It might be premature to declare the Chiefs’ dynasty dead, but it could be curtains for Kansas City this season after yet another devastating loss.
Daniel Jones’ Achilles injury blows a hole in the Colts’ plans for this season and beyond.
Mike Tomlin, J.J. McCarthy and Shedeur Sanders were among the figures who bounced back in a big way in NFL Week 14.
Week 14 in the NFL necessitated an acceptance of some challenging conditions.
The December weather forced several teams to adapt, with snow or rain altering game plans in several different matchups. But several other tilts also tested franchises in a different fashion, as some key injuries – none more notable than Indianapolis Colts quarterback Daniel Jones going down with what was later confirmed to be a torn Achilles – and surprising dynamics significantly shifted any emerging sense of order in the playoff picture.
Here are the biggest winners and losers from Sunday’s Week 14 action:
NFL Week 14 winners
Mike Tomlin
Following a week where so many were eager to speculate about his future, the stoic Pittsburgh Steelers coach once again let his team do the talking with a narrative-countering 27-22 win over the Baltimore Ravens. There were plenty of familiar elements for Pittsburgh, including the pass rush delivering in a key spot when Alex Highsmith sacked Lamar Jackson as time expired. But the Steelers also broke through by actually putting together a downfield passing attack, as Aaron Rodgers looked his best in years while completing three passes of more than 20 air yards, according to Next Gen Stats. Some perspective is needed given that the offense went cold down the stretch with four three-and-outs in the fourth quarter, and Pittsburgh was outgained 420-318. But the Steelers still delivered a pointed message, which Rodgers said might mean ‘maybe you guys (the media) will shut the hell up for a week.’ And if his team’s statement wasn’t enough, Tomlin seemed to drive it home by blowing a kiss to the CBS camera right after the conclusion of the game.
Green Bay Packers
Matt LaFleur said there was no personal satisfaction in beating Ben Johnson after the Chicago Bears’ first-year coach said at his introductory news conference in January that he had enjoyed defeating the Packers coach twice a year while with the Detroit Lions. Still, LaFleur’s maneuver in the postgame handshake resembled Micah Parsons dispatching an overmatched offensive lineman with a swim move. The Packers put the overachieving Bears in their place with a 28-21 win that handed back the NFC North lead and affirmed Green Bay’s supremacy in the cutthroat division. An offense that was with its top five receivers for the first time all season showed off its potential, with Christian Watson hauling in two touchdowns from Jordan Love. But where the two teams are most divergent are in their defenses. While Chicago’s group is adept at generating turnovers, Green Bay truly throws opponents off their rhythm, which the unit again managed to do against Caleb Williams. The Bears will have a chance for a response at home in two weeks, but it might be another year before Johnson and Co. can truly measure up.
Buffalo Bills’ late flurries
This is not a reference to the snow that covered the field throughout the close call against the Cincinnati Bengals. Rather, it was the rapid accumulation of fourth-quarter points – 21 in under five minutes – that changed the forecast for Buffalo in a 39-34 win. Games in these conditions can produce some outlier outcomes, so it’s wise not to try to make too much of the outcome. But the Bills pounced on two uncharacteristic interceptions thrown by Joe Burrow in an otherwise outstanding performance by the quarterback, and Josh Allen again carried the offense in the unit’s time of need. There’s no telling what version of Buffalo will show up on a drive-by-drive basis, but this is likely the most dangerous of the AFC wild-card contenders.
Shedeur Sanders
It’s unlikely that the cellar-dweller tilt between the Cleveland Browns and Tennessee Titans will have many more ramifications beyond shaping the top of the 2026 NFL Draft order. But despite his day coming to a confounding end when he was sidelined for the Browns’ game-deciding botched two-point conversion, Sanders made meaningful strides in his third start. There were still several setbacks, including a costly third-quarter interception. And his proclivity for holding onto the ball remains untenable, with his 3.57-second average time to throw representing the second-highest mark for any quarterback this season, according to Next Gen Stats. But for whatever pressure he invites and exacerbates, Sanders also gives the offense and its small collection of promising pieces the chance to grow. With Cleveland squandering the brilliance of Myles Garrett and the defensive end’s pursuit of NFL history, the Browns can at least see this season out while putting up the sort of fight they couldn’t muster in the fall.
