Every week this NFL season, we will break down the highs and lows—and everything in between—from the most recent slate of pro football. This week, the Bears offense backed up Ben Johnson’s bravado, Josh Allen bested the hyped Houston D, the revamped Ravens offense came out hot, Deshaun Watson was (still) embarrassingly bad, and more. Welcome to Winners and Losers.
Loser: Houston’s Bully Reputation
Finally, Josh Allen has a win over Houston’s vaunted defense. Allen’s Bills beat the Texans in a 36-31 thriller that came down to the final possession. Allen looked like the best player in football, finishing with four total touchdowns and 357 total yards from scrimmage—334 passing, 23 rushing—a stat line that is even more impressive because it came against a Houston defense that has consistently given him trouble. In his last 35 regular-season starts, two of Allen’s five worst games by passer rating have come against the Texans, and Houston held the Bills’ buzz saw offense to under 21 points in those two games.
These Buffalo-Houston games have typically been defined by the Texans’ pass rushers having their way with Buffalo’s offensive line and Allen coming apart when he’s under duress. This time around, Allen didn’t wait until he felt pressure to turn into a playmaker. Allen consistently got himself outside of the pocket when the first read wasn’t there, extended plays, and created his own good fortune with his mobility and arm talent. He completed four of his five throws for 62 yards outside of the pocket Sunday—including this 10/10 degree-of-difficulty throw to tight end Dalton Kincaid—and he scrambled for a 21-yard score against perfect coverage from the Texans defense.
Those kinds of plays will break the will of most defenses, but Houston is typically too fast, too physical, and too poised to allow an offense to beat it with backyard football. But even when the Texans did manage to keep Allen in the pocket, he was too dialed in for good coverage or quick pressure to matter. This 43-yard touchdown strike to DJ Moore was only possible because of Allen’s incredible arm strength, and he delivered the ball from a shrinking pocket with juuuuuuuussssssttttt enough velocity to avoid getting picked off.
Allen didn’t just beat this elite defense; he made them look bad. We’re simply not used to seeing that in recent years—no matter the opponent. Buffalo’s average of 7.9 yards per play is the most Houston’s defense has allowed since head coach DeMeco Ryans was hired in 2023. Sunday was the first time Ryans’s defense allowed over 400 yards of total offense to an opponent since late in the 2024 season, when they were blown out by Lamar Jackson and the Ravens on Christmas Day.
And yet, Houston still almost pulled out the win in Week 1. Houston held a one-point lead with less than two minutes left when Allen threw up what should have been the game-ending interception, his deep pass overshooting his intended receiver in the end zone, and falling perfectly into cornerback Kamari Lassiter’s hands. Lassiter inexplicably bobbled the ball and it hit the turf as Lassiter landed on his back in the end zone, giving Allen a second chance. On the very next play, Allen throws an absolute seed to receiver Joshua Palmer—who ran right by Lassiter—for what would wind up being the game-winning score. That two-play sequence from Lassiter perfectly captured how uncharacteristically bad Houston’s defense was on Sunday. The consequences of having an off day against a future Hall of Fame quarterback.
This loss washes away a mostly excellent game from Houston’s offense, and specifically from quarterback C.J. Stroud. Stroud completed 68 percent of his passes for 274 yards and a pair of scores.
In leading the Texans to 31 points, it seemed like Stroud shook off the disastrous four-interception performance in last season’s divisional-round loss to the Patriots. But when it mattered most, after getting the ball back trailing by five with 96 seconds on the clock and multiple timeouts, Stroud couldn’t deliver. He drove Houston into the red zone, but took a pair of sacks—including a strip sack that sealed the win for Buffalo. Stroud will have to own the responsibility of coming up short in a key situation, but he’ll have to share the blame with a Houston defense that should be able to deliver a win any time their offense hands them 31 points—even if a former MVP is on the other sideline. —Diante Lee
Winner: Ben Johnson’s High-Flying Offense
When Johnson went on the record this summer saying that he wanted his Chicago Bears to have the NFL’s highest-scoring offense ever, it felt a bit like preseason bluster. Yes, he has an ascending, dynamic quarterback entering year three in Caleb Williams. Yes, the Bears’ running game was a force last season. But … ever? To surpass Peyton Manning’s 2013 Broncos, Johnson’s Bears would need to average more than 37.9 points per game.
