The Keys to the Patriots’ Stunning Turnaround Were on Display in Baltimore

New England’s win answered some final questions. Plus, why Carolina deserves your respect and much more in Albert Breer’s Week 16 NFL takeaways.

Patriots coach Mike Vrabel has New England in the best shape it's been since winning its last Lombardi Trophy. / Mitch Stringer-Imagn Images

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1. New England Patriots
2. Carolina Panthers
3. Chicago Bears
4. Los Angeles Chargers
5. New Orleans Saints
6. Philadelphia Eagles
7. Cincinnati Bengals
8. Pittsburgh Steelers–Detroit Lions
9. Quick-hitters

Week 16 of the NFL regular season is drawing to a close, and we have a lot to get to, and if you want more on the Jaguars’ and Seahawks’ big wins, we have you covered with separate pieces. As for everyone else, here are the takeaways for Christmas week.

New England Patriots

The Patriots found out something about themselves in Baltimore and showed the rest of us, too. It started with the team falling behind 24–13 to the Ravens two minutes into the fourth quarter Sunday night, a week after New England blew a 21–0 lead to the Bills.

Having rung up an 11–2 start against a historically light schedule, it would’ve been easy to doubt at that point. These aren’t your older brother’s Patriots. Most of these guys weren’t even in the league, let alone on the team, the last time Bill Belichick and Tom Brady raised a Lombardi Trophy. They didn’t yet have a proof of concept.

But they were about to get it, mostly with how they reacted to being in that 11-point hole against Baltimore.

“There were no heads down or anything on the sidelines,” veteran running back Rhamondre Stevenson told me postgame. “We knew we were in the game. We just knew we had a couple of things to clean up—we saw on the sideline what we were doing wrong and where we could make some plays. We were all relentless. We knew what we had to do.”

Indeed, the Patriots ran off 15 unanswered points to upend the Ravens, 28–24.

This was the Patriots answering some final questions about the stunning regular-season turnaround Mike Vrabel has captained. Drake Maye’s Patriots had yet to pull off that kind of a fourth-quarter comeback. Now they have. Maye and his teammates hadn’t yet shown the ability to bounce back from a devastating defeat. Now, they’ve shown that they can do that, too.

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Much of it was spectacular. The first touchdown drive, covering 73 yards in seven plays, was capped by an outstanding throw and catch, with Maye dropping it in the bucket to rookie Kyle Williams for a 37-yard score. The second march was keyed by Maye taking big hits on crucial completions to Stefon Diggs, including one for 21 yards on fourth-and-2, with Rhamondre Stevenson punctuating the drive on another 21-yard gain for a touchdown.

“I’d seen the linebacker; he was bossed over to the left, and presnap, it was wide open on the right side,” Stevenson said. “So I kind of predetermined going back side. And I just saw a wide-open hole, and hit it.”

But this win was more than receiver-quarterback chemistry, a running back rolling with such clarity, or even a defense’s playstyle on K’Lavon Chaisson’s game-clinching punchout to force a Zay Flowers fumble. This victory encapsulated what Vrabel has built with the Patriots.

Patriots running back Rhamondre Stevenson rumbles into the end zone to complete New England's comeback from a 24-13 deficit on Sunday night. / James Lang-Imagn Images

Stevenson’s a prime example. He said the team is like a family, and maybe that’s because of the trust that’s been cemented. He can speak to that firsthand—his fumbling issue early in the year might’ve gotten him benched with another team. Instead, Vrabel stuck with him, which, for the coach, was about judging Stevenson for who he was, even over the most recent thing he’d done. The result? A fully bought-in player on a team full of guys like that.

“With the fumbling issue, my whole team had my back, the coaching staff,” Stevenson said. “And Vrabel, particularly, he just told me he was gonna ride with me. He knew I was trying to get it right. He knows I was making a conscious effort to hold the ball right, and I wasn’t just trying to be reckless with it—he has seen me being intentional in practice. It shows you if we have his back, he’ll treat us the way we treat the team.

“I think I treat the team pretty well, so I think that’s why he has my back.”

And as a result of a lot of cases like that, with an MVP candidate at quarterback mixed in, that team is in a lot better shape than it has been since its last Lombardi was lifted.

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Carolina Panthers

The Panthers deserve your respect. Maybe you cast a suspicious eye toward their 8–7 record, and it’s fine if you do. Perhaps it’s because they’re in the NFC South, which is valid.

Regardless, they weren’t supposed to be here.

Carolina’s been a trainwreck since David Tepper was approved as owner in 2018, posting two seven-win seasons, four five-win seasons and a two-win campaign in eight years before this one. The Panthers fired their most recent Super Bowl coach (Ron Rivera), failed on a big swing on a college coach (Matt Rhule), then saw a “safe hire” (Frank Reich) go one-and-done.

