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After just 11 games, Davante Adams’ time with the New York Jets has come to an end. CBS Sports NFL insider Jonathan Jones reports that the Jets are officially releasing the 32-year-old. This release comes after the club initially tried to shop the veteran receiver.

There were two more years remaining on Adams’ deal with New York, and he carried cap hits of $38.3 million in both 2025 and 2026, which made this departure a near certainty. With his release, the Jets take on a $8,362,664 million dead cap hit in 2025 but save $29,978,002, per Spotrac.

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Davante Adams
NYJ • WR • #17
TAR
141
REC
85
REC YDS
1063
REC TD
8
FL
0
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The Jets traded for Adams prior to the trade deadline this past season, sending a conditional third-round pick to the Las Vegas Raiders to reunite Aaron Rodgers with his top wideout. The move didn’t help the Jets like the franchise hoped it would, as New York finished with a 5-12 record while general manager Joe Douglas and head coach Robert Saleh were fired.

In 14 total games played for the Raiders and Jets last season, Adams caught 85 passes for 1,063 yards and eight touchdowns. It marked his fifth-straight season with 1,000 yards receiving, and Adams’ 103 career receiving touchdowns are the sixth-most through a player’s first 11 seasons all time.

With Adams now on the open market, let’s analyze a few potential landing spots for the six-time Pro Bowler.

2025 NFL Draft rumors: Jets, Giants interested in trading with Titans for No. 1 overall pick
Jordan Dajani
2025 NFL Draft rumors: Jets, Giants interested in trading with Titans for No. 1 overall pick
Davante Adams landing spots
By Garrett Podell

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Green Bay Packers
There’s been a public effort by the faces of the Packers to recruit Adams to return home to Green Bay. Packers All-Pro safety Xavier McKinney tweeted “Mannnnnnnnnn pull back up!” while tagging Adams’ account directly after he spoke about Green Bay’s potential desire to add a veteran receiver in the offseason on the “Up and Adams” show with Kay Adams. Adams himself highlighted a veteran wide receiver as one of Green Bay’s areas of need with the franchise fielding the youngest team in the NFL in both 2023 and 2024. Adams pointed out that wide receivers Romeo Doubs (suffered multiple head injuries, including one known concussion) and Christian Watson (torn ACL) are question marks in terms of health entering the 2025 season.

“You’ve got to see what’s up with Doubs and Christian. Obviously Romeo having a few plays this year where he ended up a little banged up and hit his head on the ground, you never know. It’s kind of that Tua situation where it could be a week, or it can extend out longer than that. We’ll see. I’m praying for him either way,” Adams said on the “Up and Adams” show.

“It kind of depends on the health of the team. It’s looking right now like obviously they might need some receiver help in one way or the other just based off what they have available. … Maybe a veteran or something in there, we’ll see.”

Packers Pro Bowl running back Josh Jacobs echoed the sentiment multiple times that Green Bay needs a veteran wide receiver on Radio Row at the Super Bowl in New Orleans. When quarterback Jordan Love was directly asked on the “Up and Adams” show about Adams, Love, who sat on the bench for the final two years of Adams’ Packers tenure, said he wouldn’t be mad at a Green Bay reunion.

“I’m not mad about it,” Love said. “Davante, that’s my guy. Obviously, I was with him for a good amount of time there in Green Bay my first couple seasons. I know exactly what type of player his. Phenomenal guy. … Just a great guy. You see it every week, the playmaking ability that he has. When I was with him, he dropped three passes in the years I saw him, so he is just a phenomenal receiver. Creates so much separation off the line, and then that’s his game. Killing guys off the line and making crazy catches and making big time plays. He’s a phenomenal receiver.”

This move makes a lot of sense. The Packers young receivers can learn a thing or two from one of the NFL’s most precise route runners, and Love gets a go-to target in crucial third-down and red zone situations.

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Pittsburgh Steelers
The Pittsburgh Steelers were in hot pursuit of San Francisco wide receiver Brandon Aiyuk last offseason before he re-signed with the 49ers on a four-year, $120 million extension just before the start of the 2024 regular season. Van Jefferson wasn’t able to provide nearly enough veteran juice alongside youngsters in George Pickens and Calvin Austin this past season. Adams could help Pickens get his head on straight while teaching both him and Austin some finer points on route-running. Adams could also serve as a safety blanket for whoever the Steelers move forward with as their quarterback in 2025, perhaps Rodgers, with both Russell Wilson and Justin Fields set to become free agents.

