Caleb Williams takes massive step, and what we learned in Sunday’s Week 5 slate

FOX Sports’ NFL experts provide the biggest takeaways from every Sunday game in Week 5 and what they mean for each team going forward.

Jets: If the Jets offense has an identity, it’s certainly not a good one. There is very little they’re doing well right now. Sure, it can’t be easy for offensive coordinator Nathanial Hackett with a struggling offensive line and a quarterback who suddenly looks very old, but his playcalling and scheme are becoming a huge problem. There’s no creativity in it, and he can’t find a way to get two of his most dynamic weapons — WR Garrett Wilson and RB Breece Hall — open in space. Everything is screens and short passes that the defense sees coming. And when they try to do something else, Aaron Rodgers ends up as a sitting duck because the blocking has been terrible. 

The Jets had 254 total yards against the Vikings— the fourth time in five games they have had fewer than 270. As good as their defense is, they can’t win that way. Rodgers would never allow Robert Saleh to demote his hand-picked OC, but the Jets sure do need a new vision on offense before it’s too late. 

Vikings: Sam Darnold won again and has been generally terrific this season. But one thing to watch going forward: He was holding the ball way too long on Sunday against the Jets. Granted, it was against a very tough Jets secondary, but the result was that Darnold took a beating in this game. He was sacked four times, took way too many hits, and even briefly left the game in the first quarter when he was hit in the ribs. He seemed shaky, passing for only 179 yards and throwing a fourth-quarter interception, and he didn’t lead the Vikings offense to a single touchdown. Really, the performance was an echo of his failed tenure with the Jets. And with receivers like Justin Jefferson and Jordan Addison, that shouldn’t happen. They can both get open and can both make contested catches. Darnold just has to get rid of the ball faster. — Ralph Vacchiano

Panthers: Chuba Hubbard was not the skill player I bet on breaking out in the Panthers offense — but he’s that guy. Receiver Diontae Johnson has yet to live up to his price tag and quarterback Bryce Young and receiver Xavier Legette and Jonathan Mingo have all yet to live up to their draft status. With coach David Canales showing up to spruce up Carolina’s passing atack, I thought one or many of those guys would emerge. But instead, it has been Hubbard finding space on the ground. He finished with 13 carries for 97 yards and a touchdown and could be in the mix to land in the top 10 in rushing yards this week — and at the end of the season. 

Hubbard is set to be a free agent in 2025, but don’t be surprised if he ends up sticking around. He’s a match for the Panthers, and they’re a match for him. He could be earning RB1 snaps in Carolina for the foreseeable future. 

Bears: Caleb Williams finally put together a complete game. That’s a massive step for a rookie. There’s no need to put an asterisk next to it. I get that he beat up on the Panthers, the NFL’s worst defense. That’s obviously important context. But last week, Williams missed a handful of wide-open touchdown opportunities. He looked way too inconsistent. He lacked touch. He seemed hurried. 

All those issues evaporated against the Panthers. Williams need only look to the other sideline at Bryce Young to know that some quarterbacks never have games like this one. Williams was 20-of-29 for 304 yards and two touchdowns. He rushed for 34 more yards. It had me thinking: OK, that is a No. 1 overall pick. It’s a massive achievement for Williams — and one worth noting. The next level of his development will be putting together games like this one against more formidable defenses. — Henry McKenna

Browns: So what exactly does Deshaun Watson have to do to get benched? The Browns are 1-4, their lone win against an until-just-now-winless Jaguars team, and they’ve yet to score more than 18 points in any of their first five games. Watson was especially uninspired in Sunday’s loss to the Commanders. He didn’t get to 100 passing yards until the end of the third quarter. Obviously, Cleveland has a huge sunken cost in Watson’s fully guaranteed $230 million contract, but why not give backup Jameis Winston a shot? The Browns are averaging fewer than five yards per pass with Watson, with a bottom-five offense that could use any kind of spark. It’s hard to imagine the Browns not finishing last in the AFC North the way things are going. 

Commanders: Rookie quarterback Jayden Daniels deserves most of the attention in Washington’s 4-1 start, but what was most encouraging in Sunday’s dominating win over the Browns was the way Washington’s defense played. The Commanders had easily the worst defense in the NFL last year — last in yards and points allowed — and Dan Quinn’s group is showing real progress. Frankie Luvu had 2.5 sacks, Bobby Wagner had 1.5 and a forced fumble on Sunday. Last year, the Commanders had just four games in which they held opponents under 27 points, while every other NFL team had at least eight. And now Washington has done it three times in five weeks. — Greg Auman

Dolphins: Nothing about it was pretty, but the Dolphins got a division win even though running back De’Von Achane went down early in the game against the Patriots. Despite the injury and a banged-up offensive line, Miami got the ground game going anyway. It’s hard to be that encouraged about a team that only put up 15 points against a struggling New England team, but the bye week will allow the Dolphins to rest and heal up. On the downside, how viable are they without Tua Tagovailoa? The team hasn’t shown interest in bringing in another quarterback after Tagovailoa’s latest concussion and seems likely to continue to lean on the run game in the meantime. Maybe that can be enough? 

Patriots: You have to hand it to the Patriots, they have no quit in them. Even as they committed a penalty on what looked like the last offensive drive and didn’t convert the resulting fourth-and-15 play, New England still managed to get the ball back with 29 seconds. It didn’t ultimately result in anything, but head coach Jerod Mayo has his team fighting despite a lack of talent, and there’s something to be said for that. 