On Sunday against the Panthers, the Bears hit that mark by the end of the third quarter, on their way to a 59-37 win, tying the 2019 Ravens for the most points scored in Week 1 in this quarter century. It was the most points the Bears have scored in any game since 1980.
Chicago scored eight offensive touchdowns against Carolina, nearly delivering a 60-burger without the aid of a return touchdown by the defense or special teams. And it all started with Williams, who should find his MVP odds skyrocketing after Week 1. He was spectacular as both a passer and a runner. He threw for only 269 yards, but he was wildly efficient—he had the highest total passing EPA of any qualified quarterback so far in Week 1 and the second-highest EPA per dropback of his career. The accuracy issues that popped up at times during his first two seasons were gone against Carolina. Just check out the way he dropped this ball in for Cole Kmet for a 22-yard touchdown—against double coverage, no less.
But we’ll remember this matchup for the way Williams and the Bears’ running game took over. Chicago rushed for 291 yards—the most by any team in Week 1 by far—and averaged an impressive 7.5 yards per rush attempt. D’Andre Swift, who received a three-year, $33.75 million contract extension on Friday, scored three touchdowns, the first three-score game of his career. And Carolina had absolutely no answer for Williams’s speed. Per Next Gen Stats, Williams reached 20.8 mph on his 29-yard touchdown run in the second quarter, and he reached 20.35 mph on his other touchdown run, giving him two of the top 20 fastest plays of the week.
It was thrilling to watch Johnson’s offense back up his big talk. The unspoken part in Johnson’s preseason proclamation, though, is that he seems to know that Chicago’s offense will have to put up big points every week to win. Chicago’s defense ranked 25th by DVOA last season. It was a boom-or-bust group that was bad on a down-to-down basis and gave up explosive pass plays at an alarming rate but profited off a league-high 33 takeaways. On Sunday, Chicago allowed Bryce Young to throw for 361 yards and three touchdowns, with an average air yards per attempt of 8.9—nearly 2 yards better than his career average.
If Week 1 is any indication, the Bears will be the RedZone must-watch team of 2026, for better or for worse. —Lindsay Jones
Loser: Dallas’s “Improved” Defense
My dad once paid a stripper four racks in three hours because she gave him a hug when he walked in. OK, she eventually gave him more than a hug, but that initial embrace was all it took to pin him and his wallet down for the night. He told me he was in love and that he met my “new stepmom.” (That was before they took his fingerprints under iPhone flashlights to make sure he didn’t dodge the credit card bill, but he doesn’t remember that.) What I learned that night is how easy it is for a man to fall head-over-heels for Cherry (was her name Cherry?) or any other dancer in a strip club.
This brings me to Sunday Night Football. This offseason, we all quickly fell in love with the new and improved Cowboys defense, coordinated by 34-year-old wunderkind Christian Parker. He had that Vic Fangio pedigree, and, best of all, he wasn’t Matt Eberflus! But after the Giants cut through Parker’s new Cowboys defense like a knife through whipped cream in a 28-20 season-opening win, it’s clear we all got taken—just like my dad did that night in Las Vegas.
Sunday night marked the Cowboys’ worst defensive performance by EPA per drive since 2017, and, somehow, it felt even worse than that. Part of the argument to buy into the Cowboys going into the year was that the defense simply couldn’t get worse than what we saw in 2025. But it definitely doesn’t look any better!
There were constant coverage breakdowns in the secondary, leaving the Giants receivers and tight ends absolutely wide open, and Parker simply refused to dial up the heat even though Dallas had success when it did blitz. The Cowboys created pressure on five of seven blitzes in the first three quarters, including the play when rookie safety Caleb Downs clobbered Giants quarterback Jaxson Dart. Dallas also got stops on two more blitzes in the fourth quarter. Dart, perhaps best known for taking unnecessary hits and combusting under pressure, had ALL DAY to throw and Dallas’s coverage busts made it look easy for the second-year QB.
