Preseason is over, thankfully. Next stop: Week 1. There will be so many things to preview for the first week of the season, especially the 2026 NFL opener \u2014 a Super Bowl rematch between the Patriots and Seahawks on Sept. 9. But I want to take this last week of the offseason to write about the vibes and the processes around the league \u2014 just to honor training camp and its conclusion. Let\u2019s talk Chiefs. Let\u2019s talk Rams and Aaron Donald. Let\u2019s talk choice routes. Let\u2019s talk Myles Garrett vs. Micah Parsons. This is Sound Smart, where I try to spin forward, dive deeper, think outside the box and read between the lines. The Los Angeles Rams are a Dream Team. And no, not in the same way that the 2011 Eagles were Vince Young\u2019s “dream team.” That team was talented. But this Rams team is something we haven\u2019t seen since the \u201807 Patriots, the \u201892 Cowboys and the \u201872 Dolphins. It\u2019s really not hyperbolic. Matthew Stafford is fresh off an MVP season. Puka Nacua led the league in receptions and finished second in receiving yards. Davante Adams is the best WR2 in football. Myles Garrett is the best defensive player in the NFL and, debatably, the best football player on the planet. Sean McVay is the best coach in the NFL. And the team just welcomed back defensive tackle Aaron Donald, who’s returning at age 35 after two years in retirement. He is a three-time NFL Defensive Player of the Year, and a first-ballot Hall of Famer. It\u2019s an L.A. team, so let\u2019s make a Hollywood comparison. This is a cast so stacked that only “The Odyssey” can compare. And that\u2019s why this might be McVay\u2019s most difficult task to date. He must win a Super Bowl. This isn\u2019t like the Lions or the Bills or the Ravens \u2014 who\u00a0feel it\u2019s their time. No, this is different. The Rams basically have no choice but to win. If they start the season with, say, three victories, we\u2019ll start talking about a perfect season. And the chatter won\u2019t be premature, even in the NFC West, with the defending Super Bowl champions. If the Rams make the Super Bowl, it will be a question of how badly they beat their opponent \u2014 not if they can. And the Rams might have three candidates at the top of the Super Bowl MVP odds \u2014 Stafford, Nacua and Garrett \u2014 before the opponent\u2019s top option. I think that\u2019s why McVay deflected every question about the partnership between Garrett and Donald in the press conference on Sunday to announce Donald\u2019s return. I think the pressure to win \u2014 everything \u2014 is why McVay said this. He’s handling his Dream Team with care. “Just because we have great individuals, it doesn\u2019t do s— for us,” McVay said. “We\u2019ve got to be able to put it together. [Donald] understands that as much as anybody.” I spent the weekend at a friend\u2019s wedding. It was special to see the way the ceremony brought the bride and groom so much happiness. And why shouldn\u2019t they be exuberant: They\u2019re perfect for each other. The happy couple decided not to do a honeymoon. The bride is headed right back to school to teach middle schoolers, and the groom will probably be painting boats by Tuesday. And later this week, they\u2019ll be exhausted and they\u2019ll make that pasta dish that they both love so much, in part because they can do it with their eyes closed. And it\u2019ll be business \u2014 and work, work, work \u2014 as usual. In some ways, that\u2019s what comes next for McVay and Donald. We saw the union on Sunday. We can see there will be no honeymoon. We can see what comes next: work \u2014 and the expectation of success. Count me as someone skeptical about the construction of the 2026 Kansas City Chiefs. When the NFL schedule came out,\u00a0I didn\u2019t think they\u2019d make the playoffs. These days \u2026 I don\u2019t know what to think. Of course, I know that it\u2019s dangerous to doubt Patrick Mahomes, even as he makes his way back from an ACL injury. The same is true of Andy Reid, even as he faces criticism for his playcalling growing stale. It\u2019ll burn you to doubt the Chiefs, even in the wake of a season when their offense sputtered and their defense lacked flash. This summer, there haven\u2019t been many hopeful headlines around Kansas City. But for the most part, there has been a real silence around the Chiefs. It\u2019s quiet. This is the silence in a horror movie, right before the villain strikes. You know it\u2019s coming. Still, you jump out of your chair. With the Chiefs, there has been this prevailing thought that their 2024 season,\u00a0with all its narrow victories, was a bit of a fluke (particularly after the Eagles routed K.C. in the Super Bowl). And so it was a similarly popular idea that the 2025 season was the year when the Chiefs\u2019 luck ran out \u2014 and it was also fluky, with bad breaks that made them seem worse than they were. If this were Goldilocks, this season would be just right. But come on \u2014 the NFL is not a children\u2019s book. And the small amount of headlines that are coming out of camp are, generally, negative. Veteran tight end Travis Kelce does not look younger. Chiefs left tackle Josh Simmons has a back injury. Chiefs