Sometimes, the NFL delivers surprises.
Like the Daniel Jones-led Indianapolis Colts becoming the first team in the Super Bowl era to not record a single punt in their first two games of a season, or the Kansas City Chiefs starting 0-2.
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But sometimes, it is also incredibly predictable.
Like, unfortunately, Joe Burrow going down injured or the best pass rusher in the NFL making one of the best defences in the league definitively the best.
Read on for all of that in our latest instalment of NFL Talking Points!
WHY HEARTBREAKING QB INJURY IS A LESSON FOR THE ENTIRE NFL
The last thing the Bengals wanted to see after Monday’s last-gasp win against the Jaguars was Joe Burrow leaving the locker room on crutches with a boot on his left foot.
But in what could be a season-defining setback for Cincinnati, it was later confirmed on Tuesday that Burrow had suffered a grade three turf toe injury which will require surgery and sideline the superstar quarterback for at least three months.
Backup quarterback Jake Browning was able to lead the Bengals on a game-winning drive and will be better for his first hit-out of the season, but he also threw three interceptions and it goes without saying that the ceiling for this explosive offence is significantly lower without Burrow running the show.
The next month or so will be a particularly brutal welcome back to the NFL for Browning, with the Vikings and defensive wizard Brian Flores up next before a brutal run of games that sees the Bengals face the Broncos, Lions, Packers and Steelers.
Sure, Browning will still have the league’s best receiver duo to throw to in Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins, but there is every chance the Bengals drop at least four of those games and find themselves with a 2-5 record by late October.
There will be some people calling for Cincinnati to trade for Kirk Cousins, but Browning knows the offence and has previously proven himself capable of at least keeping the Bengals above .500.
Cousins, meanwhile, at this point of his career coming off Achilles surgery can’t move around much in the pocket, not that it was a feature of his game before the injury, and that will only be exacerbated behind a Cincinnati offensive line that still struggles to protect Burrow.
Burrow has now taken the second-most sacks (201) among quarterbacks since he entered the NFL in 2020, while Cincinnati has not ranked better than 27th in pass-block win rate during that time.
Meanwhile, the Bengals invested the third-fewest dollars into their offensive line this season.
“Frankly, I think Joe covers up for some of the offensive line woes,” insider Field Yates said on ‘NFL Live’.
“I’d put him up there in the shortlist if not at the top of the list of best in-pocket navigators… Joe just really navigates the pocket brilliantly because of almost a sixth sense of pressure.
“Jake Browning in a serviceable backup. I think the championship equity or deep playoff run equity is out the window for the Bengals with this news.”
It is obviously a tricky balancing act given they had to pay both Chase and Higgins, while the NFL’s sacks leader Trey Hendrickson was also holding out for more money.
Plus, Burrow’s preference to play in shotgun also puts a lot more stress on the offensive line, while an inconsistent run game doesn’t help and only makes the defence key in more on the quarterback.
Either way, the Bengals look destined for another season of being a fringe playoff team while with his now growing injury history, it is hard not to wonder what could have been if Burrow had been able to stay healthy.
It is a point former NFL quarterback Dan Orlovsky made earlier in the week, urging the Bengals — and entire league — to learn a lesson from the trajectory of Burrow’s career.
“Yesterday needs to change the Bengals’ organisational philosophy for the remainder of Joe Burrow’s time,” Orlovsky said.
“Honestly, it should impact all of the NFL because it feels like Joe Burrow is trending towards becoming this generation’s Andrew Luck in a way.
“We are calling the Raiders-Chargers game and in talks with coach Harbaugh yesterday, the thing that stood out was when he said to us, ‘All I think about is, I have to protect Justin Herbert… because if I protect Justin Herbert we can go to the Super Bowl and win it’ and the Bengals have to look at that and go, ‘We haven’t committed to doing that organisationally’.
“If I’m a team in the NFL I’m learning from that and going, ‘I don’t want my young quarterback to have that similar experience’.”