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Washington Commanders
Washington reached agreement on a trade for Deebo Samuel this week, but the work at receiver may not be done. The two non-Terry McLaurin starting wide receivers — Dyami Brown and Olamide Zaccheaus — are free agents this offseason. Washington is also equipped to enter the 2025 offseason with the sixth-most effective cap space in the NFL. That gives them plenty of resources to utilize after quarterback Jayden Daniels’ 2024 Offensive Rookie of the Year of season, a year in which Daniels set the NFL rookie records for completion percentage (69%) and rushing yards (891).

Washington was a few pieces short of reaching the Super Bowl in the first season of Daniels’ career, falling against the Philadelphia Eagles in the NFC Championship game. Adams could provide the Commanders young quarterback another Pro Bowl-caliber option alongside McLaurin.

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Denver Broncos
Denver Broncos rookie quarterback Bo Nix and Daniels are the only rookies in NFL history with at least 10 wins (10), 30 total touchdowns (34) and 4,000 total yards (4,207). Nix’s 29 passing touchdowns are the second-most in league history by a rookie, trailing only Los Angeles Chargers quarterback Justin Herbert’s 31 from the 2020 season. Head coach Sean Payton has his guy at the quarterback position, so maybe he looks to supply Nix with more firepower.

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Los Angeles Chargers
Los Angeles returned to the playoffs in the first season under head coach Jim Harbaugh with an 11-6 record before faceplanting 32-12 in the opening round against the Houston Texans. Quarterback Justin Herbert threw a career-high four interceptions as the Texans secondary blanketed his receivers. The Chargers have two young wide receivers in 2023 first-round pick Quentin Johnston and 2024 second-round pick Ladd McConkey, but they could use a veteran, Pro Bowl-caliber option to complement the two youngsters. Los Angeles also possesses the fifth-most effective cap space in the NFL entering the offseason, according to OverTheCap.com. They have the room to get a redone contract done with Adams.

During the NFL Scouting Combine, the Los Angeles Rams gave Jonah Jackson permission to seek a trade and it didn’t take a long for a deal to get done. According to ESPN, the Rams are trading the offensive guard to the Chicago Bears in exchange for a 2025 NFL Draft pick.

Jackson will be leaving Los Angeles after just one season with the team. The 28-year-old signed three-year, $51 million contract with the Rams in March 2024, but he didn’t see much time on the field during his lone season in Los Angeles. Jackson was dealing with a shoulder injury early in the season, but he didn’t play much when he got back because the Rams benched him.

He was originally signed to be the Rams left guard, but that job eventually went to Steve Avila. When Jackson came back from injury, the Rams were going to have him play center, but that never panned out. Overall, he only ended up starting four games in 2024.

Before signing with the Rams, Jackson spent the first four seasons of his career in Detroit. The Lions selected Jackson with a third-round pick in the 2020 NFL Draft, and by his second season with the team, the offensive guard was voted to the Pro Bowl.

With that in mind, let’s take a look at the trade details and then hand out some grades.

Trade
Bears get: OL Jonah Jackson
Rams get: 2025 sixth-round pick
Grades
Bears: A-
This trade makes a lot of sense for the Bears. For one, Chicago is in desperate need of help on the offensive line after a season where Caleb Williams got sacked 68 times, which was tied for the third-most in NFL history. The Bears especially need help on the interior line with both of their guards (Teven Jenkins and Matt Pryor) and their center (Coleman Shelton) set to hit free agency.

Not only can Jackson potentially play guard or center, but he’ll be reuniting with a coach who knows him well: Ben Johnson. The Bears new coach was Detroit’s offensive coordinator for two of the seasons that Jackson was with the Lions, so Johnson is very well aware of what kind of player he’s bringing in.

This is a very low-risk move for the Bears: Although they’ll owe Jackson $17.5 million in 2025, they only had to give up a sixth-round pick to get him and his base salary isn’t guaranteed for 2026. If he doesn’t play well, the Bears can cheaply get rid of him after 2025; if he does play well, they’ll still have him under contract for another season.