There’s no rhythm to the Pats offense, and it’s extraordinarily lackluster with an unreliable offensive line. That’s the reason first-round pick Drake Maye isn’t playing with New England playing the long game with who they think will be their eventual franchise quarterback. I’m not sure that this season is going to amount to anything for the Patriots, but it should lay the groundwork for Maye to take over after some reinforcements are brought in along the offensive line at the very least. — Carmen Vitali
 

Ravens: NFL teams need to rethink how they value running backs after seeing what Derrick Henry has done for the Ravens. He is one of the best players in the NFL, but because he plays running back — and isn’t much of a pass-catcher — he doesn’t get the credit he deserves. Henry is as dominant as any player at any position. Just look at his game-closing run, when he rambled 51 yards in overtime against Cincinnati in Week 5. If it were Patrick Mahomes, Tyreek Hill or Henry’s teammate Lamar Jackson, we’d be talking about bookmarking it for their MVP campaign. It was clutch and beastly and elite. 

Teams will try to rationalize that they can find replacement-level running backs in the draft and that a back like the 30-year-old Henry is on the verge of seeing Father Time take away his rare gifts. But the truth is that Henry is a force, and roughly 28 teams are sitting there wishing they had him. Let’s get back to paying running backs what they deserve!

Bengals: Zac Taylor’s seat must be getting awfully hot. The Cincinnati coach had led his team through a few slow starts in the past. But right now, the Bengals are 1-4, and they are a long shot at getting into the playoffs. It feels like Taylor might have gotten too comfortable falling into the early-season hole. And now, for the first time, it truly feels like they can’t get out. Taylor could try to hold onto his job by firing his defensive coordinator Lou Anarumo. After all, on Sunday, the Bengals offense put up 442 total yards and Joe Burrow looked as good as ever. So there’s an outside shot that Taylor could scapegoat Anarumo and survive the season. But it’s not looking good for Taylor. And frankly, Burrow deserves better at this point in his career. The Bengals need a coach who can help Burrow win a Super Bowl, which feels as far away now as it did when he was a rookie. — Henry McKenna

Bills: Yes, Sean McDermott’s game management was costly on Sunday, but a bigger issue is Buffalo’s issues at wide receiver. It was clearly too early to say the Bills were doing just fine without Stefon Diggs. I’ll admit it: I thought they had things figured out. Over the past two weeks, however, Buffalo and Josh Allen have struggled to get into a groove in the passing game. Receiver Khalil Shakir has been Allen’s most reliable pass-catcher, but he missed Week 5 with an injury. So the Bills’ passing attack went from bad to worse to open the game. Weirdly, tight end Dalton Kincaid had the worst game of his career with two drops in the first half. The Bills fell into a 17-point hole. That’s when Allen started reaching into his bag of tricks to find someone — anyone — to help him carry the passing attack. There were little sprinkles of Mack Hollins and Keon Coleman. But on the whole, this was a reminder that Buffalo is still working through the challenges of not having a true No. 1 option in its passing offense.

Texans: Let’s stay on that topic, shall we? It’s impossible to overstate the value of Texans receiver Nico Collins. Houston did not score a touchdown after Collins left with a hamstring injury. C.J. Stroud looked as sloppy as he’s looked all season, and the Texans offense opened the door for Allen and company to mount a comeback. There were clearly other factors that inhibited the Texans’ production, but none was as clear as the departure of Collins from the lineup. He is one of the best receivers in the NFL right now, and even with Diggs showing up and taking away targets, Collins is putting up freakish numbers. Had he not gotten injured, it’s easy to imagine he would have put up his fourth 100-yard game in five weeks. Even missing three quarters of this week’s action, he has 32 catches for 567 yards and three touchdowns. — Henry McKenna

Colts: Defense will be the downfall of the Colts, the main reason they won’t be a serious AFC playoff contender this season. They didn’t record a single quarterback hit on a struggling Trevor Lawrence and allowed two receptions of 60-plus yards to an offense that has been terrible this season. It may only get worse for Indianapolis because its defensive line has been decimated due to injury (DeForest Buckner, Tyquan Lewis and Samson Ebukam are on injured reserve; Kwity Paye was inactive Sunday). So the progress we’ve seen the Colts make in run defense after a historically bad start to the year could start unraveling, too. A saving grace for Indy in the short term is that it has Tennessee and Miami next on its schedule, two teams with bad offenses. 

Jaguars: The Jaguars have their confidence back. I would dare to say it’s not necessarily because they got their first win of the season on Sunday, but how they did so. All three phases of the ball had massive moments, and we saw a game-winning drive from Trevor Lawrence, who had one of the best games of his career. The defense had its first takeaway of the season. Brian Thomas Jr. registered the second-longest receiving touchdown of the year for any player. Devin Duvernay had a big punt return that set up one of the best touchdown runs you’ll ever see, courtesy of running back Tank Bigsby, who added a 65-yard score in the fourth quarter. The Jaguars have two very winnable games next on their slate, against the Chicago Bears and New England Patriots in London, which is the Jags’ second home. The outlook on Jacksonville’s season changed dramatically Sunday. — Ben Arthur

The following writers contributed to this story: Ben Arthur (@benyarthur); Greg Auman (@gregauman); Henry McKenna (@McKennAnalysis); Ralph Vacchiano (@RalphVacchiano); Carmen Vitali (@CarmieV); Eric D. Williams (@eric_d_williams).

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