The hottest team in the NFL is the New England Patriots. Mike Vrabel’s team is currently riding a seven-game winning streak, with the latest victory coming on the road against the Buccaneers in Tampa. Within the winning effort, New England called upon its most influential offseason addition at two key moments of the contest.
In the closing seconds of the first half, Vrabel made a rare decision with his team on the Bucs’ 1-yard line. He ran Drake Maye up the middle for no gain on purpose, burning the down to allow the clock to run, preventing Tampa Bay from regaining po…
The hottest team in the NFL is the New England Patriots. Mike Vrabel’s team is currently riding a seven-game winning streak, with the latest victory coming on the road against the Buccaneers in Tampa. Within the winning effort, New England called upon its most influential offseason addition at two key moments of the contest.
In the closing seconds of the first half, Vrabel made a rare decision with his team on the Bucs’ 1-yard line. He ran Drake Maye up the middle for no gain on purpose, burning the down to allow the clock to run, preventing Tampa Bay from regaining possession. It was a daring maneuver, and one that only makes sense if you can pay it off with a touchdown. After three rushing attempts that failed to reach pay dirt, egg was getting ready to be splattered on Vrabel’s face. That was until Stefon Diggs made a toe-tapping touchdown reception on fourth down to masterfully pull off clock manipulation.
Fast forward to the final seconds of regulation, and the Patriots suddenly found their lead whittled down to five with the Buccaneers preparing for an onside kick. The attempt fluttered in the air for a moment, but was quickly brought into the arms of, you guessed it, Diggs, who took a massive hit but hung on to secure the victory.
It’s those winning plays from Diggs that have been a regular occurrence throughout his first season with the Patriots, and are tipping the scales away from his former team in the AFC East in the Buffalo Bills.
Buffalo suddenly finds itself losing ground in the division race, particularly after being upset by the Miami Dolphins on Sunday. Now, Buffalo is two games behind the Patriots in the win column, and is currently losing the head-to-head tiebreaker thanks to New England heading up to Orchard Park and beating the Bills back in Week 5. In that game, Diggs tallied 146 yards on 10 catches against his former squad.
When you watch the Bills in 2025, they are a club that is missing that type of impact player, particularly at the wide receiver position. In Sunday’s loss to Miami, no pass catcher topped 60 yards receiving. On the year, the last and only 100-yard wide receiver for Buffalo was Keon Coleman in Week 1.
Even though Diggs hasn’t played a down for Buffalo since the 2023 season, the Bills have yet to replace him within the offense, and it shows. To their credit, the Bills recognized this deficiency, reportedly trying to rectify it before last Tuesday’s trade deadline by inquiring on the likes of Dolphins receiver Jaylen Waddle. Ultimately, those pursuits didn’t bear fruit, and no addition at wide receiver was made.
The hole left in Diggs’ absence looms large within the Bills offense, and now the wideout is actively contributing to them falling further in the standings against their top division rival.
- Week 10 stats: 32 carries, 244 yards rushing, 3 TDs; 4 catches, 42 yards receiving
Jonathan Taylor continues to push himself into the MVP conversation, and it’s performances like we saw on Sunday that warrant the discussion. In Germany, the Colts back dazzled, rushing for 244 yards, which is the most by any player in a game this season. This was the fourth time he’s rushed for three touchdowns in a game this season, and is up to 15 rushing scores on the year. He’s the first player to record 15 rushing touchdowns through his first 10 games since LaDainian Tomlinson in 2006 (went on to win NFL MVP).
- Week 10 stats: 4 sacks, 5 total tackles, 5 quarterback hits
The New York Jets, despite ridding themselves of key defensive stars at the trade deadline, found themselves on the winning end in Week 10. That was thanks in large part to defensive end Will McDonald, who had himself a career day. The 2023 first-round pick tallied four sacks on the afternoon, as New York took down Browns quarterback Dillon Gabriel a total of six times on Sunday.
- Week 10 stats: 14 carries, 147 yards rushing, 2 TDs; 1 catch, 3 yards receiving
It was the breakout game that Patriots fans and fantasy football managers alike had been waiting for from Henderson. With Rhamondre Stevenson sidelined with an injury, Henderson once again took the lion’s share of the touches and the rookie second-rounder – literally – ran away with the opportunity. Henderson ripped off two long runs, with the first coming in the third quarter, ripping off a 55-yard touchdown run. Then, on a second-and-9 attempt from the New England 31-yard line, Henderson was again off the races. He broke the game open with a 69-yard touchdown run that put the Patriots ahead by two scores.
- Week 10 stats: 27 of 45 passing, 292 yards passing, 2 TDs, 1 INT; 3 carries, 20 yards, 1 TD
The Houston Texans had a comeback for the ages in Week 10, rattling off 26 fourth-quarter points to pull off the upset over Jacksonville. Pulling the strings of the offense was Davis Mills, who was starting for the injured C.J. Stroud. Mills had three touchdowns on the afternoon, all of which came in the fourth quarter. His final score was a gutsy 14-yard scramble to the end zone to give them the lead with 31 seconds to play in regulation.
