Week six of the 2021 NFL season served up some fresh talking points, including Aaron Rodgers’ ownership of the Chicago Bears, the Arizona Cardinals’ unbeaten run, and the Tennessee Titans’ impressive win over the Buffalo Bills. It was also the second and final International Series game of the campaign played at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, with a record attendance erupting as Jacksonville’s kicker won it in the final second.
Aaron Rodgers still owns Chicago
Sometimes it’s better to walk the walk than talk the talk. At Soldier Field on Sunday, Aaron Rodgers did both.
The rivalry between the Green Bay Packers and the Chicago Bears is one of the oldest in NFL history, but it has been one-sided in recent times. This is largely due to the excellence of Rodgers, a Super Bowl-winning and surefire Hall of Fame-calibre quarterback.
The 37-year-old threw for 195 yards on 74 per cent completion to go with a pair of touchdowns, but it was his fourth quarter score that would steal the headlines. Rodgers ran inside the pylon to score a six-yard touchdown run with 4:30 left in the game to make it 24-14 in favour of Green Bay, which would prove to be the final score. He did his championship-belt celebration, but then unleashed a tirade at Bears fans in the end zone.
“I own you! All my f***ing life I own you,” Rodgers shouted. “I still own you. I still own you!”
The worst part for the Bears? There is no retort that suggests Rodgers has not acquired the team from Virginia Halas McCaskey. He is 22-5 against Chicago, the third-highest winning percentage by any starting quarterback against a single opponent since 1950 (with a minimum of 25 starts). Rodgers has 12 touchdown passes and no turnovers in the Packers' ongoing five-game winning streak against the Bears. With Sunday's win over the Bears, the Packers improved to 13-1 in NFC North games since Matt LaFleur took over as coach in 2019. It’s safe to say the Packers will add another division crown to their collection.
Rodgers revealed he was motivated to explode as he did by a woman in the front row flipping him off with two fingers.
The Bears once held an enormous lead in their rivalry with the Packers. Chicago had a winning record against Green Bay in the 1920s, the 1930s, the 1940s, the 1950s, the 1970s and the 1980s - but while the Bears have struggled to find someone resembling a competent quarterback for decades, the Packers went from Brett Favre to Rodgers.
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With Rodgers at the helm, the Packers have crushed Chicago. They have often been slow and painful defeats, like Sunday when Rodgers meticulously completed 15 of 15 passes of 10 or fewer air yards. He decided how he wanted to beat the Bears. Maybe he will sell the team one day - maybe at the end of the season - but he seems to enjoy being a team owner.
In 2017, Rodgers became the first NFL player to own an NBA team as he bought a one per cent stake in the Milwaukee Bucks. When he made that transaction, he was simply adding the Bucks to the Bears in his portfolio.
Arizona Cardinals are still the NFL’s only remaining unbeaten franchise
It would be remiss of me to not speak about the Arizona Cardinals, who are now going into their second week as the NFL’s sole unbeaten team in 2021. Their head coach Kliff Kingsbury was absent from the 37-14 win over the Cleveland Browns due to Covid issues, but it proved to have no adverse effects.
Third-year quarterback Kyler Murray leads the MVP charge - and just watching him play helps you to understand why. Murray is magical, and he completed 20 of 30 passes for 229 yards and four touchdowns on Sunday. He registered a terrific 129 passer rating and orchestrated an Arizona offensive unit that needed to punt just twice as they converted eight of 10 third-down attempts. Murray hit DeAndre Hopkins, Christian Kirk and A.J. Green on scoring plays as the Arizona offence rolled to victory with their coach watching from afar.
The wizardry of Murray and co. has meant the Cardinals have started 6-0 for the first time since 1974 - a year that saw Leeds United sit atop English football while Manchester United suffered relegation. The Cardinals were based out of St. Louis back then, and they would finish 10-4 before they lost to the Vikings in Minnesota in the NFC divisional round. Let's see if Murray can maintain this unbeaten spell a while longer.
