A quarter of a way into the NFL season, we have two teams remaining from the ranks of the unbeaten. Also, catching up on the MLB wild card series.
The NFL’s Week 4 slate was one with a lot of surprising twists and turns. It also saw us with just two teams remaining unbeaten, with one each in the AFC and NFC.
The Minnesota Vikings continue their surprising success, holding off the Green Bay Packers in Jordan Love’s return in a 31-29 victory. They represent the NFC as the lone unbeaten team remaining.
No surprise in the AFC, as the Kansas City Chiefs are the lone unbeaten team. It did not come easy however, as Patrick Mahomes and company had to overcome a 10-0 deficit early in the first quarter to the Los Angeles Chargers. Injuries are starting to pile up for this team as well, with Rashee Rice suffering a knee injury early in the contest.
The first team to depart from the unbeaten ranks was the Pittsburgh Steelers, who fell to last year’s Comeback Player of the Year (can you guess who it is without looking it up?) That’s right, the Joe Flacco-led Indianapolis Colts won by a final score of 27-24. Flacco came in relief of Anthony Richardson, who exited the game due to injury.
The next unbeaten to fall was the Buffalo Bills on Sunday Night Football. With Josh Allen an early (but also perennial) contender for the NFL’s Most Valuable Player Award, the Bills had soundly beaten their opponents the past couple weeks. However, Sunday night would see them on the other end of that beating.
Fueled by the Baltimore Ravens’ cheat code of a backfield, Derrick Henry ran for nearly 200 yards on the Bills en route to a 35-10 victory.
The final unbeaten to fall would also be the final game of Week 4, with the Seattle Seahawks losing to the Detroit Lions. Quarterbacks Geno Smith and Jared Goff were both incredibly efficient in the matchup, with the latter not having a single incomplete pass the entire night.
Speaking of elite quarterback play, rookie Jayden Daniels has been sensational the last two games for the Washington Commanders. After putting up a 91% (!!!) completion percentage against the Cincinnati Bengals in their Monday Night matchup, he followed that up with another incredibly efficient 86% completion percentage in a commanding 42-14 road blowout over the Arizona Cardinals.
It’s early, but Daniels is the clear favorite for Offensive Rookie of the Year as things stand; his top college receiver turned division rival Malik Nabers is not too far behind though.
Daniels has led the Commanders to a 3-1 start, putting them currently at the top of the NFC East. NFL is so predictable and scripted though, am I right?
The most “interesting” (and not in a good way) game of the weekend goes to the Broncos-Jets matchup. Rookie Bo Nix passed for 60 yards – no, I’m not kidding – but also scored the only touchdown of the game; also his first career passing touchdown. That was enough to win the game by a final score of 10-9, with Aaron Rodgers and company coming up short. Don’t you love this sport?
It looked like the Titans-Dolphins game was going to match the offensive excitement, with no touchdowns scored in the first half of the contest. Pro Bowl quarterback Tyler Huntley struggled in his first start with Miami, as the offense is clearly missing starter Tua Tagovailoa.
Will Levis continued to struggle before a shoulder injury called upon Mason Rudolph to rally the Titans. We did still manage to get our weekly meme-worthy screenshot and an early interception from Levis, but Rudolph led the Titans to 22 points in the second half en route to a 31-12 victory.
The trade deadline is not for a couple more weeks, but some players are already being discussed with the trajectory of certain teams clear a quarter into the season. Along with the weekly updates on Jets (kinda) pass rusher Hasson Reddick, there is another name brought up in trade talks this week; Raiders star receiver Davante Adams.
Las Vegas currently sits at 2-2, but the talks of Adams being unhappy have been well documented over the past couple seasons. The Raiders have been unwilling to move him in the past, but that appears to have changed – for the right price, of course.
From Adams perspective, the early thought is he’d once again like to reunite with a familiar quarterback. That means two preferred options: yet another NFL reunion with his college quarterback Derek Carr and the Saints, or reuniting with Aaron Rodgers in the Big Apple. Those aren’t the only teams in the mix, but this will be worth monitoring over the next month to see if Adams is moved before the deadline.
For once, the Thursday Night Football matchup looks fairly enticing. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers sit at 3-1 atop the NFC South, and could take an early lead in the division if they can beat the Atlanta Falcons. The Buccaneers are coming off a convincing win over the Philadelphia Eagles, and the Falcons won off a last second field goal from Younghue Koo to beat the Saints.
The Sunday slate of Week 5 games starts early, with the first of a series of matchups in London being played during the weekend. Aaron Rodgers has faced the Minnesota Vikings plenty over his career, but this time he’ll be doing it overseas while playing for the New York Jets. Rodgers will look to knock off the NFC’s lone undefeated team, an old rival of his.
In the early window of games, the marquee matchup features two 3-1 AFC teams facing off. There are a lot of storylines in the matchup between the Bills and Texans. Whether it’s Josh Allen vs CJ Stroud, Stefon Diggs against his former team, or just the fact that this is two playoff teams from last year, many will be keeping an eye on this one.
It might not be the highest level of play, but a matchup that’s interesting from a narrative perspective is the Carolina Panthers heading to Soldier Field to face the Chicago Bears, their infamous trade partner. For those who don’t remember, the Bears originally owned the first pick in the 2022 NFL Draft. The Carolina Panthers sent them a haul for the rights to select quarterback Bryce Young, who has since been benched in favor of Andy Dalton after just two seasons.
Carolina will see many of the assets they gave to Chicago across from them, headlined by former wide receiver DJ Moore and rookie quarterback Caleb Williams. It’s pretty clear that the Bears won this trade, but it will be fun to see these two teams square off with most of the capital already being used.
The primetime games at the end of the weekend are promising as well. On Sunday Night Football, the Steelers will look to bounce back from their first loss of the season in a matchup with the Dallas Cowboys. At 2-2, Dak Prescott and company will look to stay in the division race early on with the Commanders ahead of the pack through four weeks.
After a very strong start to the season, the New Orleans Saints dropped their last two games in last second fashion. With injuries starting to pile up on the offensive line and hampering their offense, they’ll face Patrick Mahomes and the Kansas City Chiefs on Monday night in Arrowhead Stadium, which will conclude Week 5’s slate.
Over in the MLB, the playoff field is set with some of it coming down to the wire. The very last game of the regular season with the New York Mets and the Atlanta Braves playing 2 games back-to-back on the same day had a lot of implications. If both teams won one of the games, they would both make the playoffs, simple as that. However, it got complicated because of the Arizona Diamondbacks who stood to make the playoffs if either the Braves or the Mets won both of their games. Needless to say, that didn’t happen and the defending 2023 NL Champions will not make the 2024 postseason.
The MLB postseason moves fast, and the wildcard series is already almost over with many shocking outcomes. The Houston Astros who before this had been to seven straight American League Championship Series were knocked out by the upstart Detroit Tigers. The Tigers are the Cinderella team that no one expected to be here, they sold some of their best players at the deadline trading veterans for prospects and somehow made a run to advance to the American League Division Series to meet their division rival Cleveland Guardians. The Brewers held on to force a game three Thursday night in Milwaukee. The Baltimore Orioles, who had World Series expectations, were shockingly torn apart by the Kansas City Royals who lost 106 games last year. Over in Atlanta, the Braves who were the favorites to win the World Series entering this year got knocked out by the red-hot San Diego Padres. The Braves did have some horrible injury luck losing their two best players at the begging of the season Ronald Acuna along with Spencer Strider.
