The NFL’s Week 6 picture is starting to sort itself out, and the divide is getting harder to ignore. Some teams are hanging around because their quarterbacks keep bailing them out. Others are slipping fast, with the losses piling up and the answers running thin.
New York is one of the clearest examples of a team with more questions than solutions. Jameis Winston is not the answer if the Giants are serious about winning the NFC East.
Is McCarthy? That’s where things stand now, and the uncertainty doesn’t stop there.
The Giants have four running backs and still don’t know which one they can trust most. Cam Skattebo didn’t even touch the ball against the Saints after a fumble last week against Washington, and that only added to the mess.
It’s a situation in New York that needs to get straightened out soon.
On the other side of the contender conversation, Buffalo continues to look dangerous because Josh Allen keeps dragging the offense into elite territory. He remains a pivotal force for the franchise, and he keeps coming up with the kind of plays that separate him from so many other quarterbacks.
Keon Coleman has the chance to grow into a dependable option for Allen, and with more weapons around him, the offense looks like it can become even tougher to deal with. The Bills have already scored 197 points, which is impressive, but the defense is still a concern they have to clean up.
Kansas City belongs in the contender category for a different reason: the Chiefs are back to looking like the Chiefs. Kenneth Walker has been one of the most impressive offensive players this season, and the league may have misjudged things when the Chiefs signed him to a nice deal. The offense is rolling, the defense is playing at an extremely high level, and after one bad season last year, they are right back where they were before.
Las Vegas, meanwhile, is sliding into the pretender lane. The Raiders’ luck may have finally run out after three straight losses, including two games decided by one score.
They do have an interesting test coming against a Rams team that doesn’t look great, and that matchup feels like the one to help them turn things around if they can do it. Can Kirk Cousins find a way to pick up a win against the Rams next week?
For now, the clearest takeaway is simple: the Chiefs and Bills are building toward a big season, while the Raiders and Giants are stuck trying to find new ways to win. Las Vegas and New York are both on losing streaks, and Patrick Mahomes and Josh Allen are still playing like stars at the top of the league.
In Other News...
Josh Allen Keeps Saving The Bills As One Concern Lingers
The Bills have spent much of the 2026 season living on the edge, and Josh Allen has been the reason they keep walking away with wins. Buffalo has stacked up close games, most of them decided by a single score, while Allen and James Cook III have provided enough offense to keep the team from wasting strong stretches on the other side of the ball.
Cook has been a big part of that formula, and the defense has shown real progress under coordinator Jim Leonhard, with Christian Benford emerging as one of the more dependable pieces in the secondary. Even so, Buffalo still looks like a team searching for complete trust on that side of the ball, and the latest spotlight on Benford only adds to the sense that the Bills are improving without quite being finished. [Read more 🡒]
Bills Could Be Facing More Than An Ejection With C.J. Gardner-Johnson
C.J. Gardner-Johnsons night against the Raiders ended well before the game did, and it did not stop at a simple removal from the field. The veteran defensive back was ejected from the Bills matchup after an incident involving Brock Bowers, turning an already tense first half into an even bigger problem for Buffalo in a game where every possession mattered.
The fallout may extend beyond the ejection itself, too. Gardner-Johnson is now facing the possibility of additional NFL discipline, with the league able to hand down further punishment after reviewing the play, and the sequence even carried an immediate cost when the penalty helped set up a Raiders field goal before halftime. [Read more 🡒]
Bills Are 5-1 But One Familiar Problem Still Looks Dangerous
The Bills left Las Vegas with a win and a 5-1 record, enough to keep them on top of the AFC East as they head into their bye week. Josh Allen once again supplied the kind of playmaking that can carry this team through stretches when things get messy, but the broader picture from Sunday was less tidy. Buffalos penalty issues continued to show up, and the defense spent too much time fighting off third-down stress against a Raiders offense that found ways to stay on the field.
Buffalo has earned a little breathing room before Week 8 brings Baltimore to town, and that pause arrives at a useful moment. The Bills are winning, but they are also carrying a familiar problem that can get exposed quickly against sharper opponents. If the penalties keep piling up and the third-down defense remains shaky, the record will not hide it for long. [Read more 🡒]