I can’t imagine how Parker’s debut as a DC could have gone any worse, honestly. He and the Cowboys defense need a bounce-back at home against Washington next week like my dad still needs Cherry’s real name. —Austin Gayle
Winner: Declan Doyle
There are 17 offensive play callers who are either working with a new team this season or doing the job for the first time. No one made a better first impression than Baltimore’s new play caller, Declan Doyle, who engineered touchdown drives on four of the Ravens’ first five offensive possessions against Indianapolis. Those scores effectively won the game for Baltimore halfway through the second quarter.
After months of offseason chatter about how much pressure quarterback Lamar Jackson and this Ravens offense are under this season, Doyle and this unit reintroduced themselves as AFC front-runners and reminded everyone just how easy the game can look with Jackson in the huddle. Baltimore finished with 506 yards of total offense and 41 points, second only to Chicago’s blistering 552 yards and 59 points on Sunday. Baltimore never seemed to break a sweat—even after receiver Zay Flowers left the game with a hamstring injury.
Doyle didn’t have to do anything truly unorthodox to chase Indianapolis’s defense off the field. He just applied popular concepts that work for other great offenses to a roster that features a two-time MVP in Jackson and one of the most productive running backs of all time in Derrick Henry.
The Ravens had 10 dropbacks from under center in Week 1, which tied for the ninth most in the league through Sunday’s games and was the most Jackson has ever had in a single game. He averaged a ridiculous 14.3 yards per attempt with a 116.7 passer rating from under center. Given how effective he was on Sunday, why did one of the league’s best passers have to play through eight seasons and three offensive coordinators who didn’t seem to trust him to operate from under center?
Jackson’s ability to throw from these under-center looks also makes things easy for Henry. He averaged 6.8 yards per carry on under-center runs on Sunday and finished the game with 130 yards and a pair of scores on those 19 carries (144 yards on 24 carries overall). Henry is an ageless wonder and unstoppable no matter what scheme he plays in, but things looked especially easy for him against the Colts as a result of Doyle’s play calling. It felt like the first defenders to touch Henry were defensive backs, exactly what a defense doesn’t want when facing a 250-pound back who moves like a freight train.
Last season was a mess for this offense because of injuries and bad luck, but it looks like the Ravens are back—and somehow even better than before. —Lee
Loser: The Vikings’ Quarterback Plan
Minnesota was one of the biggest winners of the week, pulling off a 39-22 come-from-behind win over division rival Green Bay. But the Vikings will head into Week 2, and possibly beyond, with major questions at quarterback.
Starter Kyler Murray left the game with a concussion after taking a brutal helmet-to-helmet hit in the first quarter. Murray had been scrambling and was mid-slide when he was hit by two Packers defenders. The impact of the collision knocked Murray’s helmet off, and he landed awkwardly on the turf at U.S. Bank Stadium. He was able to walk off the field and into the locker room but was fairly quickly ruled out for the rest of the game.
That left the Vikings with quarterback Carson Wentz, who went 2-3 as a starter for them last year before he suffered a season-ending shoulder injury. Wentz was largely an afterthought throughout the 2026 preseason as Murray and J.J. McCarthy battled for the starting job. Last week, Kevin O’Connell declared Wentz to be QB2 ahead of McCarthy. Wentz was solid against Green Bay after Murray’s exit, throwing three touchdowns and no picks, and he showed that he knows the no. 1 rule of playing quarterback in Minnesota: just throw the ball to Justin Jefferson. The Vikings’ star receiver caught eight passes for 92 yards and two touchdowns. Jefferson caught a two-point conversion midway through the fourth quarter that gave the Vikings a 25-22 lead.
