Each week, we round up the NFL action, picking our MVP, the best game of the week, and the winners and losers after the final whistle blows. Week 9 of the NFL 2025 season gave us a scintillating renewal of the Chiefs-Bills rivalry, a landmark Sam Darnold performance, and another heart-breaking loss for the Cincinnati Bengals and their porous defense.

WEEK 9 SCORES

Thursday

Baltimore Ravens 28 @ Miami Dolphins 6

Sunday:

San Francisco 49ers 34 @ New York Giants 24

Los Angeles Chargers 27 @ Tennessee Titans 20

Minnesota Vikings 27 @ Detroit Lions 24

Atlanta Falcons 23 @ New England Patriots 24

Indianapolis Colts 20 @ Pittsburgh Steelers 27

Denver Broncos 18 @ Houston Texans 15

Chicago Bears 47 @ Cincinnati Bengals 42

Carolina Panthers 16 @ Green Bay Packers 13

New Orleans Saints 10 @ Los Angeles Rams 34

Jacksonville Jaguars 30 @ Las Vegas Raiders 29

Kansas City Chiefs 21 @ Buffalo Bills 28

Seattle Seahawks 38 @ Washington Commanders 14

Monday:

Arizona Cardinals 27 @ Dallas Cowboys 17

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GAME OF THE WEEK

Chicago Bears 47 @ Cincinnati Bengals 42

Sooner rather than later, we will have to ban the Cincinnati Bengals from featuring in the game of the week. However, their particular brand of roster-building — pumping an unseemly percentage of their salary cap into their skill players without giving more than a second’s thought to their defensive depth — combined with the franchise’s propensity for soul-crushing losses, makes them a perennially entertaining watch.

Let’s look at some of the records and statistical oddities from this game, which demonstrate just how bizarre this Bengals team has become:

• Caleb Williams became just the second player to have caught multiple passes, and thrown for multiple touchdowns in the same game. He joined Chicago legend Walter Payton in this rare club, as Ben Johnson dialled up his own version of the Philly Special to give Williams his first receiving touchdown, before a double pass featuring backup Tyson Bagent demonstrated that Johnson hasn’t lost any of his creativity since switching to the Windy City.
• Joe Flacco threw for 470 yards and four touchdowns. He leads the NFL with 11 passing touchdowns and 1,254 yards since he joined the Bengals in Week 6. In that span, the Bengals have allowed 36 points per game, and the franchise is 1-3.
• In the past two weeks, Cincinnati have allowed 86 points and over 1,000 yards. They are the only team in the Super Bowl era to allow at least 500 total yards, 38 points and have zero takeaways in consecutive games.
• Since the start of 2024, the Bengals have four losses in games when they have scored at least 38 points, the rest of the NFL combined has four such losses in the same time frame.

The manner in which the Bengals ultimately lost this game was a perfect microcosm of their season. Flacco managed to overcome a 14-point deficit with just 4:43 left on the clock. First the veteran connected on a deep pass over the middle to Noah Fant, which he followed with a two-point conversion. The Bengals then recovered an onside kick, and Flacco again led a rapid scoring drive when he connected with Andrei Iosivas with less than a minute on the clock.

On the ensuing drive, the Bears were able to convert a 3rd-and-10 as Williams broke containment for a 19-yard rush. Chicago were required to use their final timeout, adding pressure on the second-year quarterback to push his team into field goal range but, on the next play, Williams found Colston Loveland over the middle. Geno Stone simply had to wrap the rookie up to force a scrambling Bears offense to clock the ball. Instead, he tried to land a shoulder on the rookie, who spun out of the contact and took the ball to the house.

Another defensive meltdown by Cincinnati; another crazy finish to a game in an NFL season that has delivered last minute drama on a weekly basis.

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MVP OF THE WEEK

Sam Darnold (QB, Seattle Seahawks)

Seattle have quietly established themselves as true contenders in the NFC, thanks in part to a stout defense and Jaxon Smith-Njigba’s breakout season. Sam Darnold’s quiet brilliance has largely been overlooked, but his own ‘breakout’ performance in the Seahawks’ 38-14 primetime win over the Commanders should change that.

Darnold was unstoppable in the first half, throwing for 290 yards and four touchdowns before his first incompletion. Going 17-for-17 to open the game demonstrates just how accurate the eighth-year-pro has become; that process started last year in Minnesota, but has accelerated following Darnold’s move to the northwest.

His success came against everything Dan Quinn threw at him. According to NextGenStats, Seattle’s signal caller completed at least 80 percent of his passes against both man and zone coverage, averaging more than 12 yards per attempt versus both defensive schemes. Darnold was supernaturally efficient by any underlying metric generating 0.83 EPA per play, 13.8 yards per dropback and finding success on 75 percent of his plays. While he wasn’t perfect against the Commanders — he threw an inconsequential interception — his ability to progress the ball down the field more than makes up for the occasional booboo. Can he maintain this level of performance through the end of the season, or will we see a similar collapse that led to his ousting in Minneapolis?

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Winners: Josh Allen

The rivalry between Josh Allen and Patrick Mahomes — and, by extension, the Chiefs and Bills — has given NFL fans incredible entertainment over the past few seasons. Sunday’s matchup was the tenth between the signal callers and their respective franchises since the 2020 season, and it still doesn’t feel stale.

Over the past few seasons, the reigning MVP has enjoyed the spoils in the regular season, while Mahomes gains the upper hand in the post-season — this instalment followed that trend, with the Bills pipping the Chiefs to a 28-21 win in western New York.