Rams: D
The fact that the Rams were able to get a draft pick for a player who they almost certainly were going to cut is a good thing, but that’s about the only good thing for Los Angeles. The Rams signed Jackson to a three-year deal, but since he’s now gone, that means they ended up paying him $25.5 million for just one season of action. The Rams will also be taking an $11.3 million dead cap hit for the trade, but they will save $3.3 million in overall cap space. This is simply a move that didn’t pan out for the Rams.

Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen is having quite the year. From a deep playoff run, to an engagement to actress Hailee Steinfeld and the NFL MVP Award, the 28-year-old hasn’t seemed to stop. Allen is now following in the footsteps of his fiancée and will be taking his talents to the entertainment world.

Allen signed with entertainment production studio Skydance Sports and the former first-round pick will develop scripted, unscripted and branded content with the company, per the Hollywood Reporter.

The quarterback said one reason he’s venturing into this new field goes back to a slogan he used during his MVP acceptance speech: “Be good, do good.”

As one of the best quarterbacks in the league, Allen has the ability to reach many people and plans to capitalize on that fact to “do good.” Allen hints of what kind of content he plans to create, saying it will be motivational.

“I’m excited to partner with a world class organization like Skydance Sports to further my creative ambitions through storytelling,” Allen said. “Utilizing my platform to do good and be good is very important to me, and Skydance is an excellent partner, who can help me achieve this goal, through the creation of compelling content that aims to inspire.”

Specifics of the projects he’s working on have yet to be revealed.

“Josh has quickly made a name for himself as one of the most exciting and skilled players in the NFL,” head of Skydance Sports Jason Reed said. “Not only is he a uniquely talented player, he is an amazing human being. His vision, determination, and creativity make him a force off the field as well as on, and we are thrilled to be partnering with him as be builds his business outside of the game.”

Skydance Sports was formed by Skydance, David Ellison’s entertainment studio and the NFL in 2022.

With Mike McCarthy on the hot seat in Dallas, it’s starting to look like there’s a very real chance that he won’t be returning as their head coach in 2025. McCarthy is in the final year of his contract and with the Cowboys struggling, it will be pretty easy for Jerry Jones to make the decision to move on once the season is over (Jones has already said he won’t fire McCarthy during the season).

If the Cowboys are in the market for a new coach in January, one name that keeps popping up is Deion Sanders. The Pro Football Hall of Famer spent five seasons in Dallas and won a Super Bowl with the Cowboys in 1995.

One of his teammates during that Super Bowl-winning year was Michael Irvin, who got to interview Sanders on Wednesday on FS1. During the interview, Irvin didn’t shy away from the speculation and he mentioned that Sanders might be a good fit as coach of the Cowboys.

So how did Sanders respond?

He shut down the talk immediately.

“Oh Lord, don’t start that,” Sanders said. “I love it where I am. I love it where I am.”

At that point, Deion then took the FS1 crew on a video tour of his office, which is inside Folsom Field and has a view of the mountains.

“Let me take the computer in here, because you’re starting to talk that talk. I love it where I am,” Sanders said.

.@michaelirvin88 asked @DeionSanders about coaching the Cowboys… Watch until the end to see Prime’s response 😂 pic.twitter.com/wonYbtDR4H

— Speak (@SpeakOnFS1) November 13, 2024
This doesn’t necessarily mean he’s not interested, he might not just want to deal with any distractions right now.

Sanders currently has Colorado sitting at 7-2 and if he said he was interested or even hinted at interest in the Cowboys job, that would create a distraction for the rest of the season for both the Cowboys and the Buffaloes.

Deion is still coaching his son, Shedeur, who’s just happens to the quarterback for the Buffaloes. Shedeur will be leaving after the 2024 season, though, and at that point, it wouldn’t be completely crazy if Deion also decides to move on.

As matter of fact, the craziest scenario would be Deion going to the NFL and then landing his son in the draft so that they could reunite in the NFL.

Deion actually did want to coach the Atlanta Falcons at one point, but the team wasn’t interested in hiring him. We made a list this week of former NFL players who would also make solid NFL coaches and Deion was at the top. You can check out our full list here.

The matchup between the Kansas City Chiefs and Buffalo Bills is not just one of the biggest games in Week 11, but also one of the biggest games of the season. These teams have met three times in the playoffs recently and with both trending towards a playoff run this year as well, the outcome of this game could have significant seeding implications.