Then, they hired Dave Canales, whose first interview was with Tepper. They did it in part because of how well he interviewed, and in part because of the belief that Dan Morgan, who was being promoted to general manager, had in him, from the eight seasons they spent together rising through the ranks of Pete Carroll’s Seattle program.

Slowly and steadily from there, the whole thing’s come together. Last year, a 1–7 start was followed by a 4–5 finish. This year has brought more consistency, and flashes of brilliance, highlighted by wins over the Packers and Rams. But Sunday was different. The Panthers weren’t sneaking up on the Buccaneers, the four-time defending division champ. They were both 7–7 coming into Sunday, and the Panthers came out with a high-stakes 23–20 win.

“Canales has done an awesome job with the guys,” Morgan told me. “Just letting them be themselves, and also tailoring the scheme to what they do. Same thing with [DC Ejiro] Evero on the defensive side. And then just creating that positive environment where, ‘Hey, we’re a young team. We’re gonna make mistakes, but play hard, play your ass off, and where the chips fall at the end, they’ll fall.’ I think it’s really been the chemistry part of things that the guys have really come together as a team.

“You’re really starting to feel that around the building.”

As for the players, it’s the stars, for sure, and guys like Bryce Young (102.5 rating), Tetairoa McMillan (six catches, 73 yards, TD) and Derrick Brown (five tackles and a sack) did shine. But it’s the depth and balance of the roster, too. It’s having Yosh Nijman ready at left tackle in Ickey Ekwonu’s absence. It’s Jalen Coker’s 34-yard catch to set up the game-winning field goal. It’s fourth-round rookie Lathan Ransom’s pick to seal it.

As Morgan sees it, the players are fulfilling what he and Canales are looking to find, which happens to be the same sort of competitive, tough guys they helped Carroll find in Seattle.

“We play so hard,” Morgan said. “I’m rarely gonna watch the tape and be like, ‘Man, this guy’s jogging to the ball, or this guy’s not trying to finish a block.’ Looking out there today, you could really see that. They’re hungry to win. They’re tough. They’re physical. That’s the brand of football we want to play around here.”

Regardless of what happens next—with those Seahawks coming to Charlotte next week, and a rematch with the Bucs the week after—the Panthers look a lot different than they have in a while.

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Chicago Bears

The big thing that Ben Johnson has established in Chicago is belief. The one thing that stuck out to me over the summer when I visited Bears camp was simple: It looked hard.

And that went for everything. From the way the players practiced to the amount the coaches were throwing at them, Ben Johnson was conducting what looked very much like an old-school Parcells-ian weeding out through the offseason (which makes sense since Dan Campbell, whom Johnson worked with in Miami and for in Detroit, is a Bill Parcells protégé). He was going to find out how much his guys could handle, one way or the other.

The result, as I see it anyway, was on display with five minutes left in Saturday night’s showdown with the Packers, with the Bears down 16–6 and searching for a spark. Most teams with Chicago’s recent history would probably be dead in the water, even with a record of 10–4, in that spot. These Bears weren’t—and it goes back to how Johnson hardened them.

“Just making it harder on us at the beginning,” veteran receiver DJ Moore told me late Saturday night, “and then in camp you could tell that what his vision was for this team was coming to fruition [as the season got closer]. And then we just had to fulfill it every week. And every week, we try to achieve that and go out there and put our best foot forward.”

It’s fair to say that they’ve achieved it.

Moore’s spectacular 46-yard touchdown catch in overtime—a perfect throw from oft-criticized/picked-apart franchise quarterback Caleb Williams—didn’t just beat the Packers 22–16. It showed, again, what sort of tough, resilient team Johnson has forged.

Then again, so did the play of the special teams, with 51- and 43-yard fourth-quarter field goals from Cairo Santos drawing the team closer, and setting the stage for Josh Blackwell to recover Santos’s onside kick with two minutes left. The defense did, too, stiffening for a turnover on downs in overtime (assisted by a botched fourth-down snap). But more than anything, it was Williams who stood tall, going 11-of-21 for 143 yards and two touchdowns in the fourth quarter and overtime, with two scores coming under significant duress.

“He just stayed calm and cool, collected all game,” Moore said. “He knew he was going to have a chance to come back and win this game. Never got too high, never got too low.”

The first was to undrafted rookie Jahdae Walker, who came into Saturday night without an NFL catch to his name, and somehow had Williams’s trust to the point where the QB threw it to a spot for him to get it on fourth-and-4 with 28 seconds to go, and an all-out blitz bearing down on him. The second, of course, was the one to Moore, on a call the Bears had highlighted this week as one they’d have ready for a zero blitz.