It’s easy to simply chalk this up as a win for Allen over Mahomes but, as always, the details are far more complicated, and praise for the Bills performance should be doled out equally. Buffalo was able to pressure Mahomes at an alarming rate; the three-time Super Bowl MVP was hurried on more than half of his dropbacks, per Next Gen Stats. The future Hall-of-Famer completed less than 50 percent of his passes, with many of those completions coming on short throws around the line of scrimmage. The entirety of Buffalo’s defense did their bit, with the secondary forcing five incompletions per Pro Football Focus. The revamped Kansas City passing game simply couldn’t force their will on a pumped up unit.

Allen was steady and efficient. He completed 23 of his 26 passes for 273 yards and a touchdown, and added two further scores on quarterback sneaks. James Cook added 114 yards on the ground. Given the struggles the Bills had in punching the ball in from the one-yard line in last season’s AFC Championship Game, the efficiency on the ground and in the red zone will give Buffalo fans some hope that this result can finally be replicated in these sides’ inevitable post-season matchup.

Loser: Jayden Daniels & Washington Commanders fans

While Darnold’s brilliance deserved to be the headline coming out of the nation’s capital on Sunday, the apparent season-ending injury to Commanders’ quarterback Jayden Daniels inevitably became the story.

The gruesome injury came with the Commanders trailing the Seahawks by 38-7 late in the fourth quarter, drawing questions over Dan Quinn’s game management. The reigning Offensive Rookie of the Year has already missed time this season, which has certainly been a factor in a disappointing 3-6 record for last season’s runners-up in the NFC.

With such a devastating injury, comparisons between Daniels and the last great hope of the Washington franchise, Robert Griffin III, were inevitable. RGIII himself added to the furore around the incident.

“All I know is the emotion of watching him in the game, with seven minutes left, down 38-7. My first thought is: Why is he still in the game? The Seahawks had the game won. I understand you want to play to the end but, with the injuries he’s already had this year, it doesn’t make sense. This is why I wanted them to hold him out until the bye week, let him get back healthy. Attack the back half of the season, as close to 100 percent as possible.

“Freak accident, freak play. I can’t help but feel for Jayden Daniels, for Commanders fans. Demoralising blow, man.”

Many pundits earmarked the Commanders as a possible regression candidate heading into the season. With an ageing roster and an injured franchise quarterback, this season could already be a lost cause.

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THE ROUND UP

Who is going to win the NFC North? Just as it appears the Packers were announcing themselves as a bona fide Super Bowl contender, they drop an egg in Dallas. The Lions came roaring back, but have lost games that, last season, they would have found a way through. The Lions’ 27-24 home loss to Minnesota has allowed the Vikings a sniff of a chance in the division. J.J. McCarthy did just enough to eke out a win in a scrappy game in the Motor City. Meanwhile, the Packers lost 16-13 at home to the Panthers, despite entering the game as a 12.5-point favourite according to the bookies. Just one win separates the four teams in the division.

Cam Little’s 68-yard field goal finally broke a record that was destined to be broken. Little’s bomb was out of this world, and would easily have cleared the bar from 70-yards plus. It is the seventh kick of more than 60 yards in the NFL this season, which is already a record in itself. Little’s side went on to win 30-29 in overtime, on the road in Las Vegas, as the Raiders failed to convert on a game-winning two-point conversion attempt in the dying moments of the game. Brock Bowers re-announced himself as one of the NFL’s best offensive talents with three touchdowns on 12 catches and 127 yards.

Dallas’ baffling season continued in a 27-17 loss against the Cardinals on Monday night. Over the past two weeks, the previously red hot Cowboys offense has faltered. On Monday, a case of fumble-itis in key moments gave the momentum back to the Cardinals. Javonte Williams coughing up the pill was particularly back-breaking, as it appeared Dallas would be the latest side to comeback against the profligate Cardinals in the dying moments. Arizona was able to see out the game thanks to two late sacks by Calais Campbell, and the steady hand of back-up QB Jacoby Brissett. Brissett was able to get Marvin Harrison Jr. going early and often; is he the superior option under center given Kyler Murray’s recent struggles?

Just as the Cardinals tend to wilt in the fourth quarter, the Broncos tend to come to the fore in the closing moments. Again, Denver came from behind in the final stanza, pipping the Houston Texans in an 18-15 win for Sean Payton’s side. Bo Nix looked to be a different beast in the final 15 minutes as the offense went from a 29.7 percent success rate in the opening three quarters, to 42.3 percent in the fourth. Their average yards per play went from 3.8 to 5.0 according to PFF. How good could the Broncos be if they turned up for all four quarters? On a side note, the Texans offense, which has been one of the league’s worst, took an even bigger downward turn when CJ Stroud was taken out of the game in the second quarter after failing a concussion test.

The Colts’ offense as the most efficient unit in the history of the sport came to a crashing halt on Sunday, as they lost 27-20 against the feisty Pittsburgh Steelers. The Colts still managed to outgain their opponents (225 vs 368 total offensive yards), but three Daniel Jones interceptions, as well as the Steelers defense holding Jonathan Taylor to steady-if-unspectacular gains, were enough for Pittsburgh to drag out a statement win.

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STATS OF THE WEEK

• Jaxon Smith-Njigba is on pace to be the first player to notch 2,000 receiving yards in a season. His 948 yards are the most by any player under the age of 25 through the first eight games of a campaign.
• This segment may as well be named after Christian McCaffrey. The all-world running back now holds the record for the most NFL games with both a receiving and rushing touchdown. His 16 such games inches him ahead of Hall-of-Famer Marshall Faulk.