While fans are getting excited to watch two of the best quarterbacks in the league duel on Sunday on CBS, Bills’ quarterback Josh Allen is looking at this like any other game.

“It’s a Week 11 game,” Allen said, via the team’s website. “It’s no bigger and no less than the last 10 games that we’ve had. I know the media perception and the fan perception of what this game means. But for us, it’s just a Week 11 for us.”

Allen’s approach is not a surprising one from the offensive leader, who is clearly looking to stay focused for the next task at hand.

The QB is not the only one on the team treating this game as business as usual. Defensive end Greg Rousseau said he isn’t looking at it as a any different, but understands why some people may.

“I feel like they’re a good team so, you’re gonna get a lot of hype from the outside,” Rousseau said. “But at the end of the day, it’s like every single game, like one out of 17, so the same size, but obviously they’re a good team. It’s not a bigger deal than me, but I’m sure a lot of people look at it that way.”

Allen and Co. have the chance to ruin the Chiefs perfect season, as K.C. currently stands at 9-0 and have managed to squeak out wins no matter how close the games got. While the Chiefs seem to have the talent, and a little bit of luck, on their side to be the first team in a 17-game season to go undefeated, the last three times these squads met during the regular season, the Bills came out victorious.

If the regular season ended right now, the Chiefs would be the No. 1 seed and get the bye, while the 8-2 Bills would be the No. 2 seed. If Buffalo wants a chance at getting the one bye in the AFC, a win Sunday would significantly help their chances. Last season, the Baltimore Ravens finished No. 1 in the conference, followed by the Bills and Chiefs at No. 3. Buffalo and Kansas City both finished 11-6 last year.

The Bills and Chiefs will kickoff at 4:25 p.m. ET as the standalone national game on CBS.

THE NFL TODAY will be live from Buffalo on Sunday. Fans can join the crew in Lot 6 at Highmark Stadium starting at Noon ET on Nov. 17.

The biggest game of the NFL season is upon us as the Kansas City Chiefs travel to Buffalo to face the Bills on Sunday afternoon.

Know who else will be around Lake Ontario this week? International superstar and Travis Kelce’s girlfriend Taylor Swift, who’s nearing the end of a nearly two-year Eras Tour.

Just a coincidence? Sources tell CBS Sports actually … yes.

“Completely unintentional,” a league source said earlier this week about the scheduling.

Though nothing has been confirmed in NFL circles yet, the expectation is Swift will attend Highmark Stadium on Sunday for the game, one day after she will have played three consecutive shows in Toronto.

Teams regularly ask the NFL to avoid — or book — certain dates for a variety of reasons. After six straight years of finishing the regular season on the road, the Jets requested and finally received a season-finale home game at MetLife Stadium this year, for example.

The league did work around Swift’s tour in some regards. The NFL did not plan home games for the Saints, Dolphins and Colts when their home stadiums were hosting Swift for the Eras Tour.

The NFL works with Amazon Web Services to devise each season’s schedule. This year there were one quadrillion schedule possibilities for a 272-game season, and the league considered more than 26,000 factors when making the schedule.

But Swift’s tour stop in Toronto was not one of them.

“The teams are honest with us about stadium availability,” Mike North, the NFL’s VP of broadcast planning, told CBS Sports in May ahead of the schedule release. “Some of these teams share their stadiums, whether it’s with Major League Baseball teams, if not stadiums, at least downtown footprint, municipal services, parking lots. We’ve got MLS teams playing in our buildings. Sometimes you’ve got a major golf tournament or a NASCAR race in the market.

“And yeah, every now and then a stadium asks for us to consider having the NFL team on the road a certain weekend because they have an event that they have an opportunity to book in their building, whether it’s the truck and tractor pull or a pop superstar concert or any other reasons. So try to take that all into consideration. Put it in the soup and just keep stirring and hope that where we land, at the end of the day, you know, if not satisfies everybody, disappoints everybody evenly and hopefully only a little.”

For the profile of this game, the NFL could have placed this rivalry matchup just about anywhere on the schedule. And whether the Chiefs were playing in Buffalo this weekend or any other stadium, it’s probable Swift could have gotten wherever Kelce was on the field.

In February for Super Bowl LVIII, Swift made it to Las Vegas in time for the game after playing a show in Tokyo that weekend. Getting her plane from Toronto to any NFL stadium this weekend would have been much easier than that.