“[Johnson] was definitely holding it for a spot like that,” Moore said. “And the defense gave us what we wanted. It was up to me to just run fast and win. But as soon as I heard the play call and then broke the huddle, and saw the defense, I knew we were good to go.”

And now the Bears are on their way, too, because they got here the hard way.

They still have the 49ers and Lions on the schedule, so it’s tough to predict where they’ll land in the playoff bracket. But it’s pretty easy to see that, regardless of what their seed is, or how this year ends, Johnson has that franchise going places.

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Chargers coach Jim Harbaugh has L.A. at 11-4 despite numerous injuries to its offensive line. / Kevin Jairaj-Imagn Images

Los Angeles Chargers

I’m really impressed with the Chargers. L.A. is now 11–4, in a very tough division, without its starting tackles, its bellcow rookie tailback just returned, and, as we said last week, is playing with unmistakably Jim Harbaugh’s style.

The Cowboys came into Sunday with something to prove, having been eliminated from the NFC playoff picture less than 24 hours earlier. It showed in how they went 79 yards in 10 plays on the game’s opening drive and scored again on their next two possessions. But the Chargers rode it out and eventually knocked Dallas out.

The final was 34–17. The real story, though, was in the second-half numbers. L.A. outgained Dallas 219–129 after the break, nearly doubled up time of possession, and, most importantly, blanked their hosts 13–0 after carrying a 21–17 edge into halftime.

“It’s just us locking in, executing and taking advantage of our opportunities,” old vet receiver Keenan Allen told me after it was over, “trying not to leave anything short, trying to keep everything in front of us and making sure we take care of our part.”

Allen had been a Charger for 11 seasons before being cut by Harbaugh and GM Joe Hortiz upon the new regime’s arrival in Los Angeles. He spent last year in Chicago, before returning this year, meaning he’s seen the before and after of the franchise, its coaching situation and the quarterback it’s cast its lot with.

His review? You can start with Harbaugh. 

“He just has that aura, just that winning culture, he has that winning feel to him,” Allen said. “I think everybody just believes in it.”

And that’s been proven, of course, in how the team has effectively stayed the course in the face of injuries. The Chargers had a guard (Jamaree Salyer) starting at left tackle, an October signing (Bobby Hart) filling in at right tackle for Trey Pipkins III (Joe Alt’s replacement), and a quarterback playing with a protective sleeve over a surgically repaired left hand.

That quarterback, of course, is a big part of making all this work, too, and this version of Justin Herbert, as Allen sees it, is a little different than the pre-Harbaugh version.

“Just how he runs the offense, [he’s] much more composed, much more confident,” Allen said. “He’s seeing things before they happen, and he’s making the right play over and over again.”

Then, there’s the Jesse Minter–led defense that makes up for what it lacks in prime-of-their-career stars (save for Derwin James) with smarts and savvy, and a lot of disguise.

Put it all together, and you have a team that somehow, inexplicably, is getting tougher and better as the year goes on. And now, with the Broncos’ loss on Sunday, they’ll have a shot, if they can beat the Texans on Saturday, to win the NFC West in Week 18 in Denver.

Which is something I didn’t see coming.

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Saints quarterback Tyler Shough celebrates his fourth win on Sunday since becoming the starting quarterback in New Orleans. / Matthew Hinton-Imagn Images

New Orleans Saints

The Saints suddenly have some flexibility—and maybe more than just that—with Tyler Shough in the saddle. In April, I talked to some scouts who thought that if the New Orleans rookie hadn’t been a seven-year college player who’d played at three different schools, and wasn’t 26 years old, he might have been seen as the best quarterback in his class.

It’s too early to judge whether that’ll wind up being the case.

But through seven starts, Shough is showing everyone something. The team was 1–7 when it named him the starter, and the Saints are 4–3 since. He’s completed 66.4% of his throws for 1,792 yards, seven touchdowns, five picks and an 86.5 rating. Add the size and arm strength, and his calm and command, and New Orleans has a young quarterback with upside. How much? Well, that’s the question.

With that established, you can say this for him: He’s taken advantage of his opportunity.

“My goal is to put everything on film, so that they feel comfortable with me starting every single game,” Shough said. “My preparation, what’s on film, how I operate in the building, being a leader, being myself, that’s what I care about. Everything has been great so far. I have to continue to do that because, at the end of the day, it’s the NFL. You’re constantly being evaluated, and I understand that. What I put on tape matters.”