Tyler Shough
When the New Orleans Saints handed their offense to Shough for the rest of the season after a 1-7 start, they at least gave their fans a reason to stay invested in a campaign of stalled growth. The second-round rookie quarterback is rewarding the organization with enough sparks to start a conversation about whether he can hold down the role for at least another year. Shough reeled off two impressive touchdown runs – the first coming on a 34-yard designed run, the latter an even more impressive 13-yard scramble – to power a 24-20 upset of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Neither play was the sort of outcome the Saints should expect the 6-5, 219-pounder to be able to replicate, but both were vital on a rain-soaked day in which New Orleans was again without running back Alvin Kamara. Consistency is still difficult to come by, but if Shough continues along this trajectory, he will be hard to shunt aside for a first-round rookie passer.
J.J. McCarthy
One isolated performance against an undermanned Washington Commanders defense won’t single-handedly shift the season-long narrative surrounding the struggling quarterback, but McCarthy and the Minnesota Vikings need to cling to any signs of progress given how infrequently they’ve popped up. The second-year signal-caller finally exhibited some composure in a 31-0 rout, throwing for a season-high three touchdowns and averaging just 2.56 seconds to throw, his quickest mark of the year, according to Next Gen Stats. Not plagued by the protection problems that have become more pervasive as the season has dragged on, Minnesota was able to incorporate its tight ends more into the passing attack rather than forcing them to block or chip. The result had all three of McCarthy’s scoring strikes going to players at the position – two to Josh Oliver and another to T.J. Hockenson – on a day when the rushing attack led the way with 162 yards on 34 carries. The Vikings can’t expect things to remain this easy for the young passer, but the next two games against the Cowboys and Giants will provide opportunities to rebuild some confidence and establish a path forward before the degree of difficulty ramps up considerably in the final two weeks with tilts against the Lions and Packers.
NFL Week 14 losers
Kansas City Chiefs
If the Chiefs end up missing the playoffs for the first time since 2014 – three years before Patrick Mahomes was drafted and just the second season under Andy Reid’s watch – Sunday night’s 20-10 loss to the Houston Texans will serve as a fitting encapsulation of all the ways in which this year’s team came up short.
The Texans’ top-ranked defense doesn’t depend on deception or inordinate blitzing. It’s all the more galling, then, for opponents to be subdued by a group that simply comes out and denies almost everything, overwhelming offensive lines with its front four while its secondary locks down things on the back end.
In as close as a Week 14 game can be to a must-win affair, Kansas City wasn’t outfoxed. It was simply overmatched.
The Chiefs once again left Mahomes to try to sling them to victory despite entering the game without three starting offensive linemen and later losing another. Yet time and again, the quarterback’s supporting cast failed to rise to the moment. The most devastating drop came late in the fourth quarter, when Travis Kelce bobbled a pass that would then be intercepted by Texans linebacker Azeez Al-Shaair, extinguishing any shot at a late rally.
Despite his best efforts, Mahomes finished with the worst completion rate (42.4%) and passer rating (19.8) of his career, while his three interceptions also tied a personal low.
Any optimism surrounding Kansas City this season has largely stemmed from the notion that it was only a matter of time before this core flipped a switch and reached its previous heights. But the end of the Chiefs’ nine-year reign atop the AFC West – cemented Sunday with the loss – indicates that this new and undesirable era has really arrived.
There’s still a path to the postseason, but things are stacking up extremely unfavorably for Kansas City, which can’t count on tiebreakers against the Texans, Bills and Jaguars, who all are ahead of them in the AFC pecking order. Whenever the season ends, it might be time for the franchise’s most serious overhaul since the Super Bowl 55 beatdown by the Buccaneers.
A run game that lacks any kind of explosiveness should be completely reconfigured so as to recalibrate an attack that too often pushed everything on Mahomes’ plate. The largely dormant pass rush ranks among the most pressing problems, with the group unable to get home against C.J. Stroud even when it was able to generate pressure. And the longstanding issues in the receiving corps seem as pervasive as ever.
Daniel Jones and the Indianapolis Colts
‘It’s not looking good,’ Colts coach Shane Steichen said of Jones’ Achilles injury that knocked the quarterback out of Sunday’s 36-19 loss to the Jacksonville Jaguars. And while Steichen was speaking strictly about his starting signal-caller’s medical outlook, his words are also applicable to the football prognosis for both Jones and the Colts, both in the short and long term.
