Category: News Feeds

Week 2 might not have featured the same scoring fireworks as Week 1, but it still delivered plenty of historic performances. Dak Prescott etched his name into the Dallas Cowboys record books, while Christian McCaffrey joined another exclusive list. Ja’Marr Chase and Jaxon Smith-Njigba continued to establish themselves among the NFL’s most dominant receivers. But not every milestone was worth celebrating. One rookie quarterback joined an unfortunate group with his first career pass, while the Bears followed their Week 1 explosion with a historic scoring drop-off. From record-breaking performances to some very unfortunate history, Week 2 had a little bit of everything. Here are the numbers that put it all into perspective: This page may contain affiliate links to legal sports betting partners. If you sign up or place a wager, FOX Sports may be compensated. Read more about Sports Betting on FOX Sports.​Latest Sports News from FOX Sports

The Kansas City Chiefs did it again. Patrick Mahomes led the Chiefs on two field-goal drives in overtime, which were good enough to get to 2-0 with a win over the Indianapolis Colts. It improves the Chiefs’ recent streak of overtime wins. Here are my takeaways from Sunday night: It’s hard to find many situational stats where Kansas City doesn’t look good, but they’re a really good team once a game gets to overtime. When they pulled out an overtime win over the Colts on Sunday night, it was their sixth win in their last six overtime games. Their last overtime loss was to the Bengals in the 2021 AFC Championship Game. Even with that, they’re now 9-1 in overtime games since the start of the 2019 season. Of course, a big part of that is Mahomes – in overtime entering Sunday’s game, his career overtime numbers were 30-for-41 for 377 yards, completing 73% of his passes for a 109.5 passer rating. He’s actually only thrown one touchdown pass, but he consistently leads his team to victory. Converting a third-and-12 as he did with a pass to Tyquan Thornton was another case of Mahomes delivering when the Chiefs need him most. It’s almost like last season, when the Chiefs missed the playoffs and Mahomes looked mortal, was a palate cleanser to allow fans to enjoy the three-time Super Bowl champion being extremely good again. Sunday night was Mahomes getting back to his old self – three touchdowns and no interceptions, with one score each to tight end Travis Kelce and wide receivers Xavier Worthy and Jalen Royals. It’s the 30th time in Mahomes’ career he’s had at least three touchdown passes and zero interceptions. He actually had four such games last year, and he registered two-thirds of his touchdown passes for the season in those games. The dynastic aspect of the Chiefs going to five Super Bowls in seven years and winning three of them put Mahomes at a level of consistently great that has fans almost rooting against him as a default. We might not be able to seriously sell them as underdogs for very long, but it’s reset things enough that fans can enjoy Mahomes in a way they couldn’t for a while. Wide receiver Alec Pierce was carted off with an ankle injury. The Colts just don’t have the receiver depth to keep up without Pierce, with Josh Downs helping out but little else from the position Sunday night. Keenan Allen had no catches on his first four targets. Then, both starting corners were sidelined: ex-Chiefs star Mooney Ward and Sauce Gardner. It’s hard to build enough depth to handle multiple injuries at a position like corner in one game. Give the Colts credit for keeping this game close, though. They kept it close with the Chiefs despite playing cornerback Kapena Gushiken, an undrafted rookie from Ole Miss who the Colts claimed off waivers from the Eagles less than three weeks ago. Having that kind of player ready to play for exactly this kind of scenario. 3 ½. What’s Next? The real setup in the Chiefs’ upcoming schedule is them facing the Seahawks and Broncos – both of last year’s Super Bowl teams – on the road in back-to-back games in Weeks 6-7. Before they get there, Kansas City should have three very winnable games – at the Dolphins, at the Raiders and at home against the 0-2 Chargers. Kansas City could have a lot of momentum built up by the time they take on the defending Super Bowl teams two weeks in a row. The Colts, meanwhile, have a pair of 0-2 teams on deck with a home game against the Texans and a trip to face the Commanders in Week 4, with quarterback Jayden Daniels’ status up in the air after suffering an elbow injury on Sunday.​Latest Sports News from FOX Sports