running back Kenneth Walker III, their big splash from free agency, has a foot injury. And receiver Rashee Rice, who is supposed to be the WR1 despite his knee surgery and suspension last season, isn\u2019t exactly getting rave reviews. “His overall r\u00e9sum\u00e9 speaks for itself. The thing I\u2019m still working on is getting to know the person \u2014 seeing the things that make him click. What are the things that inspire him?” Chiefs offensive coordinator Eric Bieniemy said last week. “The thing that I love about Rashee is that he\u2019s tough. The other thing that is \u2014 and I\u2019m not saying this in a bad way \u2014 he\u2019s hardheaded. You know what I mean? And he\u2019s stubborn. Because he feels that he\u2019s good enough at certain things. \u2026 Now, it\u2019s just about making sure we can get the continuous reps to get him back on track, to get him in game shape.” Holy red flags, Batman! Whether Bieniemy meant to or not, the OC dropped more than a few backhanded compliments about Rice. Bieniemy clarified that “stubbornness” really isn\u2019t a bad thing for players. He said Walker is also stubborn. “He doesn\u2019t like to be wrong,” Bieniemy said of Walker. “You don\u2019t mind that for player, because it presents a challenge.” Still not exactly a fawning description. But there\u2019s more. “You\u2019ve got to get them to see it from a different point of view,” Bieniemy said. “And when they can see it from a coach\u2019s point of view, now it just opens them up and gets them to realize: \u2018There is a better way of doing this.\u2019” Bieniemy was asked if there\u2019s another level for Rice. “I believe there is another level,” he said. “And, of course, he would tell you there\u2019s plenty of levels for him to get to.” Here’s a coach pushing a player’s buttons. Here’s a coach who senses the team isn’t getting enough from a player who should be a star. And so here’s a team that has a disquieting number of questions surrounding its roster. Everything is logically telling me the Chiefs won’t make the playoffs. They can’t possibly! Really, I’m telling you to not be afr—. *jump scare* In the early phase of my career covering football, I was on the New England Patriots\u2019 beat, covering Tom Brady and Bill Belichick. That\u2019s when I learned all about the “option route.” The receiver and quarterback look at what the defense is giving them and let that determine which route the WR will run. Sometimes the receiver will decide a full second into the play. It requires\u00a0exceptional rapport between QB and WR. It is, essentially, the route that the Patriots used to beat the Rams in Super Bowl LIII. It was Julian Edelman\u2019s route. He racked up 10 catches, 141 yards and eight first downs, largely by running the option route to find slivers of space in a defense that refused to allow any. So it feels somehow fitting that Jared Goff is one of the caretakers of that route in today\u2019s NFL. Back then, he was a young Rams quarterback (on the losing team in that Super Bowl). But he\u2019s now entering his intellectual prime as a veteran Lions QB with many of the same answers Brady had. And star receiver Amon-Ra St. Brown is the guy who runs Edelman\u2019s option route. In Detroit, they gave it a different name, “the choice route.” And according to St. Brown, it\u2019s the route that has produced the most receptions for him and Goff since they joined the Lions in 2021. “It gets us out of a lot of situations,” St. Brown told me. “I can break a lot of different ways. I can do a lot of different things. So it gives us a lot of options.” Break it down in depth? “It’s like around a five-yard route. You can either break in, you can break out, or you can just hook it up. So, depending on the defense \u2014 whether it’s man, if it’s inside of you, you can release out and you can break out. If [the defender is] already sitting inside, you want to break out, get the ball on a quick out-route. If it’s zone, any cover-2 type, you sit right in between the flat player [covering the quarter of the field nearest the sideline] and the hook defender [covering the inside quarter of the field over the offensive and defensive line]. The QB can dart you right there, and you can catch a knife for about 10 or so yards. Get lucky, maybe get 15. “If [the defensive back is] playing any type of other man and they blitz, the home run shot is usually the in-breaking route. It doesn’t happen all the time, but when it does come, it usually goes for like 15-, 20-yards, if not a touchdown. But you got to be patient for that one.” This route isn\u2019t for everyone. It\u2019s reserved for an outstanding slot receiver and pocket passer \u2014 with a rare connection,\u00a0like Goff and St. Brown have. “I think we’ve built the chemistry to where, when we snap the ball, like a second into the play, he already knows what I’m doing. I know what I’m gonna do. It\u2019s timing and rhythm. He\u2019s not even thinking about what I\u2019m going to do. He already knows what I\u2019m going to do.” You\u2019d think that this was St. Brown\u2019s favorite route. But \u2014 no. “My favorite route is the one that\u2019s going to work,” St. Brown told me. The Buffalo Bills are