After her three shows this week, Swift has open dates on Sunday through Wednesday before returning to the Rogers Centre for three more shows. She finishes the tour, which began in March 2023, in Vancouver in early December.

She has already attended all five Chiefs home games this season. Since her first appearance in a suite on Sept. 24, 2023, which was a 41-10 win at Arrowhead over the Bears, the Chiefs are 18-3 with Swift in attendance. Of course, they’re 23-5 since that date regardless of whether Swift’s in the building.

It’s impossible to know just how great the so-called Taylor Swift Effect has been on the NFL, but no one at the league is denying it. The NFL reportedly saw big ratings boosts in the female 12-17 and 18-49 demographics in her first appearance at a Chiefs game last September.

Her impact on the league from a social media perspective was “honestly unlike anything we’ve seen,” one league executive told CBS Sports last fall.

“Obviously the Kansas City Chiefs are a pretty big brand, seeing the 12-year-old girls wearing number 87 Chiefs jerseys. It’s fun for all of us to see,” North said in May. “And while I don’t have daughters, I do have nieces. And maybe my favorite thing about what’s happening now is, you know, if Taylor Swift is getting those little girls in front of a television screen to watch NFL football, yes, they’re looking to see Taylor, but they’re also starting to see an incredible amount of women in really prominent positions.

“They’re seeing women game officials. They’re seeing women coaches. They’re seeing women announcers. If we can bring more little girls to the television screen and they can see themselves looking back at them, there’s nothing but a positive there. So, yes, the Taylor Swift effect is real, but I can’t say that the Kansas City Chiefs got more national television because their tight end is dating a pop superstar. They got national television because they’ve played their way into those windows.”

THE NFL TODAY will be live from Buffalo on Sunday. Fans can join the crew in Lot 6 at Highmark Stadium starting at noon ET on Nov. 17.

Welcome to the Thursday edition of the Pick Six newsletter!

I hope you don’t have any plans tonight, but if you do, you might want to go ahead and cancel them because we have a huge Thursday night game: Commanders at Eagles. Please make sure to enjoy this game, because we have the Browns coming up next Thursday and I’m guessing that won’t be as enjoyable.

Of course, we’ve got a preview of tonight’s game coming in today’s newsletter, plus we have some playoff projections and we’ll be breaking down the latest comments from Deion Sanders, who might be bringing some drama to the 2025 NFL Draft. As a fan of drama, I’m all for it.

As always, here’s your daily reminder to tell all your friends to sign up for the newsletter or you can tell people you run into at the grocery store. That also works. To get them signed up, all you have to do is click here.

1. Thursday night preview: Picks and best bets for Commanders at Eagles
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   USATSI
   The Washington Commanders (7-3) have been the biggest surprise in the NFL this year and they’ll have a chance to take over first place in the NFC East on Thursday night if they can go into Philadelphia and knock off the Eagles (7-2).

Here’s one reason why each team should be feeling confident:

Why the Commanders can win: Although the Eagles have one of the best defenses in the NFL — they’ve given up the second-fewest yards per game (274.1) this year and sixth fewest points per game (17.9) — that shouldn’t intimidate the Commanders. The Eagles have only played two teams that currently have a winning record (Atlanta and Green Bay) and those two teams had a lot of offensive success against Philly, averaging 399.5 yard 25.5 points per game. Basically, with the way Jayden Daniels has this offense playing, it won’t be surprising if Washington has some offensive success. The key will be for the Commanders to get their rushing attack going: Washington is 6-0 this year when they rush for at least 140 yards, but 1-3 when they don’t.
Why the Eagles can win: The Commanders are surrendering an average of 142.7 rushing yards per game this year, which is the fifth-worst number in the NFL. The Eagles have the perfect weapon to take advantage of a bad run defense and that weapon is Saquon Barkley, who is currently second in the NFL with 991 rushing yards. This feels like a spot where Barkley would have a big game, but if the Commanders go all in to stop him, that could open things up for Jalen Hurts and the passing attack. Either way, the Eagles offense could be primed to have a big night as they look to take control of the division.
You can get a full preview of the game from Jeff Kerr by clicking here.

If you’re thinking about betting on the game, here are a couple of props.