Burrow has battled a string of injuries since first entering the league in 2020, going down in Week 11 of his rookie season with a torn ACL, PCL, MCL and meniscus.
He then suffered a grade two sprained MCL when he was sacked by Von Miller in Super Bowl LVI while his 2023 season was cut short by a torn wrist ligament.
Chargers go 2-0, Bucs win with late TD | 01:20
MIC-DROP MOMENT EXPOSES ‘BIG CONCERN’ FOR CHIEFS
Is it too early to panic about the Kansas City Chiefs?
And given they have started the season 0-2, should star defensive tackle Chris Jones really be trash-talking Jalen Hurts?
In case you missed it, the referee’s microphone picked up Jones telling the Eagles quarterback that he didn’t even have 100 passing yards as Philadelphia was kneeling out the clock in its 20-17 win.
For the record, Hurts did have 101 yards. But Hurts’ response — “we won the f***ing game, shut your a**e up” was perfect.
The Eagles don’t need to throw the ball because they have the best offensive line in football and a generational talent at running back in Saquon Barkley. They are also 2-0.
The Chiefs, on the other hand, are yet to win a game and look to be putting far too much on the plate of Patrick Mahomes.
Mahomes is one of the few quarterbacks capable of putting a team on his back, but at the moment the Chiefs don’t have a go-to answer when the game is on the line and their offence is stuck in the mud.
That isn’t necessarily a huge surprise given their two most explosive weapons in the passing game, Rashee Rice and Xavier Worthy, missed Monday’s game against the Eagles.
But even the usually reliable Mahomes-Travis Kelce connection is no longer a guaranteed first down or touchdown, with a critical drop from the veteran tight end seeing Kansas City turn the ball over late in the fourth quarter.
It is the first since 2014 and the first time in the Mahomes era that the Chiefs have started a season 0-2. The last six times they did? They missed the playoffs.
Meanwhile, since 2020 a total of 82 teams have started a season 0-2 with just 10 making the playoffs and two progressing to the conference championships. None have gone on to play in the Super Bowl.
Now, it is too early to count Kansas City out. After all, as long as No.15 is healthy the Chiefs will always be in with a shot.
But the run game is still inefficient and while Mahomes is always capable of extending plays with his legs, it is never a good thing when the quarterback is the leading rusher on the team through two games.
“There is no more Patrick Mahomes can do through two weeks,” Orlovsky said on ‘NFL Live’.
“I would argue that he has played pretty darn good against two really good defences and the Chiefs are 0-2. No, he has not been perfect but he’s played pretty well. He leads the team in rushing.
“No one is open, there is poor spacing in their pass game… they are poor in short yardage situations.
“You’re sitting here going, ‘What can they hang their hat on?’. That is the big concern right now.”
Meanwhile, even if Worthy may return next week, his shoulder could well be a ticking time bomb with the speedster one big hit away from needing surgery.
Rice, on the other hand, has another four weeks to serve on his suspension and on the other side of the ball, the drop-off in pressure from the Chiefs’ four-man rush is also a concern.
Mahomes is no stranger to performing miracles but even this may be a step too far, especially if the run game continues to struggle with Kareem Hunt and Isiah Pacheco combining for 53 yards in their latest loss to Philadelphia.
“Last year they also weren’t explosive throughout any of the season. One difference was they were efficient running the ball,” ESPN analyst Mina Kimes said on ‘NFL Live’.
“They weren’t explosive but they were consistently able to grind out three, four-yard runs to keep the offence on time. That’s gone right now.
“The Chiefs have faced light boxes 82 per cent of the time… if you play a defence that is ceding the run the way they have and can’t punish them at all on the ground you’ve got no chance, especially if you’ve got no world beaters at receiver.
“So, if you’re going to point to one thing they really have to figure out it’s the run game because right now outside of Patrick Mahomes scrambling it is killing them.”