With Steichen confirming Monday that Jones suffered a torn Achilles that will end the signl-caller’s season, Indianapolis has a crisis on its hands for the last four weeks of the regular season. Having lost four of their last five games, the Colts now face the prospect of trying to seize a wild-card berth – the AFC South crown all but out of reach – with a sixth-round rookie quarterback in Riley Leonard at the helm. And the schedule brings a final slate of games likely to render Indianapolis the underdog in each contest.
The Colts offense was already coming down from its early-season peak after the unit led the league in scoring en route to a 7-1 mark. But reproducing that efficiency seems even more outlandish with defenses now able to load up even more against Jonathan Taylor in an effort to force Leonard to be a consistent downfield thrower.
The upcoming offseason, however, is where things truly get complicated for Jones and the Colts. The quarterback figured to score a massive payday once his deal expired after this season, with Indianapolis having a strong incentive to bring him back. A torn Achilles, however, would likely leave Jones uncertain for at least the start of next season in even the most optimistic of recovery timelines.
Would Indianapolis still be willing to pay a sizable sum – or use the franchise tag – given the uncertainty? There aren’t many good alternatives for the Colts after they dealt away their first-round draft picks for the next two years in a clear commitment to building around this offense and Jones. But Indianapolis was forging ahead at a time when it looked as though it could capitalize on a wide-open AFC field. Now, if the Colts fall in all of their remaining contests, they’ll end up at 8-9 – the exact same mark they held last year before late owner Jim Irsay gave Steichen and general manager Chris Ballard a one-year reprieve. And if defensive coordinator Lou Anarumo lands a head-coaching gig elsewhere, Indianapolis will almost be back at square one as it commits to recreating magic that dissipated long ago.
Baltimore Ravens
Did everyone panic about the wrong AFC North team? The Ravens’ Thanksgiving stumble was largely overlooked once the Steelers seized the spotlight with their struggles days later, but Baltimore has raised serious concerns as it fell behind Pittsburgh in the divisional pecking order. Yes, Isaiah Likely’s overturned touchdown loomed large in a close game that featured close calls that didn’t go the Ravens’ way. But there’s no need to indulge in conspiracy theories or hypotheticals when the offense simply started slow and went just 2-for-6 in the red zone, settling for three field goals and coming up short on a turnover on downs on the others. Meanwhile, the defense regressed to its decrepit earlier form, with a particularly debilitating coverage breakdown coming on an easy Jaylen Warren screen for a touchdown, among other miscues. Baltimore still might have a chance to reclaim the division so long as Pittsburgh doesn’t wrap things up before the Week 18 rematch. At this rate, however, the Ravens simply don’t look suited for the postseason.
Tampa Bay Buccaneers
The Buccaneers should be thankful that there’s no NFL Playoff Selection Committee. Any such entity would probably try to omit this group from the postseason, regardless of their finish within the division. With Sunday’s setback against New Orleans, Tampa Bay has now lost five of its last seven games and dropped into a tie atop the NFC South with the Carolina Panthers at 7-6. Any sloppiness can’t merely be chalked up to the soggy conditions, as Baker Mayfield again was out of sorts. The Bucs had a distinct scheduling advantage in the final five weeks, but the loss essentially rendered that moot given the looming matchups with Carolina in Weeks 16 and 18. A fifth consecutive division crown is hardly a given.
Washington Commanders
Being eliminated from playoff contention wasn’t a massive letdown in and of itself, as Washington was already starting down a lost season long before Sunday. But the fashion in which the Commanders suffered their shutout loss since 2019 was a sobering reminder of how far the organization has tumbled in a short time. In a meeting of NFC powers from last season that had both come undone in 2025, it was the Commanders who were unable to find any sort of toehold as they dropped their eighth consecutive game. Jayden Daniels’ return from a dislocated elbow figured to invigorate the offense, but Washington had no answers for Brian Flores’ defense, which surrendered just 206 total yards. Daniels exited the game in the third quarter after aggravating his elbow injury, though coach Dan Quinn said the second-year quarterback could have returned. While Quinn maintained he plans to keep playing Daniels for the rest of the year, Washington might soon need to revisit that school of thought to prevent this season’s calamitous run from extending into 2026.
This story has been updated with new information.