ONE PLAYER PROP I LIKE: Kenneth Gainwell OVER 13.5 rushing yards (-125 at BetMGM): This is an extremely low number for Gainwell, who has averaged 27.4 yards per game over the Eagles’ past five games. He’s also gone over this total in four of Philly’s past five games and I won’t be surprised if we see him do it again tonight.
ONE KICKING PROP I LIKE: Zane Gonzalez OVER 6.5 points (-135 at BetMGM): The Commanders have played nine games this year and in ALL NINE of those games, their kicker has scored at least NINE points. The Commanders kicker was Austin Seibert in the first eight games, but it was Gonzalez in Week 10 and he’ll also be kicking tonight. Last week, Gonzalez scored nine points and it won’t be shocking if he tops that total tonight.
And in case you’re wondering, my props are 26-19 on the season (13-8 on kicker props and 13-11 on all other props).

We also have a full betting preview from SportsLine that you can check out here.

And finally, here are our picks for the game.

PICKS FOR ‘TNF’

Kerr’s pick: Eagles 33-23 over Commanders
Prisco’s pick: Eagles 31-24 over Commanders
My pick: Eagles 27-24 over Commanders

Over on our CBSSports.com picks page, you can see who our eight experts are taking by clicking here.

2. NFL playoff projections heading into Week 11
   With the NFL schedule now in mid-November, you might be wondering which teams have the best chance of making the playoffs this year. Well, I was also wondering that, so to figure out who’s going to make the playoffs, we had Stephen Oh of SportsLine simulate the rest of the season. We then used those simulations to project the 14 teams we expect to make the playoffs.

Here’s how our projection breaks down for both conferences:

AFC

1. Chiefs
2. Bills
3. Ravens
4. Texans
5. Steelers
6. Chargers
7. Broncos
   First team out: Bengals

NFC

1. Lions
2. Commanders
3. Falcons
4. 49ers
5. Eagles
6. Vikings
7. Packers
   First team out: Cardinals

Tonight’s game will obviously have a huge impact on the NFC East race. Right now, the Commanders have a 58.4% chance of winning the division, but if they win tonight, that will shoot up to 80.2%. On the other hand, the Eagles will see their chances go up from 41.6% to 60.5% if they beat Washington.

In news that won’t surprise you, the Chiefs are currently the team favored to win it all, according to our projection. If you want more details on the projections, including the individual playoff chances for all 32 teams, be sure to click here.

3. Midseason superlatives: Voting on the most disappointing team and biggest overachiever
   I know we had our midseason extravaganza last week (You can see it here) and that it’s not even the midseason anymore, but we have one more midseason story coming your way and it’s coming right now. We rounded up 13 NFL writers and had them vote on several topics from the biggest disappointment to the biggest overachiever.

Let’s check out the results of our poll (Teams are only listed if they received more than one vote in their category)

Most disappointing team

1. Jets (6 votes)
2. Cowboys (3.5 votes)
   Breakdown: These were the only two teams that got more than one vote and it’s not surprising. Both of these teams were viewed as Super Bowl contenders, but the only way they’re going to be watching the Super Bowl this year is if they buy a ticket to the game.

Biggest overachieving team

1. Commanders (4.5 votes)
2. Steelers (2.5 votes)
   T-3. Vikings (2 votes)
   T-3. Cardinals (2 votes)
   Breakdown: The Commanders won this vote, but don’t sleep on the Cardinals. They’ve managed to put together a 6-4 record despite the fact that they’ve played the second-toughest schedule in the NFL through 10 weeks. Their first 10 opponents had a combined winning percentage of .581. Only the Buccaneers have faced a more difficult slate (.658).

Team most likely to break out during the second half of the season

1. Buccaneers (4 votes)
2. 49ers (3 votes)
3. Bengals (2 votes)
   Breakdown: If you’re wondering why the Bucs are on top, it’s because they have the easiest remaining strength of schedule in the NFL. Their final seven opponents have a combined winning percentage of .328. Only one remaining team on their schedule currently has more than three win (Chargers). As for the other two teams here, it’s pretty self-explanatory. The 49ers finally have Christian McCaffrey back while the Bengals seem to be on the cusp of being good if they can stop shooting themselves in the foot.

If you want to see all the superlatives that we voted on, be sure to check out our full story here

4. Answering the NFL’s biggest questions heading into Week 11
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   As we get ready to head into Week 11, there are a lot of questions that need to be answered around the NFL and the good news for us is that we have Jordan Dajani here to answer them.