transparently\u00a0not the same team as last year. But how much have the new pieces made an impact on the culture? And how much will those new pieces make an impact on the field? Josh Allen is still Josh Allen. Joe Brady is still Joe Brady. And they\u2019re the key pillars that GM Brandon Beane is intent upon building around. They\u2019re more of the same from last year. That\u2019s the old. The new? Beane and Brady traded for Bears receiver DJ Moore, a deal that hasn\u2019t gotten much fanfare when compared to the trades for Jaylen Waddle and A.J. Brown. For all the criticism surrounding Moore\u2019s value on the trade market (and I was one of those skeptical voices), the receiver has been a really good fit with Allen and in Brady\u2019s offense. The schematic fit, of course, is no surprise given that Moore broke out in Brady\u2019s offense in Carolina. But the fit with the quarterback \u2014 that\u2019s a new and noteworthy development. Moore\u2019s contributions were regular and immediate in training camp and preseason. His first catch? 33 yards. That\u2019s new. But it\u2019s also a conglomeration of old. The truly new element for Buffalo is on defense. Brady hired defensive coordinator Jim Leonhard, who was on the Denver Broncos’ staff last season. He\u2019s of the Rex Ryan and Mike Pettine schools of defense, running a 3-4 base. That\u2019ll keep all of the Bills\u2019 best players on the field, from pass-rusher Gregory Rousseau to defensive tackle Ed Oliver to cornerback Christian Benford. But it\u2019ll be a change from former head coach Sean McDermott\u2019s 4-3 defense (that largely scrapped that third LB for a nickel corner, Taron Johnson, who left this offseason). It can be hard to make that transition. I also have some questions about how edge Bradley Chubb (viewed as a free-agency overpay) and safety C.J. Gardner-Johnson will hold up \u2014 now that they appear to be past their primes. But if this unit looks anything remotely close to the Broncos\u2019 defense from last year, then there will be a lot to like. I\u2019m just not sure the roster looks quite as impressive from a talent standpoint when compared to Denver’s. And Leonhard remains relatively unproven, rising quickly in the pros. Though he’s a former 10-year NFL safety, his first job in the league was as a defensive backs coach and pass-game specialist \u2014 in 2024! The Bills landed in the middle of the road at 20 turnovers in 2025. They were 19th in sacks. They\u2019re hoping to see both numbers go up. “We’re going to attack the football,” Leonhard said. “The biggest stat in football is turnovers, so we’re going to be aggressive, we’re going to fly around, we’re going to communicate, we’re going to play well together, but we’re going to cause issues for offense, and we’re going to force them to react to us.” It\u2019s a nice concept. And maybe the defensive leadership shift \u2014 and the schematic shift that comes with it \u2014 will be enough to put this team over the top. But I\u2019m still not sure about the question I wondered when the team promoted Brady and retained Beane. Did they change enough? Will these alterations land Buffalo in the Super Bowl? That\u2019s really all that matters to the Bills \u2014 and to Allen. Two of the league\u2019s biggest game-wreckers, Micah Parsons and Myles Garrett, spent the offseason together. And that made for some pretty fun conversations \u2014 including: Who gets more double teams on defense? In the video below, you can see their friendly but tense exchange. Here are the numbers: Double teams, per Next Gen Stats: Parsons: 88 (21.9% of rushes)Garrett: 60 (12.8%) Offensive attention (doubles and chips), per NGS: Garrett: 39.5%Parsons: 37.4% It\u2019s not easy being either guy \u2014 even if they make it look easy. But Garrett should have a more pleasant experience in 2026 now that Aaron Donald has come out of retirement.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Preseason is over, thankfully. Next stop: Week 1. There will be so many things to preview for the first week of the season, especially the 2026 NFL opener \u2014 a Super Bowl rematch between the Patriots and Seahawks on Sept. 9. But I want to take this last week of the offseason to write about<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/onlinebettingnewyork.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33391"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/onlinebettingnewyork.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/onlinebettingnewyork.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/onlinebettingnewyork.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33391"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/onlinebettingnewyork.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33391\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/onlinebettingnewyork.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33391"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/onlinebettingnewyork.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33391"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/onlinebettingnewyork.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33391"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}