one step back mode, and Sunday against the Bucs was definitely some forward motion.
A statement victory against the only real division challenger, capped by the kind of final-game defensive stand the Falcons have all too often screwed up … these are the moments that add up to something more. Cousins threw for another four touchdowns Sunday, and the Raheem Morris regime appears more willing to use the Falcons’ entire array of offensive weapons. This team isn’t at Detroit’s level yet, but it’s more than good enough to make some noise in the playoffs.
The immediate future favors the Falcons; Atlanta faces Dallas, New Orleans and Denver before its bye, while Tampa Bay gets Kansas City and San Francisco before its break. That’s a good opportunity for Atlanta to put even more divisional breathing room between itself and the Bucs, more time for Cousins and the offense to settle into a winning rhythm. Let’s see if it continues.
ANSWERED: Whether the sun is setting on the Bengals’ 2024
It’s too early to close the door on any team outside of Tennessee, Carolina and the two New Jersey-based outfits, but after Sunday’s loss to the Eagles, the Bengals already feel like they’re laying out their clothes for their offseason vacation. When your leading rusher has 32 yards and your leading receiver 73, your offense ain’t working. And when you’re tied at 17 with 4:16 left in the 3rd quarter and then lose 37-17, your defense ain’t working, either.
The Bengals are now 0-4 at home, 3-5 overall, and their only wins are against Carolina, Cleveland and the Giants — not exactly a trio of playoff-bound squads. “We’re not good enough,” Joe Burrow said after Sunday’s loss. “We’re not good enough, so we’ve got to get better.” If only it were that easy.
ASKED: When is a punt a victory?
Sometimes, when your season’s circling the drain, you take pleasure in the little things … you know, like a good punt. Check out this beauty from the Jaguars’ Logan Cooke:
That was a 73-yard boomer that hit at the 10-yard line and skipped out at the 1, pinning the Packers deep in their own territory. It’s the punt version of a perfect approach in golf, 350 yards to a kick-in eagle. The Packers three-and-outed on the next series, but unfortunately, the Jaguars jaguar’ed the end of the game, allowing a last-minute drive leading to a last-second game-winning field goal. Jacksonville is 2-6 and four games out of the division lead, but hey, at least the kicking game is on point.
ANSWERED: Fine, National Tight End Day is a thing
You ever notice how “National Donut Day” seems to come around, like, every six weeks? Social media loves these sorts of made-up holidays, times when you can argue about pizza toppings on National Pizza Day or show love for your brothers and sisters on National Siblings Day. These aren’t sanctified dates like Christmas or Halloween; they’re purely marketing concoctions, and they work because we indulge them.
The NFL never met a trend it couldn’t co-opt, and now we have National Tight End Day, a manufactured holiday that the league and its broadcast partners happily shoved in our faces all day long on Sunday. But this was the weird thing: The tight ends actually stepped up! Tight ends scored 16 touchdowns on 177 receptions on Sunday, the most ever in the league’s history. Why, it’s almost as if the NFL had a script and forced its teams to follow it!
Hey, wait a minute …
Anyway, now that the door to made-up holidays has opened, let’s get weird. Let’s have National Overmatched Backup Quarterback Day, National Surly Postgame Wide Receiver Day, and National Don’t Put Up Big Numbers While You’re On My Fantasy Bench Day. All of it. Let’s do it!