And he’s in the Saints’ quarterback equation for 2026. Part of it, he’ll tell you, is the preparation he had, as a starter and a backup, and failing and succeeding at Oregon, Texas Tech and Louisville

“That leveled me out mentally, as far as expectations and the importance of preparation,” he said. 

And he’s continued to grow through it all, including one great example in the middle of Sunday’s 29–6 rout of the Jets.

“The two-minute drive right before half, coming out there, I had a big throw to Juwan [Johnson], and that wasn’t even part of the play call we had,” he said. “We had multiple alerts, multiple different kinds of things we’re trying to attack, and I just checked to a completely different play. We were all on the same page, and it ended up being an explosive [play] and helped flip the field. Just having that confidence and the preparation, and also just having that in the toolbox, it was kind of a fun moment.”

So what does Shough’s development mean for New Orleans in the long term?

Shough probably hasn’t done enough to dissuade the team from taking, say, a quarterback whom they believe could become Josh Allen or Patrick Mahomes. But as it stands right now, the presence of such a prospect in the 2026 draft class looks iffy at best. And as they keep winning, they keep falling in the draft order anyway (they are now projected to pick eighth).

At the very least, it sure looks like Shough has done enough to make it so the Saints won’t have to force anything, which would only create more opportunity for him to show what he can do.

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Philadelphia Eagles

Now that we know the Eagles will have a shot to defend their title in January, this much is clear: The formula will be different from last year’s. Philadelphia’s offense isn’t quite what it was. On the flip side, the defense may be better than the 2024 edition, having held nine consecutive opponents to 24 or fewer points, while routinely buying the offense time to get its act together.

Such was the case again in Saturday’s NFC East–clinching win over the Commanders, with the defense holding the Eagles’ rivals to 10 points through three quarters, then producing a game-turning pick (Cooper DeJean rung that one up) at the end of the third quarter to blow it open.

Playing that way, of course, means traveling a narrower path to a title for Nick Sirianni’s crew. But it’s a credit to the coaches and players that there is still a path.

“Last year was special,” veteran Brandon Graham told me postgame. “We lost a lot of guys. They got paid, like Sweaty [Josh Sweat], you got Milt [Williams] and all them guys on defense. And I just felt like they did a good job of having people, having depth. And so, for me, honestly, it’s just been cool to see everybody build. Because every year is different, man. We got new faces, new starters, new people that’s coming in. …

“And I mean, man, it’s really about making sure that you’re staying working, even through the chaos and the storm that sometimes happens during the year. Nobody wavered.”

The opportunity was there through a rough three-game stretch Graham referenced a couple of times as we talked, with consecutive losses to the Cowboys, Bears and Chargers cutting into the collateral an 8–2 start gave the team. But through it, there was a process Philly had to go through to find its formula for this year’s playoffs.

Saturday brought more clarity, with the team, after a 31–0 drubbing of the Raiders last week, leaning on Saquon Barkley and the run game (which isn’t quite what it was last year) to highlight a defense that’s gotten better as young players have gotten their footing.

Now, because the team is still evolving, and because there have been bumps, Graham says the circumstances “really do” make building momentum over the next couple of weeks vital for this Eagles group. “There’s no point to taking the foot off the gas. It’s more like, O.K., that’s our first step, getting in the dance,” Graham says. “Here it is.”

It is, indeed, there for the Eagles now, with, again, a tougher road ahead than the one they earned last year. We’ll see where they take it.

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Dolphins quarterback Quinn Ewers and Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow shake hands after Cincinnati's rout of Miami on Sunday. / Nathan Ray Seebeck-Imagn Images

Cincinnati Bengals

As bad as things have been in Cincinnati, Sunday showed a very real distinction in what the Bengals have on their roster. Joe Burrow and Tua Tagovailoa were taken five picks apart in the 2020 draft. Both entered Hard Rock Stadium on Sunday, eliminated from the playoffs, with rosters that surely will undergo some retooling in the coming months.

One threw for 309 yards, four touchdowns and a 146.5 passer rating.

The other was benched, an emergency third quarterback for a team taking a 45–21 beating.

The point: The future for Cincinnati can still be awfully bright, based on what Burrow’s helped to build there since 2020, with better injury luck and some better players on defense. And that showed in the team’s effort against the Dolphins.

“I wasn’t surprised at all. I was proud of them, but I wasn’t surprised,” Bengals coach Zac Taylor told me, as he boarded the flight home. “We got tremendous character in the locker room, and we told them it was a character game. Two teams out of the playoffs, they’re going down to vacation weather in Miami, and our guys handled it the right way. They handled the practice week the right way. They’re on top of the plan.