Minnesota’s defense did the rest, hitting Packers QB Jordan Love 15 times (with four sacks), forcing Green Bay into two second-half turnovers, and holding the Packers’ run game to just 3.1 yards per carry. (Packers coach Matt LaFleur easily could have been our loser here. He took heat for the Packers’ lackluster performance in a wild-card loss last season and then quickly received a contract extension, only for his team to give up a 22-10 lead in Week 1. Oof.)
For Minnesota, there are worse formulas than relying on an all-world receiver and a Brian Flores defense, but O’Connell and the Vikings can’t be feeling great about their quarterback plan. There’s a reason the team didn’t want to go into 2026 with McCarthy and Wentz and went after Murray in free agency: They hoped that Murray’s skills as a dynamic runner and elite deep-ball passer could elevate an offense that never got off the ground last season. —Jones
Loser: Deshaun Watson (Unsurprisingly and in Multiple Senses of the Word!)
Deshaun Watson rewarded the Browns for their faith in him as their starting quarterback by throwing an interception five plays into his 2026 season.
Cleveland went on to lose the game, 34-10, to Trevor Lawrence and the Jaguars. But for the grace of Atlanta’s Cooper Rush and some garbage time stat-padding, Watson might have put up the worst performance of any Week 1 starter. And still, Browns coach Todd Monken wasn’t ready to put a quarterback switch on the table.
“I’d rather just talk about today, because I haven’t had time even to look at the tape,” Monken told reporters postgame.
Personally, I would start the review process with that first-quarter pick, this strip sack, and the second-quarter play where Watson took a delay of game penalty for not getting the ball snapped on time, then shrugged his shoulders and looked around like he was confused.
Watson, who has not been a productive starting quarterback since 2020—six whole years ago—was both bad enough against the Bills’ third-string defense in a preseason game to be booed by Cleveland fans and whiny enough to complain about it. He still (somehow) won the starting job over Shedeur Sanders, in part based on the “logic” that two road games to begin the Browns’ schedule would give him a soft entry away from the home fans who can’t stand him. Cleveland plays at Tampa Bay next week.
As Watson has not been nearly good enough to play himself into the space where his disgraceful personal history would be glossed over as some sort of Adversity to be Overcome, he was also pilloried pregame on ESPN’s Sunday NFL Countdown.
For most teams and players, this would all add up to an especially notable embarrassment. But for the Browns, it’s just Sunday. And for those keeping track at home, Watson’s historically awful contract will be laying waste to the team’s salary cap for three more years. —Nora Princiotti
Winners: Detroit’s Spider-Men
Lions linebacker Derrick Barnes delivered the stadium walk-In to end all stadium walk-ins, showing up to Ford Field on Sunday morning in a full Spider-Man suit. He was accompanied by his young son, Trey, who was also dressed as Spider-Man. It turns out the Lions needed a superhero-esque performance to outlast the Saints, and Barnes delivered with an interception, a sack, a tackle for a loss, two pass breakups, and an iconic end zone celebration.
The Lions nearly had the worst loss of the day (non-Chargers edition). Detroit entered the game as a 7-point home favorite, and built a 21-0 lead early in the third quarter, before New Orleans’s second-year QB Tyler Shough caught fire. He threw for 252 yards and two touchdowns (and a pick, by Barnes) after halftime, tying the game at 24 and forcing overtime. The Lions scored first, on a Jared Goff pass to Amon-Ra St. Brown, but Shough led the Saints right down the field for a touchdown of their own. New Orleans went for two and the win, but Shough’s pass went out of bounds in the back of the end zone, allowing Detroit to hold on.
And thank goodness. Had they lost, superstition might have kept the Barneses from dressing like superheroes ever again. —Jones
Loser: The Chargers’ Good Vibes
We all should have known better than to trust the Chargers with the high expectations that came with adding offensive coordinator Mike McDaniel and defensive coordinator Chris O’Leary—who worked closely with former Chargers defensive play caller Jesse Minter—this offseason. Those two hires, especially McDaniel, felt like they’d give the Chargers a real edge this season.