Let’s take a look at two of his biggest questions this week:

Who’s in the best spot to land the top QB in the 2025 NFL Draft? “If the season ended today, the Jacksonville Jaguars would own the top pick. They just signed Trevor Lawrence to a record contract, so they probably aren’t drafting a quarterback. With the in mind, keep an eye on the Giants, the Titans, the Browns and Raiders as we inch closer to the end of the regular season. All four of those teams currently hold a top-five pick.”
Are the Steelers actually Super Bowl contenders? “The Steelers have an incredible defense and Russell Wilson has brought some consistency to the offensive side of things. They are a good team, but I don’t think we can call them ‘Super Bowl contenders.’ Pittsburgh has started four different seasons 7-2 or better under Mike Tomlin. They won zero playoff games in the previous three instances.”
Steelers fans, please direct your hate mail to Jordan and not me.

Also, you can check out the rest of Jordan’s story here.

5. Deion Sanders might throw a wrench in the 2025 NFL Draft
   The NFL Draft is usually a pretty simple process: A team picks a player and then that player signs a contract with the team. However, things may not be so simple next year, and that’s because it sounds like Deion Sanders might throw a wrench into things.

During an interview on FS1 Wednesday, the Colorado coach was asked if he might “step in” if the the wrong team tries to draft his son, Shedeur Sanders.

Here’s what Sanders had to say:

Sanders said he’ll step in if the wrong team tries to draft his son. “Yeah, but I’m not gonna do it publicly, I’d do it privately.” Sanders said of possibly stepping in. “I’m going to be a dad until the cows come home.” The Colorado coach also said he’d step in to make sure two-way star Travis Hunter doesn’t go to the wrong team, either.
What Sanders is looking in an NFL team. Deion didn’t name any specific teams for his son, but he did give a description of what he wants to see from a team that might draft Shedeur. “Somebody that can handle the quarterback that he is, somebody that can handle, understanding what he’s capable of. Someone that has had success in the past handling quarterbacks or someone in an organization that understands what they’re doing. Not just throwing you out there amongst the wolves, if you don’t have the support and the infrastructure of the team.”
Sanders won’t be worrying about the offensive line. Deion said the structure of the organization is way more important than that the line looks like. “Forget the line, he’s played with lines that haven’t been great, but he’s been able to do his thing, but just the infrastructure of the team, the direction of where we’re going.”
Sanders also responded to the Cowboys coaching speculation. When Michael Irvin brought up the possibility of Sanders coaching the Cowboys, Deion gave him a six-word response, “I love it where I am.” Deion then took the FS1 crew on a video tour of his office, which is inside Folsom Field and has a view of the mountains.
The craziest scenario would be Sanders going to the NFL and then drafting his son. As things stand now, our four mock draft writers have Shedeur headed to three different locations: New York (Giants), Las Vegas and Cleveland. Out of those three teams, I could see Deion and Shedeur teaming up with the Raiders.

If you want to know where our draft writers have Travis Hunter going, you can see all of our mock drafts here.

6. Extra points: Aaron Rodgers still planning to play in 2025
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   Getty Images
   It’s been a busy week in the NFL, and since it’s nearly impossible to keep track of everything that happened, I went ahead and put together a roundup for you.

Aaron Rodgers wants to play another season. With the Jets struggling and Rodgers taking a beating this season, there was some thought that he might want to retire after the 2024 season, but that’s not the case. During his weekly press conference on Wednesday, Rodgers said he would like to return in 2025. The four-time MVP turns 41 on Dec. 2.
NFL combine staying in Indianapolis for another year. The NFL has been tossing around the idea of moving the combine to a different location, but if that happens, it won’t be until 2027 at the earliest. The league reached a deal with Indianapolis that will keep the combine in the Indiana city through the 2026 season.
Jon Gruden lands a deal with Barstool Sports. The former Raiders coach has found a new job. Gruden will once again be working in the media after landing a multiyear deal with Barstool Sports. Gruden had been visiting with several NFL teams over the18 months, including the Chiefs and Saints, but he never landed a job. Instead, he’ll be taking his first media job since leaving ESPN to coach the Raiders in 2018.
J.J. McCarthy has second knee surgery. The Vikings rookie had to undergo a second knee surgery this week as he continues to work his way back from a torn meniscus. The 10th overall pick in the 2024 NFL Draft needed another procedure done on his right knee to mitigate swelling that occurred after he ramped up his physical therapy work. You can read more details on McCarthy’s situation here.