- Week 10 stats: 20 of 36 passing, 220 yards passing, 1 TD; 8 carries, 63 yards rushing, 1 TD
The Chicago Bears continue to find ways to win. This time, it was Williams, who put the team on his back with an impressive fourth-quarter display that erased a double-digit lead by New York to move Chicago to the 24-20 victory. In the fourth quarter alone, Williams posted a 109.2 passer rating with 77 yards and a touchdown through the air, while adding 52 yards rushing that included a 17-yard go-ahead touchdown.
- Week 10 stats: 15 carries, 142 yards rushing, 2 TDs; 3 catches, 30 yards receiving, 1 TD
Gibbs continued his monster season on Sunday as the key cog in Detroit’s blowout win over the Commanders. The back became the first player in Lions history with multiple career games with two rushing touchdowns and one receiving touchdown. Those scores also put him in elite all-time company.
- Week 10 stats: 4 total tackles. 0.5 sacks, 3 QB hits, 2 TDs
Lawrence had not one, but two fumble recoveries returned for a touchdown during Seattle’s win over the Cardinals. Both were fumbles by Jacoby Brissett on a strip sack, rushing 34 yards to the end zone on the first recover and 22 yards on the second. Lawrence became just the fourth player in NFL history with multiple fumble returns for a touchdown in a game, and the first defensive lineman.
Notable Week 10 gaffes
Falcons poor clock management before halftime
Atlanta finds itself 3-6 on the season after an overtime loss to the Colts, where they had multiple opportunities to win. One failure in that pursuit came just before halftime when head coach Raheem Morris made the puzzling decision not to call a timeout, following a 10-yard sack of Daniel Jones to set up a third and long. When Jones went down, there was roughly a minute left on the clock. Instead of using one of his two timeouts, Morris kept them in his pocket. That allowed Indy to bleed the clock down to about 19 seconds, and Jones was then picked off by Jessie Bates III to give possession back to Atlanta. However, because there was so little time on the clock, the Falcons simply kneeled to head to the locker room. Had they called that prior timeout, they could’ve had time to set up a quick scoring drive.
Giants, Jaguars collapse in the fourth quarter
It was an abysmal ending in Week 10 for both the New York Giants and Jacksonville Jaguars, who each blew double-digit leads in the fourth quarter. For the Giants, they extended their lead to 10 points over the Bears following a 19-yard chip-shot field goal by Younghoe Koo. From that point on, however, the offense (led by Russell Wilson in for the injured Jaxson Dart) logged back-to-back three-and-out drives and then turned the ball over on down to ice the game for the Bears.
New York has now lost back-to-back games when leading by 10-plus points in the fourth quarter, and is 0-4 on the road in games when leading by 10 or more points this season.
More egregious, however, was the Jaguars. They entered the fourth quarter with a 29-10 lead, and proceeded to watch the Houston Texans rip off 26 unanswered points to pull off the 36-29 upset. It was the largest fourth-quarter comeback win by the Texans in team history, and the largest blown lead (19) in Jacksonville history.
Browns coverage team allows back-to-back TD returns
Cleveland’s special teams unit has seen better days. The Browns fell to the New York Jets, 27-20, in a game where the coverage team allowed not one, but TWO touchdown returns. The first game after Dillion Gabriel found David Njoku for a touchdown to give Cleveland an early 7-0 lead. On the ensuing kickoff, however, that lead was immediately erased with Kene Nwangwu exploding for a 99-yard touchdown return.
On the very next possession, the Browns went three-and-out and punted the football to Isaiah Williams, who took it 74 yards to the house.
Two-minute drill
Here are some of my quick-hitting takeaways/notes from Week 10:
- After another blown fourth-quarter lead, we’re officially on Brian Daboll watch. He may not see Week 11.
- Drake Maye’s deep ball continues to be the best in the NFL, and the surging MVP candidate now has two impressive road wins under his belt.
- There’s a bunch of high-level quarterback play in the NFL right now, but no one is hotter than Matthew Stafford. The MVP candidate is now the first quarterback to record four passing touchdowns and zero interceptions in three straight games.
- The Buccaneers will run away with the NFC South, but desperately need to get some of their key skill-position players back if they want to be looked at as a serious Super Bowl contender.
- This upset win over Buffalo likely saved Mike McDaniel’s job through the rest of the 2025 season. Beyond that, it’s still a mystery.
- The Jaguars are not a serious playoff threat, and it wouldn’t surprise me if they fall out of the AFC playoff picture entirely when the dust settles.
- Bryce Young has now gone seven consecutive starts with under 200 yards passing.
- The Commanders have now lost four games in a row by 20-plus points (tied for the longest in franchise history). That’s the type of streak that typically sees some heads roll on the coaching staff.
- Don’t look now, but the Baltimore Ravens have won three straight games and just one game under .500 with a very easy schedule in front of them.
- I’m still not sold on Michael Penix Jr. as Atlanta’s QB of the future.
- The Steelers offense looks lost and could’ve used another wide receiver at the trade deadline. Now, their lead in the AFC North is dwindling fast.
- Even amid all of the injuries to the offensive line and backfield, don’t rule out Los Angeles for the AFC West crown just yet. An upcoming schedule of at Jaguars (Week 11) and vs. Raiders (Week 13) sandwiched around their bye sets them up with potentially nine wins heading into the final month.
- I’m already looking at my watch waiting for the showdown between the Seahawks and Rams next weekend.
- It feels like the eventual Super Bowl LX winner is going to come from the NFC.