It didn’t look that way in Week 1. Losing 26-14 at home to the Cardinals, a team that entered the season with the longest Super Bowl odds, is a massive faceplant. Los Angeles looked as sloppy on Sunday as they did in their wild-card loss to the Patriots in January. O’Leary’s defense couldn’t get off the field in the first half, allowing Jacoby Brissett to lead two separate drives that each spanned at least 10 plays and six minutes of game time. Arizona ultimately held the ball for 19 of the first 30 minutes. That imbalance was an indictment of the Chargers’ run defense, which should be one of this team’s strengths. Against a trio of massive interior players like Dalvin Tomlinson, Jamaree Caldwell and Teair Tart—each of whom is over 315 pounds—the Cardinals averaged 4.5 yards per carry in the first half. The Chargers gave Arizona’s rookie running back Jeremiyah Love far too much space, making it easy for him to create dynamic runs like this one:
The Chargers offense will probably take more of the blame, however, for this loss. That group never found a sustainable rhythm, in large part because of issues with the interior of the offensive line that made it impossible for Los Angeles to do much with its run game. Second-year running back Omarion Hampton averaged less than half a yard before contact on his dozen carries—a stat that’s even worse considering the lack of talent on the Cardinals’ defensive front. McDaniel’s offense needs explosive runs to set the foundation for the rest of his scheme, and it’s going to be impossible to generate those long rushes if they keep getting crushed in the trenches.
Without a dependable rushing attack, Justin Herbert found himself trying to be a hero with his team chasing multiple possessions. (Does this sound familiar?) Herbert was sacked twice in the fourth quarter while trying to mount a comeback, and he averaged just 5.8 yards on his 12 pass attempts in the fourth. He threw an awful interception on a deep pass into double coverage that effectively ended any realistic chance for the Chargers to come back.
Head coach Jim Harbaugh, notably known for hyperbole, recently called his shot by saying Herbert will be the greatest quarterback ever. And sure, Herbert has already had an impressive career considering how often he’s played (and won) with an average (or worse) supporting cast, but he’ll have to play better than this—and the offense will need to support him better than this—to even get close to that conversation.
McDaniel will have his hands full trying to craft an offense with three linemen that might not be starting-quality players in the NFL, and the pressure on O’Leary to deliver a good defense will ratchet up after this disappointing performance—especially when Minter’s defense in Baltimore played well enough to essentially win their game in the first half. The preseason hype machine promised a dynamic brand of Chargers football, but Sunday felt as flat as ever. —Lee
Winner: The Bengals’ Roster Building
If we’re going on pure talent, Joe Burrow is a top-six, if not top-four, quarterback. His no. 1 receiver (Ja’Marr Chase) is his best friend from college, and his WR2 (Tee Higgins) is probably the best no. 2 in the game. Running back Chase Brown is solid, and offensive tackles Amarius Mims and Orlando Brown Jr. are good. On paper, Cincinnati has everything you need to be a top-five offense.
It was the Bengals defense that needed help heading into 2026, and Cincinnati aggressively went to work fixing a unit that finished last season ranked 30th by DVOA. They sent a first-round pick to the Giants for nose tackle Dexter Lawrence II and signed safety Bryan Cook, edge rusher Boye Mafe, and defensive tackle Jonathan Allen in free agency.
The big defensive moves that Bengals de facto GM Duke Tobin (actual title: director of player personnel) made immediately started paying off. On Sunday against Tampa Bay, Mafe had a sack and fumble recovery, and Cook recovered a Baker Mayfield fumble into the end zone, which flipped the game in the Bengals’ favor in the second quarter. The Bengals might finally have the complete roster they need to make up for questionable play calling decisions down the stretch by head coach Zac Taylor.
Cincinnati’s offense drove 70-plus yards and scored on two of its four drives in the first half. Everything clicked on those possessions as the Burrow-Chase-Higgins-Brown combination worked like a dream. The defense, meanwhile, was making Mayfield’s life hell. By early in the third quarter, the Bengals led 27-10. And then the offense stalled. Taylor’s unit, with Burrow, Chase, Higgins, and Brown all healthy, averaged –0.19 EPA per play in the second half. Only the Patriots offense (–0.22) had a worse second half going into Monday Night Football.