The Kansas City Chiefs haven’t lost a game all season. In fact, they haven’t lost since Christmas 2023. Despite their dominance in the last 15 games, they are underdogs heading into Week 11 against the Buffalo Bills.

The Bills are two-point favorites for the AFC showdown between the top two teams in the conference. While the betting odds are on Buffalo’s side, history is on Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes’ side. The three-time Super Bowl champion has been an underdog 14 previous times as a starter and is 11-3 in those games.

The Chiefs were also underdogs in Week 7 in their Super Bowl rematch against the San Francisco 49ers, who were 1.5-point favorites. They won that game 28-18 on the road and now face another road trip where they are not favored.

Mahomes has a .798 winning percentage as a favorite in his career and a .786 winning percentage as an underdog. The Chiefs were favored in every regular-season game in 2023, but were underdogs in three playoff games — Bills, Ravens and 49ers. As we saw, that didn’t matter and the Chiefs marched their way to a second consecutive Super Bowl win.

This is the most challenging game for the Chiefs for the remainder of the season (we’ll see about their road game in Pittsburgh on Christmas), so it likely will be the last time the Chiefs won’t be favored in the regular season.

Kansas City currently sits at 9-0, while Buffalo is 8-2. Buffalo has defeated K.C. in their last three regular-season meetings.

The Chiefs and Bills will face off in Buffalo Sunday at 4:25 p.m. ET on CBS as the standalone national game.

THE NFL TODAY will be live from Buffalo on Sunday. Fans can join the crew in Lot 6 at Highmark Stadium starting at noon ET on Nov. 17.

Justin Fields played an integral role in the Pittsburgh Steelers’ surprising 4-2 start to the 2024 season. But Fields hasn’t received any playing time since Russell Wilson replaced him in the starting lineup in Week 7. Wilson has won each of his three starts under center as the Steelers have improved to 7-2 entering Sunday’s big AFC North matchup against the 7-3 Baltimore Ravens.

Despite his recent absences on game days, Fields hasn’t been forgotten by Steelers offensive coordinator Arthur Smith, who alluded to Pittsburgh’s backup quarterback possibly getting some snaps against Baltimore.

“We’ve had a package every week,” Smith said when asked about his plans for Fields moving forward, via the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. “It goes back to the flow of the game. It will be ready to go when we need it. Maybe it will be this Sunday. Maybe it will be next Sunday.”

Specifically, Fields’ mobility has been a component of Pittsburgh’s offense that has been missing since the quarterback change was made. Fields is still the Steelers’ second-leading rusher despite not playing in the last three games. Conversely, Wilson has rushed for just 13 yards on 10 carries during his time running the offense. He did score on a short touchdown run during his first start, a blowout win over the Jets in Week 7.

Speaking of that play, it was somewhat of a surprise that Steelers coach Mike Tomlin didn’t insert Fields into the game for that specific moment. But Tomlin wanted to see what Wilson could do in all facets of the game. And while Wilson is not Fields as far as running is concerned, he is still capable of making the occasional play with his legs, like his 6-yard run on a third-and-4 play during last Sunday’s 28-27 win over the Commanders.

So far, the Steelers haven’t needed Fields’ on-field presence to win games with Wilson under center. But that could change in the upcoming weeks, starting with their upcoming game against a Ravens defense that has allowed the least amount of rushing yards in football so far.

If not this week, it appears that Fields will get back on the field at some point this season. The 25-year-old is set to become a free agent next offseason, so it’s reasonable to expect that the Steelers have an invested interest to see Fields get more live reps before possibly re-signing him.

Either way, Wilson has seized control of Pittsburgh’s offense, largely because of his accurate deep ball passing and leadership skills that come with being a nine-time Pro Bowler and former Super Bowl champion. Wilson’s lengthy film sessions with Smith — that sometimes go well into Friday night — certainly help.

“We spend so many hours (working on film), sometimes my wife FaceTimes me, making sure I’m not somewhere on the South Side,” Smith joked on Thursday, via 93.7 The Fan. “I’m like, ‘There’s Russ.’ We’re here on Friday night, talking through those situational things.”