Puka Nacua played his final snap for the Los Angeles Rams on Sunday with a reported knee injury, the kind that needs "more imaging Monday" before anyone knows how bad it is. Nacua was targeted 19 times in the 20-13 win over Washington. He caught 14 balls for 150 yards and a touchdown. Then his knee went, and the machine kept humming.
That's the NFL in one play. Workers get used up, the product gets sold, and the league moves to the next Sunday.
Who Gets Used Up
Myles Garrett came back from a knee injury that sidelined him for seven games, and the Rams put him straight to work. All three of his tackles were sacks, and the first forced a fumble. In eight previous games, the Rams had 12 sacks combined. Aaron Donald, the superstar defensive tackle, "came out of retirement" to line up next to Garrett, creating what the base reporting calls an "all-world defensive line." Garrett's trade to Los Angeles happened in the offseason. Nobody asked him where he wanted to go. A player gets moved like inventory, then gets praised for producing.
Over in Kansas City, Patrick Mahomes appeared to be leaving the game in the second quarter after his arm bent awkwardly when he was sandwiched by multiple defenders. He stayed in and finished with 242 yards and two touchdowns. Cleveland's Shedeur Sanders threw for 297 yards in the first start of his sophomore season, led two comeback drives, and watched the Browns lose 23-22 in overtime when a 2-point try failed. Chicago's Caleb Williams threw four interceptions, and receiver Luther Burden III fumbled inside his own 20 with 3:48 left. The Bears still won 27-24 on a walk-off field goal by Cairo Santos, the first team to win while turning it over five-plus times since 2006.
What They're Calling "Competition"
The Las Vegas Raiders started 3-0 under coach Klint Kubiak and quarterback Kirk Cousins. They've lost five of their last six, after a 38-17 loss at San Francisco left them 4-5. They allowed 30 or more points for the sixth consecutive game, the longest streak in team history. The Chargers, meanwhile, fell 44-22 to Houston and remain the league's last winless team, joining the 2011 Indianapolis Colts as the only teams since 2000 to start 0-8 the year after making the playoffs. Justin Herbert's fourth-quarter touchdown pass ended a run of 37 consecutive drives without a touchdown. He's gone 10 straight starts without multiple touchdowns. The person under center takes the headline; the front office that built the roster takes nothing.
Washington's ending was a mess. With the ball on the Rams' 31-yard line, they threw a short pass, then tried a lateral until the clock ran out. Coach Dan Quinn said the team called two plays, one a deep ball and the other a short completion and lateral option if the Rams blitzed hard. "Didn't love our execution at the end," he said. The people running the play get the blame. The people who wrote it get the paycheck.
Who Sits Above the Scoreboard
The standings have a way of turning human wreckage into numbers: Rams 5-4, Bears 7-2, Chiefs 6-2, Washington 2-5-1, Chargers 0-8. Players like Nacua don't speak in those columns. He didn't discuss his injury with reporters after the game, and the base reporting notes he was visibly in a good mood. The league will tell the rest of the story through a medical report, an imaging result, and a roster move. The body at the center of it gets a vote on none of it.
- nfl
- los angeles rams
- myles garrett
- chicago bears
- caleb williams
- kansas city chiefs
- cleveland browns