Baker Mayfield has a golden opportunity to re-enter the MVP race in Week 11
Baker Mayfield. Josh Allen. The two quarterbacks were both drafted in the first round of the 2018 draft. So far, Allen has had the more impressive career, with five division titles and five playoff wins under his belt, in addition to an MVP award.
But could the tides be changing?
In 2025, Baker Mayfield is playing some of the best football of his career. He's accurate. He's no longer mistake prone. He's cut out the recklessness. He's throwing touchdowns to sixth-string recievers. He's clutch, with four game-winning drives under his belt at the halfway point of the season.
Meanwhile, Josh Allen has struggled. He did not play well in any of the Bills' three losses, and has been surpassed by Drake Maye in his own division.
Could this be the year Mayfield takes the crown from Allen as the best quarterback from the 2018 draft class?
It might all come down to this week.
The stakes could not be higher. Both teams need a win to avoid losing ground in the playoff race. If the Bills lose, they likely fall to 2.5 games behind the Patriots. If the Bucs lose, they fall to 6-4 with the Rams coming up next. A loss to the Rams would doom Tampa Bay to "pretender" status for the rest of the season, regardless of whether they win the division.
Baker Mayfield needs to outduel Josh Allen for more reasons than one. For his own legacy, but also for his team in 2025, Mayfield needs to find a way to outplay Allen and take down the Bills.
Fortunately for him, the path to beating Allen is simple. Don't turn the ball over, and let Allen make the mistakes. Josh Allen still has the same turnover-prone tendencies that he did as a rookie, especially when his team is losing. If Baker stays cool, calm, and confident, he can outduel Allen and win the game for Tampa Bay.
Blockbuster Eagles Trade Pitch Swaps A.J. Brown for $140 Million All-Pro WR
There aren’t very many wide receivers in the NFL you can say are better than Philadelphia Eagles superstar A.J. Brown. You can count them on one hand.
What if the Eagles could get one of them in exchange for Brown, and send the headache that comes with his incessant whining and complaining elsewhere? Wouldn’t that be something they should consider?
In this case, it would be swapping Brown in exchange for Minnesota Vikings wide receiver Justin Jefferson and sweeten the pot for the Vikings with a 2026 first round pick. If Philadelphia general manager Howie Roseman is truly as great at his job as we think he is, might even be able to get the Vikings to see the benefits of the deal financially and just do the Brown-Jefferson swap straight up.
The key is getting Brown out of Philadelphia and making sure there’s another Top 5 wide receiver to take his place. Jefferson is the likely only candidate.
Vikings: Swing and Miss at Drafting QB
From the outside looking in, it seems like the Vikings looked at the 3 quarterbacks they had on their roster last year — Sam Darnold, Daniel Jones and J.J. McCarthy — and picked the worst one to move forward with.
Darnold is now with the Seattle Seahawks and looks like an NFL MVP candidate.
Jones is now with the Indianapolis Colts and looks like an NFL MVP candidate.
McCarthy has seemed, for all intents and purposes, totally lost.
McCarthy, who missed 5 games with a high ankle sprain and is 2-2 in 4 starts this season, just looks lost. The result? The Vikings are 4-5 and in last place in the NFC North Division one year after going 14-3 in the regular season.
If we’re going to crown a King of Suffering in Minnesota right now, that can only be the 26-year-old Jefferson, a 4-time NFL All-Pro with a 4-year, $140 million contract who has had to endure the insult of catching passes from McCarthy and Carson Wentz this season.
It’s not an exaggeration to say the Vikings are wasting the prime years of the career of one of the NFL’s greatest wide receivers of all time, which we can rightly say Jefferson is halfway through his sixth season.
Consider this: Jefferson has been named Pro Bowl or NFL All-Pro 4 times in his first 5 seasons and had more receiving yards through his first 5 seasons than any player in NFL history, including winning NFL Offensive Player of the Year honors in 2022 with 128 reception for 1,809 yards and 9 touchdowns.
Also consider if the Vikings were to swap Jefferson for Brown, it would free up roughly $24 million in cap space for 2026 — that’s the financial benefit.
Brown’s Constant Complaining Wears Thin
Brown has spent the majority of the 2025 regular season complaining about his role in the offense as the Eagles try to win a second consecutive Super Bowl — we count 3 separate online crash outs this season alone as the Eagles have started the regular season with a sparkling 7-2 record.
His latest complaint came via a Twitch livestream on the Tuesday following Philadelphia’s 10-7 win over the Green Bay Packers in which Brown called the season a “s–t show” after just 2 receptions for 13 yards.
That prompted a rare visit and talk from team owner Jeffery Lurie at Eagles practice on Thursday, and came after the Eagles had to address trade rumors about Brown after the NFL trade deadline on November 4.
This offseason, it might be smart for the Eagles to turn those rumors into reality.