THE INCREDIBLE HISTORY BEHIND LATEST SURPRISE QB RESURGENCE
First it was Geno Smith in Seattle, then Baker Mayfield with the Bucs and later Sam Darnold with Kevin O’Connell in Minnesota.
Now, it looks like Daniel Jones is on track to be the NFL’s latest rags-to-riches story at the quarterback position.
It is only early and one of those games came against a Miami secondary that has to rank up there with the worst in the league, but the Denver defence that Jones was just able to overcome?
This was a defence which entered Monday allowed the second-fewest points per game, least yards per play and third-fewest passing yards per play in the NFL since the start of the 2024 season.
They also led the league in sacks (81) during that period and against a typically indecisive quarterback like Jones, they should have feasted.
But they didn’t. They weren’t able to turn Jones into the inaccurate, turnover-prone disaster he was at the Giants.
Instead, the Colts have become the first team in the Super Bowl era to not record a single punt in each of their first two games of a season. Who would have picked that?
Part of the credit has to go to the Colts offensive line, which is a far better unit than the one Jones dealt with for most of his time in New York.
But a lot of Jones’ early success also has to do with his new head coach in Shane Steichen, who helped Jalen Hurts take a major leap in Philadelphia and was expected to do the same for former fourth overall pick Anthony Richardson.
Richardson’s struggles in his first two seasons are well-documented and under pressure to keep his job, Steichen and the Colts front office opted for the more experienced Jones with the hope he could take command of the offence and keep them in the playoff hunt.
It was a decision that was met with widespread criticism at the time given Jones seemed like a band-aid solution — and a fragile one at that — for an organisation that prioritised self-preservation over the development of a young quarterback that clearly needed reps.
But as long as the Colts keep winning and Jones keeps executing this offence at a high level without putting the ball in harm’s way, there won’t be any questions.
‘ONLY GONNA GET BETTER’: TERRIFYING REALITY FOR REST OF NFL
Are the Green Bay Packers the best defence in the NFL?
Quite easily — and the proof wasn’t even in what Green Bay did last Friday against Washington.
It came on Monday when Detroit stomped Chicago, scoring 52 points after being held to just 13 the week prior against the Packers.
Everyone knew Green Bay’s defence was elite after that game. But how elite? After all, this was a Lions team that lost offensive coordinator Ben Johnson and starting center Frank Ragnow.
There was an expectation entering the season that they may start slow and struggle to replicate the same efficiency, both on the ground and through the air, that they had with Johnson calling plays.
But their demolition job against the Bears proved that opening week loss to Green Bay said more about the Packers’ defence than any regression for the Lions.
And how about these numbers from ESPN’s Ben Solak? Are they because second-year quarterback Jayden Daniels has also taken a step back after his sensational rookie season?
Part of it would be uninspiring play-calling from Kliff Kingsbury and a slow start from his top receiver in Terry McLaurin, who sat out the majority of the summer due to a contract dispute.
But again there is a common thread here: the Green Bay defence, which former NFL quarterback Tony Romo called “easily” the number one defence in the league right now.
“They’re the standard right now in the NFL,” he said.
“Every year a team comes out and you’re like, ‘OK, that’s the team’. As soon as I was watching them in that first quarter I was like, ‘Wow’.
“They don’t even have to play exotic coverages. They can line up in Cover-3 and rally to the ball like no team.
“It was like the Eagles in the Super Bowl last year. They’re the standard right now in the NFL. They’re good in all three phases. They have a good coaching staff, a really good quarterback but this defence is number one right now in the NFL easily.”
The scary part? Micah Parsons is still only just ramping up and Packers safety Xavier McKinney warned “it’s only gonna get better”.
“I don’t even know how many snaps he got today but it wasn’t even every snap like he’s gonna get to eventually, so as he keeps building, we’re just gonna get better the more and more he’s on the field,” he said.
Next up for the Packers? The Cleveland Browns, led by the turnover-prone Joe Flacco.
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