Around the AFC, a few familiar names are still shaping the conversation - Peyton Manning through the text thread, Justin Herbert through the scramble drill, and Ashton Jeanty through sheer toughness.
In Denver, Sean Payton said Manning remains in regular contact and keeps sending messages about Bo Nix and the Broncos offense. Payton had a little fun describing the volume and length of those notes, but he made it clear he always reads them and answers back.
“ Listen, he’s not too long with those (voice memos), ” Payton joked, via Broncos Wire. “ I do get all his Omaha Production, like it could be anything, and it’ll come.
And one of the challenges in-season is when - in-season, you get each week, and obviously a ton of fans, you get a ton of well-wishes, congrats, or ‘Hang in there’ if you had a tough game. And I remember asking (former Broncos coach) John Fox, ‘How do you deal with these texts?’
And he said, ‘I just delete them all!’ So I never delete Peyton’s.
I’ve always responded.”
Bo Nix said he has also leaned on Manning for help on specific play calls and defensive looks, using the Hall of Famer as a sounding board for the kinds of situations that can decide games.
“ I’ve referred to him on, ‘What do you do in this situation? What do you do in that situation?
What helped you in a situation like this? ’” Nix said.
“ That’s where somebody like Peyton comes in. [It’s] really helpful, and for a guy like that to be available and to help is really cool.
Usually for him, [the messages are], ‘Keep your head up. Keep going back to work.’
Or, ‘Great game. Y’all fought hard.’
”
Payton also said of the Broncos’ latest effort, “It was good enough to win, but there’s still a number of things that we’ve got to improve on,” Payton said.
In Los Angeles, Jim Harbaugh addressed the struggles of Justin Herbert, a quarterback who is usually among the league’s most reliable performers. Harbaugh pointed to Herbert trying to force plays as the season has gone on, saying that kind of desperation has shown up too often.
“There are definitely times when he was trying to make a play, and too many times this season, there’s been that desperation time,” Harbaugh said, via The Athletic. “That’s what I’d attribute that to.
Doing anything and everything he can…That fumble, he was trying to throw a ball away. He’s just hell-bent on winning.
Like when he tried to avoid a safety, falling to the ground and somehow gets the ball off as an incomplete pass. He was trying to do the same thing in that situation.
I’m not going to tell him anything different. He’s doing anything and everything that he can to help us win, and I applaud those that do that.”
That came with the backdrop of a harsh reality: neither Herbert nor the Chargers can ignore the fact that no NFL team has started 0-5 and still reached the playoffs.
Over in Las Vegas, Ashton Jeanty was dealing with foot and ankle issues heading into Week 5, yet still suited up in the loss to the Patriots. Klint Kubiak said the rookie was not close to full strength, but made it clear the effort to play told him plenty.
“Yes, Ashton is beat up,” Kubiak said via the Raiders Wire. “And it’s a testament to how tough he is that he’s out there playing today for his teammates.”
In Other News...
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What makes the frustration linger is that this is not just about one bad month or a few close losses. Around the team, the conversation has drifted toward ownership and the broader budget approach, with the sense that the current path leaves little margin for improvement and even less patience for the people tasked with fixing it. [Read more 🡒]
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For the Chargers, though, the conversation appears to be more noise than real negotiation. Herbert has a no-trade clause, he recently signed a five-year extension through 2029, and the organization has made clear it has never discussed moving him and has no intention of doing so. Still, the buzz says plenty about the tension fans live with: when a team has a quarterback this talented, every hypothetical trade offer becomes a referendum on how much faith should be placed in the player who is supposed to define the next era. [Read more 🡒]
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Justin Herbert is 28 and still under contract for four more years, which is why any talk of a reset still sounds jarring. Even so, the way this season has unraveled has left room for an uncomfortable question that did not exist when the year began: if the struggles keep going, could the Chargers eventually consider a much larger overhaul, one that changes the direction of the entire team? [Read more 🡒]