“And then they went down there, and you see how they started the second half. Defense got four straight turnovers, and the offense scored four straight touchdowns. It was fun to watch us play in all three phases the right way.”

There were a few things I took from my conversation with Taylor, and I’ll definitely get to more of that, and some of the Burrow-specific stuff, in my Tuesday notes. But the main thing is that this team, stricken by injuries and contract strife, has a golden opportunity to come out of it like a Phoenix in 2026.

As for the Dolphins, we’ll get to them in the quick-hitters.

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Pittsburgh Steelers–Detroit Lions

The end of the Steelers-Lions game was an abomination. The referees’ convention and conference call with Park Avenue was confusing at best, and infuriating at worst, with two teams fighting for their playoff lives standing in bewilderment.

The result: Amon-Ra St. Brown got a lateral off to Jared Goff, and Goff scored a touchdown, but the touchdown wouldn’t count because St. Brown was guilty of offensive pass interference before he caught the ball from Goff initially. Of course, before that, to most of us, it looked like St. Brown’s forward progress had been stopped before he flipped the ball to his quarterback. Either way, the product, a Steelers win, was the same.

And let’s make sure we give Pittsburgh credit. The Steelers went on the road, got their third consecutive win, and, at 9–6, are closing in on their first AFC North title since 2020 while clinching a non-losing record for the 19th consecutive year under Mike Tomlin (and the 22nd consecutive year total). Aaron Rodgers looks more comfortable than he has in years, the running game’s getting going, and the defense has performed admirably without T.J. Watt.

All that said, too many games have become about the officials, and in the end, this one became another, even if it should’ve been about a furious Lions comeback that fell short. I’d hope this offseason that the league takes a complete look at how they handle officiating and goes beyond the results in their looming negotiations with the officials (with a CBA that expires May 31).

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Quick-hitters

Now, let’s finish up with some final thoughts …

• Most sensible conclusion to the Tagovailoa story: The Dolphins eat more than half of his $54 million number for 2026 to buy a draft pick, and make him someone else’s reclamation project. If they can find a taker, that is. I did think, at one point, it might make sense to keep him aboard as a de facto bridge QB for ’26. But a clean break might be best.

• I’ll be interested to see whether Grant Udinski lands interviews in January. The Jags’ OC was enormously valued by Kevin O’Connell and received promotions in Minnesota in consecutive years to prevent his departure. He will turn 30 next month, so he’s a year younger than Sean McVay was when McVay landed the Rams’ job. But he’s talented, and there aren’t a lot of young offensive names in the on-deck circle.

• If the Raiders make a change, I’d say Chargers defensive coordinator Jesse Minter would be an interesting name to keep an eye on. Minter’s done a nice job in three different stops (Vanderbilt, Michigan and the Chargers) as a DC, and Mike Macdonald’s success in Seattle helps him. Minter was a Ravens staffmate of Macdonald’s and replaced him at Michigan in 2022.

• The Bills won a real clunker of a performance on Sunday, which sometimes is what you need to do. Now, if the Patriots somehow stub their toe against the Jets or Dolphins …

• I do wonder what having Josh Johnson, Max Brosmer and Chris Oladokun (and Dak Prescott, too) leading eliminated teams into Christmas Day will do for scheduling, given how much Netflix is paying to get involved. With Christmas on Friday, Saturday and Monday in the next three years, it would surprise no one if the league built flexibility into it, even if that really sucks for the fans who actually go to the games.

• The Giants and Raiders are the NFL’s two worst teams, tied at 2–13, and play against each other next Sunday. Las Vegas may be playing for the right to draft Fernando Mendoza or Dante Moore. The Giants, on the other hand, would likely auction off the pick, with a bunch of quarterback-needy teams close enough in the order to deal up.

• The Falcons’ current regime has been assumed for a few weeks to be on the chopping block. But Atlanta’s now won two straight, so could a Monday night upset of the Rams next week change things? I don’t think it’ll happen. I’m not sure it’d flip the plan on its head anyway. That said, it might make things more interesting.

• Cam Ward had a really nice afternoon against the Chiefs on Sunday, for what it’s worth.

• I still like Jonathan Gannon as a coach. But seven consecutive losses and 12 losses in 13 weeks are pretty tough to survive. While Arizona owner Michael Bidwill hasn’t shown his cards yet, it’s fair to say Arizona’s performance will likely merit some level of change, with, I’d say, Gannon in a little more trouble than GM Monti Ossenfort is right now.

• The Browns are still playing hard, and I still think Kevin Stefanski is a really good coach and will get snapped up quickly if he becomes available in January. I’d also understand if everyone decided it’s simply time for a change.

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