NFL 2026-2027: Week 6

The Game Room
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Week 5 results:

Bucs 24, Cowboys 16
Jaguars 19, Eagles 17
Packers 31, Bears 7
Texans 26, Titans 3
Bengals 31, Dolphins 24
Patriots 45, Raiders 17
Vikings 23, Saints 13
Jets 17, Browns 12
Steelers 34, Colts 22
Giants 27, Commanders 27 (OT)
Broncos 23, Chargers 17
Lions 45, Cardinals 21
49ers 32, Seahawks 29
Ravens 30, Falcons 23 (OT)
Bills 37, Rams 34 (OT)

Here are this week’s lines. All spreads taken from DraftKings on Tuesday the 13th at 1:45 pm CT.

Thursday night:
Seahawks @ Broncos (+2.5)

Sunday early thirty:
Texans v Jaguars (-3) Game played in London, 8:30 am CT kickoff

Sunday early:
Bears @ Falcons (+3)
Ravens @ Browns (+4.5)
Titans @ Colts (-7)
Jets @ Patriots (-7.5)
Saints @ Giants (+1.5)
Panthers @ Eagles (-1.5)
Steelers @ Bucs (+2.5)

Sunday late:
Cardinals @ Rams (-12.5)
Chargers @ Chiefs (-8.5)
Bills @ Raiders (+4.5)

Sunday night:
Cowboys @ Packers (-1.5)

Monday night:
Commanders @ 49ers (-7.5)

Byes:
Bengals, Lions, Dolphins, Vikings

NFL 2026-2027: Week 5
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After last night’s kicking woes, the Rams have decided to part ways with their kicker, Harrison Mevis. They have signed Blake Grupe off the Jets’ practice squad.

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Falcons GETTING 3 and at home against the Bears. I’d take Atlanta straight up. Bears are on a downer. The 'most points in a season" goal has never seemed so far off.

I’d also take the Giants at home against the Saints. Winston seems more the good version than Mr. Exasperation lately.

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With the Houston and Tampa wins last week, that leaves 3 still defeated 0-5 teams, all in the AFC. Miami, Tennessee, and LA Chargers.

They’ll probably manage at least a win or two this season but perhaps we’ll see a team go defeated this season to join the 2008 Lions and 2017 Browns

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I was watching him do warmups last night, and thought he was the backup kicker, normally a lineman, as he has that build, a la Lou Groza. I even half-expected him to kick it straight-on.

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He reminded me of when Sebastian Janikowski was kicking for the Seahawks. Seabass looked like somebody’s dad won a sweepstakes to kick in the NFL.

I remember watching him pull a hamstring in his last game with Seattle trying to kick a field goal in a wild card game against Dalles (right before halftime) and the Seahawks punter had to fill in as kicker for the rest of the game. Seattle lost that game and their postseason was over. Janikowski retired in the offseason.

Kickers that look like this, in my experience, don’t do so great in the NFL.

Mevis:

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Janiskowski was a first-round pick of the Oakland Raiders in 2000. He played 18 seasons for them and was a great kicker. We Chiefs fans hated his guts.

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Oh yeah, there was a reason he lasted so long, but he clearly played too long.

Not every kicker, not even the really good ones, can last as long as Adam Vinatieri and still do a great job.

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As I’ve detailed before, competition for kicking spots has never been more fierce, and you’re only as good as your last game. Mevis was 17/20 for his (short) career before last night, a league average 85%.

Contrast that with 1972, the last year before they moved the posts back to the end line: overall averages were 61%, and 5 teams were 50% or below, with the Colts trailing at an absymal 33%. Yet they hung onto their kicker, Jim O’Brien, he who had the winning kick in Super Bowl V vs. the Cowboys, all season long. The Aints had 3 guys @ 44%, having let Tom Dempsey go a season earlier, who had a howitzer for a leg but often didn’t know where it was going. DC had Curt Knight, 47%, who led the league the previous year with 29 out of 49, but they hung onto him through Super Bowl VII, which they lost (he missed ALL EIGHT that he attempted that postseason, an astonishing thing for a SB contender).

There are TENS of THOUSANDS of kickers now much better than any of those guys, many in high school. I can only conclude that an NFL team simply didn’t have anything near the pool of guys they have now to pick and choose from, and that they simply didn’t prioritize kicking like they do now, which is amazing when you think about it, that they would neglect a key component of winning to that extent for as many years as they did.

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I had no idea that kickers were that bad at that point. I think it was about the late sixties that the European soccer-style kickers started to show up. Guys like Stenerud, Ypremiam, and the Brothers Gogolak.

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The averages have leveled off for about 15 seasons now (yes right around 85%), implying that all the competition, training, equipment, and repetition can only go so far. [Number of climate controlled stadiums has likely leveled off too]

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Rooting for the Ravens as always, even from Cleveland.

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This is true.

This is not. While the % made hasn’t changed much, the distance has. The average distance of attempted and made FG has still been steadily climbing, with more than twice as many attempts from 50+ yards in 2025 as in 2010. The change to K-ball handling in 2025 has made this even worse, but the trend was obvious even before that change.

I’m not sure we’ve seen peak kicking yet, unless they change the rules.

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Even Jan Stenerud - who was one of my favorite players when I was growing up, and who was the first pure kicker to be elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame - only made 67% of his field goal attempts over the course of his 19-year career. He was great in his era, but that sort of performance would get him cut today.

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Good point.

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More on FG kickers from way back. Fred Cox had a 15 year career with the Vikings, and his career FG% was 62%. He led the league in FG% in 1969 with 70.3%. He was a pro bowler in 1970. Over his career, he attempted 25 FG of 50+ yards. He made 2 of them.

Not only were kickers back then mediocre, they rarely kicked long FGs.

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Eagles have it as bad as the Niners.