The Bengals won the turnover battle 4-1 but won the game by only six points. The roster’s talent level clearly isn’t the issue, especially now with the new starters on defense. Please, help me understand exactly what edge Taylor is giving the Bengals. Where is Taylor elevating or even just maximizing the gargantuan talents Tobin has given him on offense?
Burrow’s “evolution” was supposed to have him under center more, yet Cincy ran just nine (9) plays from under center, per TruMedia. Cincinnati’s success rate on those plays? Zero percent.
I want to believe in the Bengals. The Burrow-Chase-Higgins trio is must-see TV and is easy for anyone who isn’t a fan of another AFC North team to root for. But we can’t forget that the Bengals would have lost this game if Mayfield hadn’t gotten so reckless. The Dolphins, Rams, Chargers, and Titans all had more efficient second-half offenses this week. Even looking at the full game, Cincy’s offense ranked in the middle of the pack by EPA per drive and success rate for Week 1 against a pretty mediocre Bucs defense.
Next, the Bengals find themselves as early 2.5-point road dogs against a much better defense in Houston. After losing my shirt by betting the Bucs in Week 1, I’ll be betting my underwear and pants against Taylor and the Bengals versus the Texans. —Gayle
Loser: The Rams’ Big-Brain Plan to Beat Jet Lag and Win the Super Bowl
The Rams’ season hasn’t gotten off to an ideal start, and that’s before you consider that the team flew for 32 hours in a span of under three days.
Los Angeles’s 27-7 loss to San Francisco in Melbourne on Thursday night, a.k.a. Friday morning local time, was the worst Week 1 loss by a preseason Super Bowl favorite in half a century. It was also quarterback Matthew Stafford’s lowest-scoring game as a Ram and the team’s first double-digit loss since 2024. Definitely a bad result for a group that had spent most of the offseason getting hyped up as a superteam.
Another blow came Sunday, when sources told The Ringer’s Tom Pelissero that defensive end Myles Garrett will have arthroscopic surgery and miss at least the next four games on injured reserve. Garrett, who came to the Rams in a blockbuster trade on June 1, didn’t record a tackle or sack and had just three total pressures in 39 defensive snaps against the 49ers.
Garrett’s absence now puts plenty of pressure on Aaron Donald, who did not go to Australia for the season opener as he continues to get back into playing shape after unretiring in August, to make a quick return. The Rams’ next four games are against the Giants, Broncos, Eagles, and Bills, three of whom were playoff teams last season and all of whom have strong offensive lines.
The team’s sleep science expertise took an L as well.
Two days before they played in Australia, a country that is famously far away from basically everything, the Rams had not left Los Angeles yet. This was part of a years-in-the-making strategy, hyped up in the press, designed to reduce the impact of jet lag on players traveling halfway around the world for a single game by keeping their body clocks on local time. According to ESPN’s Peter Schrager, the Rams sent 15 staffers to Australia and back over the past two years and tracked their sleep cycles along the way. Based on those results, head coach Sean McVay decided on the quick trip approach. The Rams touched down in Melbourne around 24 hours before kickoff.
It’s not clear whether the Rams staffers who were guinea pigs were asked to do physical activity that could simulate the strain of an NFL game. It’s hard to imagine they were. By the time kickoff came, though, Los Angeles’s players looked, well, like a bunch of people who’d recently gotten off a 16-hour red-eye.
The 49ers, meanwhile, fresh off an absolute doozy of an offseason, took the more traditional route to long-haul travel and went to Melbourne almost a week before the game to give players time to recover from the flight and adjust to the major time difference.
It’s a long season. The 49ers also deserve credit for playing a game on their terms, relying on defense and a consistent run game. A Kyle Shanahan team in a good rhythm is always tough to beat. Of course, it’s also a bit annoying that the NFL’s relentless thirst for new markets turned a marquee game into a jet lag management contest with very little suspense. It’s not the start the Rams wanted. At least they’re sleeping in their own beds again. —Princiotti