For years, Justin Herbert has been widely considered a prototype for an NFL quarterback. Scouts, coaches, executives and many in the media have gushed over his arm and legs, marveled at his mechanics and drooled over his potential. Heading into every year following his splendid rookie season, the NFL has been bracing for his inevitable breakthrough. It’s time we all admit that we were just wrong. After six NFL seasons, plus two ugly games this year, we should all accept Herbert for what he is: a good quarterback but not one destined for greatness. Herbert is no longer being held back by a poor situation. In 2026, he’s holding back the Los Angeles Chargers. It’s true that his offensive line is terrible at times and his receivers drop way too many passes. But the best quarterbacks find ways to elevate their teams. And it’s clear that Herbert doesn’t do that, at all. His shortcomings were on full display Sunday, as the Chargers fell to 0-2 with a 26-14 home loss to the Las Vegas Raiders. Herbert was just 15 of 27 for 192 yards with a touchdown pass and two interceptions. He was outplayed by Raiders quarterback Kirk Cousins, just like he was outplayed by Arizona quarterback Jacoby Brissett one week ago. Was it entirely Herbert’s fault that the Chargers lost to two teams that were supposed to be awful to start the season? Of course not. But that’s not the standard of a franchise quarterback. And it’s certainly not the standard for a quarterback Jim Harbaugh recently said “will be known as the greatest, best ever to play the position of quarterback” when his career ends. The truth is, Herbert is not even on the fringe of the fringe of that conversation. And even with his record pace to 25,000 career passing yards, he doesn’t seem destined to pass Dan Fouts or Philip Rivers on the list of the greatest Chargers quarterbacks of all time. Now, Herbert does put up numbers. There’s no denying that. But he’s been expected to transcend the numbers, especially when Harbaugh hired Mike McDaniel as his offensive coordinator this season. McDaniel was the guy who was finally going to get the greatness out of Herbert. It’s why the Chargers were considered a dark-horse Super Bowl contender. It’s crazy now to think that just two weeks ago their title odds were equal to the Eagles’ and better than those of the Broncos, Patriots, Bengals and 49ers.While the season is still young, the 28-year-old Herbert is not. Moreover, the McDaniel addition hasn’t helped at all. And the only logical conclusion is that Herbert is simply missing what makes quarterbacks great. Ernie Accorsi, the former New York Giants general manager who passed away on Saturday, once described the bar like this: “Can they take their team down the field with the championship on the line and into the end zone?” In other words, how do quarterbacks perform in the biggest moments? Well, Herbert is 0-3 in the playoffs for his career, and he performed pretty poorly in each of those three games. But it’s more than just the results. It’s about making his team better than the sum of its parts, even in the regular season. It’s about making his teammates better than they are. Herbert couldn’t even do that against the Cardinals or the Raiders, two clubs universally predicted to finish last in their respective divisions. His supporters might point out that Chargers tight end David Njoku deflected a pass into Herbert’s first interception on Sunday. But the truth is the pass was underthrown and behind Njoku, who was a few yards behind the defense and would’ve had an easy big gain if the ball had been thrown in front of him. Herbert’s second interception, late in the fourth quarter, was an ill-advised, forced throw into traffic to the wrong side of Derius Davis’ hands. Herbert’s lone touchdown pass, to be fair, was outstanding. He evaded pressure, stepped up and sidearmed a dart to tight end Oronde Gadsden, giving the Chargers a short-lived, third quarter lead. But that’s Herbert. For every good play, there’s at least one bad play. One step forward, one step back. And more often than not, the step back comes at a terrible time. Which brings up one more Accorsi-ism: He said the definition of leadership was “watching Johnny Unitas step off the bus.” His point was that the old Baltimore Colts knew they had a shot every game just because Unitas was their quarterback, because of his presence. They were that confident that he’d find a way to pull a game out. There’s just no way the Chargers can say that about Herbert. He’s good yet frustratingly overrated. He’s a white-knuckler, not a man that inspires confidence in the big spots. And that’s a huge problem for the 0-2 Bolts. Their upcoming schedule is brutal — at Buffalo, at Seattle, versus Denver, at Kansas City, at the L.A. Rams, versus Houston and at Baltimore. The Chargers need a great quarterback to avoid bottoming out. But that’s just not who Herbert