Since 1990, 40 teams have started 6-0 with an average finish of 13-3 while 38 of them have made the playoffs. Barring an unlikely and frankly ridiculous collapse, Arizona are here to stay.
King Henry puts Buffalo to the sword
The Great Wall of China, Chichen Itza, Petra, Machu Picchu, Christ the Redeemer, Taj Mahal and the Colosseum were selected via online poll to be the New 7 Wonders of the World back in 2000. It’s time to re-open the ballot.
Derrick Henry is not normal. The Tennessee running back is who I imagine the person that coined the term ‘superhuman’ was thinking of when he used the word. Henry has led the league in rushing yards, attempts and touchdowns for the last two seasons and he broke the fabled 2,000 yard barrier in 2020 - and yet he is as impressive as ever this year. In the Titans’ 34-31 win over the Buffalo Bills, Henry amassed 156 yards from scrimmage and three touchdowns.
Rather than use Henry as the inevitable battering ram in the way we know he can be utilised, Tennessee turned to Henry when they needed him - and he obliged, powering through Buffalo’s number one ranked defence at will. The Titans proved they can compete with the best in the league when Henry is feeling himself, and his dominance forced Buffalo’s linebackers to focus on the big man, opening avenues for the likes of AJ Brown and Julio Jones to make plays.
Lets not pussyfoot around this: the Bills struggled. Seven days after they crushed the Kansas City Chiefs to win by 18 points at Arrowhead, Buffalo - and their defence, in particular - were bullied. Their defense allowed the Titans to score on all three offensive possessions in the second half, and quarterback Ryan Tannehill did not throw an incompletion in the fourth quarter despite Tennessee coming into their clash with 20 sacks allowed, the second-most in the NFL. The Titans deserve credit in establishing the run through Henry early, sure, but they were without starting left tackle Taylor Lewan for much of the game due to injury.
For all the talk of Buffalo’s porous defence and their stagnant redone offence, this was a game that belonged to Henry - nicknamed ‘the king’ due to his remarkably unstoppable combination of size and speed. He reached 21.8mph when scoring a 76-yard touchdown run in the second quarter, the highest speed among ball carriers this season. The 27-year-old currently holds a 260-yard lead at the top of the rushing standings and has twice as many rushing touchdowns as his closest competitor; Ezekiel Elliott and several others have five scores in 2021 - Henry has 10.
Long live the king.
The London Jaguars pick up their first win
Approximately 4,259 miles from Jacksonville, the Jaguars picked up their first win of the season in front of what was supposed to be a home crowd. While most of the 60,784 in attendance were supporting the Miami Dolphins, the crowd erupted like a last-gasp Premier League winner when kicker Matthew Wright struck a field goal to secure the Jags a 23-20 win over Miami as time expired.
The fact that this game came down to the swing of Wright’s right boot felt…right. Wright was a free agent when this season began six weeks ago, and his heroics snapped a 20-game losing streak for the Jaguars - the second-longest such run in NFL history. Entering this game, the Jags were the only franchise in the league without a successful field goal as Wright and Josh Lambo were a combined 0-4 through five losses. However, Wright - starting in place of the injured Lambo for the third straight game - broke Jacksonville's kicking curse with a 40-yarder on their lone first-quarter drive before tying the game with a spectacular kick that bent through the air and split the sticks with 3:40 remaining.
Jacksonville got the ball back, and rookie quarterback Trevor Lawrence excellently hit Laviska Shenault Jr. for a short gain to call the time out with a second remaining as Miami were set up to stop the Hail Mary. The stage was set for Wright to hit the 53-yarder and win a game for the first time in 21 attempts - and he struck it straight through, sending the Spurs crowd into raptures.
For Jacksonville, London proved to be the perfect site to get their season back on track. In doing so, they also earned Lawrence and under-fire coach Urban Meyer their first NFL wins - and their 25-year-old kicker became the first in NFL history to make multiple field goals of over 50 yards in the final four minutes of a single match.
Right place, Wright’s time.