is. He’s never going to be among the best doing it, much less the best to ever do it. He is, instead, the most overrated. Everything about this season for the Washington Commanders was riding on the health of QB Jayden Daniels. They were sure that their 5-12 disaster a year ago was mostly because he missed 10 games with injuries. They believed that with him healthy again, they could really be a contender again. Then Daniels was carted off the field on Sunday with a dislocated left elbow and a towel over his head. And that moment might mark the figurative end of the Commanders’ season — and Dan Quinn’s coaching tenure in D.C. And yes, it’s that serious, because it’s hard to see how the 0-2 Commanders can recover if Daniels is sidelined for an extended period of time. He looked great against the Cowboys on Sunday before his first-half injury, throwing for 96 yards and running for 69 more. The Commanders were in the game prior to that point. Then they fell apart and lost, 37-20. The extent of Daniels’ injury isn’t known, but as cruel as it may be, it’s hard to see Quinn surviving another season without his biggest star and best weapon. The Commanders don’t have the defense or running game to push through Daniels’ absence. It would take a brilliant coaching job by Quinn to even reach the heights of .500. And that might not be enough to keep him on the job for a fourth year, not after he shook up his coaching staff and took over the defensive playcalling as a way to get the Commanders back on track. Maybe it would be unfair to make Quinn pay for two seasons lost to devastating Daniels injuries. But it sure seems likely that if the Commanders miss the playoffs again for any reason, owner Josh Harris and GM Adam Peters will opt to go into 2027 with a new coach and a fresh start. It felt like all of Chicago went silent when QB Caleb Williams went down on Sunday afternoon. It had to cross everyone’s mind that a special season might have just slipped away for the Bears. The good news after the game — a wretched 9-3 loss to the Minnesota Vikings — was that Williams had only suffered a hamstring injury and was walking without much of a limp. But even Bears coach Ben Johnson admitted that hamstring injuries can be “pretty damaging.” And it’s possible the damage is already done. That’s because even though the extent of Williams’ hamstring injury wasn’t immediately known, hamstring injuries tend to linger. And that’s especially problematic for players who make their living with their legs. Just ask Ravens QB Lamar Jackson, who was never the same last year after pulling his hamstring in Week 4 — an injury from which the Ravens never recovered, either. A fully healthy Williams really is the key to everything in Chicago. He’s grown so much in his first two seasons and looked primed to be an MVP contender this year, now with a stronger grasp of Johnson’s offense. Yes, he was struggling on Sunday in the rain against a tough Vikings defense. But even in that game, he showed how good he is at making something out of nothing and keeping defenses off balance. His presence alone is a huge part of what makes the Bears’ powerful running game go, too. Tyson Bagent might be a fine backup, but he’s just not nearly the QB Williams is. Few are. And unfortunately, it’s possible Williams won’t be himself again this season. That would be a shame, because there was a chance for this to be a super season in Chicago, if you catch my drift. This will get lost in the headlines about Williams, but don’t dismiss the brilliant job Brian Flores’ Vikings defense did against the Bears — and the miracle they’ve pulled off so far this season. A week ago, the Bears put up 59 points and 552 yards. Flores’ defense held that unit to 297 yards and three points. Williams was out there for all but the final seven-and-a-half minutes Sunday, and the Vikings had him throttled. Flores’ defensive masterpiece comes on the heels of a brilliant fourth quarter against Green Bay, in which the Vikings forced two turnovers and twice stopped the Packers on fourth down in the red zone to spark a wild comeback victory. The Vikings are now 2-0 despite some bad quarterback play from Carson Wentz, who took over for injured starter Kyler Murray, and it’s all because of Flores’ defense. Maybe one club out there team will remember that in the coming offseason, and look beyond the fact that he’s suing the NFL for racially discriminatory hiring practices, and offer him a head coaching job. He certainly deserves it. He’s the best defensive coordinator in football right now, and he was a better head coach than you probably remember in Miami, where he guided a rebuilding franchise to a 24-25 record and two winning seasons in three years. He deserves a second chance, regardless of whether that lawsuit is settled. There were signs last season, and they are even more obvious now: These aren’t the same old Philadelphia Eagles. They’re not going to wear teams down with a best-in-the-league offensive line anymore, and they’re not going to beat teams into submission with a punishing, clutch defense. So if they’re going to win as much as they’re used to winning, it’s going to be on the shoulders of quarterback Jalen Hurts. That was really clear on Sunday in Tennessee when Hurts nearly cost the Eagles the game by throwing two terrible interceptions, but then bailed them out with a brilliant final drive. Down 20-17 with 1:56 to go, Hurts drove the Eagles 65 yards for a touchdown, completing 6 of 8 passes for 61 yards and a 3-yard scoring pass to Darius Cooper along the way. That included two brilliant throws to — and catches by — DeVonta Smith, proving they can be a heck of a duo even without A.J. Brown. Afterward, his teammates were clear that Hurts was the main reason the Eagles escaped with a win. “That motherf—er balled out today,” left tackle Jordan Mailata said. “Jalen really got in his bag today.” In NFL Fallout, Ralph Vacchiano breaks down the impact of the biggest events every Sunday.​Latest Sports News from FOX Sports

When you make a throw that Tom Brady calls an “absolute piss missile,” you’re almost certainly going to win his LFG Player of the Game. That was the case for Dak Prescott on Sunday. The Dallas Cowboys quarterback completed 26 of 31 passes for 279 yards and four touchdowns without an interception in their 37-20 win over the Washington Commanders. The throw that Prescott made that Brady called an “absolute piss missile” came on a 35-yard completion to CeeDee Lamb, dropping a deep pass through a tight window along the sideline. That throw was arguably Prescott’s most impressive of the day, helping Dallas move down the field on a drive to extend its lead back to three scores. However, Prescott had a pair of more noteworthy passes on Sunday. He tied and later broke Tony Romo’s record for the most touchdown passes thrown by a player in Cowboys history. His 24-yard touchdown pass to Lamb that gave the Cowboys a 37-20 lead was 249th, surpassing Romo’s mark of 248. Prescott shared nothing but respect for Romo and some other iconic Cowboys quarterbacks, but he also acknowledged that he has more work to do — and he raised the bar for himself. “It’s a blessing,” Prescott told Brady. “Growing up, being a Cowboys fan and watching Tony [Romo] set the bar — and like you said, Troy [Aikman], Roger [Staubach] and some of the greats that have come before me — I’m honored. It’s something I don’t take lightly. Like I told you guys in the production meeting, I’m just getting started. There’s a lot of better things than records, and I think records are meant to be broken. “So, I’ll go and try to set this one high, which makes it harder for the next guy to break. But it’s a huge honor.” That record-setting throw shows just how far Prescott has come since he entered the league as a fourth-round pick in 2016. While Prescott had many people to thank for the achievement, though, there was one person who was top of mind for him on Sunday: his late mother, Peggy. “I just know she would be proud,” Prescott said. “I know she’s looking down. I know she’s celebrating. I’m emotional just thinking about it. But it starts with her. I wouldn’t be the man I am, I wouldn’t have the confidence and I wouldn’t be resilient if it weren’t for everything she taught me and just everything God’s put me through. I’m super thankful for my Lord and Savior, always getting me through everything. Just trying to be the best version of myself each and every day and giving to the people and the world something to follow.” Records aside, Sunday was a much-needed day for the Cowboys. Dallas looked unimpressive in its Week 1 loss to the New York Giants, and a loss to Washington would’ve put the Cowboys in a bad spot. Their next five games are also against teams that were projected to go at least .500 entering the season. So, when you add all of that together, Prescott was proud of how the Cowboys picked up a decisive victory on Sunday. “How resilient we are,” Prescott told Brady on what stood out about the Cowboys’ performance on Sunday. “We understood that we know who we are, but we had to go put it out there on display. We had to show the world and we just wanted to bounce back. “Obviously, we can’t start 0-2, and you can’t start 0-2 in the division. So, just getting back home, getting back in front of our home crowd and getting a win was huge for us and our confidence. We can use that as we go to Rio next week and play a good Ravens team.”​Latest Sports News from FOX Sports