Betting

Are we finally out of road here for Joe Lombardi? It’s the third OC job he hasn’t been able to keep for longer than three years, and not even buddy Sean Payton could keep riding this train. It’s possible the Broncos elevate Davis Webb, who has garnered head-coaching interviews, to their offensive coordinator position. Lombardi has plenty of experience as a quarterbacks coach and, despite working as an NFL coach since 2006, is only 55. He should at least be able to find NFL work elsewhere as a lower-rung assistant.

McDaniel was scarce on details — not surprising — but promised to rein in the signal-caller a bit. McDaniel added “I think not relying too heavily on Justin’s ability to do above and beyond I think is critical. ... That’ll be one of the first things that we’ll try to do is take a little off his plate.” Reading between the lines, it’s possible that Herbert will be instructed to run a little less in 2026. He took off a career-high 83 times for 498 yards and two touchdowns. His overall fantasy value will probably remain as it was in 2025 — or improve — due to improved schematics. But we’re hoping the Chargers keep the running plays on the table for fantasy purposes and this does not sound like a team that plans to do that after watching him play the final six weeks of the season with a left hand that was recovering from surgery to repair a fracture.

Campanile was the only one of the two that was still up for a head-coaching gig after the Bills picking Joe Brady sealed off Udinski’s final interview opportunity. Campanile will apparently say no to the Cardinals and move ahead with the Jaguars for another season. Jacksonville’s first-place schedule and sudden improvements will make them a target for regression, but keeping coaching staff continuity should help ward some of it off.

Removing the part of our brain that understands what this really means is six more months of daily speculation about Aaron Rodgers coming back, it does make sense that win-now hire Mike McCarthy would want the best quarterback he could have. He has a pre-existing relationship with Rodgers, and Rodgers — clearly flawed at this point — is probably as good as the Steelers could hope to do at the position next year. Anyway, here’s to another offseason of this.

Well, it really made no sense to keep Engstrand and find a new playcaller, so we guess from that point of view it makes sense. Engstrand’s run game was versatile and varied and he probably deserves a role as someone’s run game coordinator at the very worst next year — perhaps he’ll head back to Detroit. The Jets will do whatever it is the Jets do from here, which from the looks of their defensive coordinator search probably means they’ll wind up paralyzed by overanalyzing 10 different candidates. Frank Reich has been the rumored playcaller replacement for the Jets in recent days.

Stefanski added that he thinks “you see a player on tape that can get through progressions, can layer the ball, can push the ball down the field” and said Penix is attacking his rehab from a late-season torn ACL. Stefanski was notably reluctant to dive into the future on Kirk Cousins, which could be read as a non-endorsement for his return. If Cousins doesn’t return, the Falcons may need a new bridge quarterback for the early season while Penix returns to the field. But with no first-round pick, it always made sense for the Falcons to give Penix the balance of the season to see what he could do. Alternatives with notably higher upside would appear hard to find in free agency or in the later rounds of the draft.

Stefanski ceded play-calling power to Rees down the stretch in Cleveland last year and they turned into a heavily screen-focused team with (holding back laugh) Pro Bowler Shedeur Sanders under center. We wouldn’t necessarily expect the same things next year in Atlanta since we don’t know who the quarterback will be just yet, but Rees did get a decent amount of offense out of what was a fairly weak core on paper last year.

Both will come in for second interviews this week. Cunningham has been regarded as the favorite all along and interviewed for Atlanta’s preposterously-named “president of football” job before it wound up being Matt Ryan’s gig. Liipfert clearly impressed Falcons brass in his interview last week. We’d still imagine Cunningham as the favorite here, but we’ll see how both fare in an extended sitdown with Kevin Stefanski and Ryan.

With Joe Brady landing the Bills head coaching job, Daboll is resigned to take over as OC for head coach Robert Saleh’s Titans. Daboll, who served as Bills offensive coordinator before becoming Giants head coach, will be charged with molding second-year QB Cam Ward following Ward’s uneven rookie year in which he was among the NFL’s most inefficient passers. Turning Ward into a viable starting NFL quarterback will be Saleh’s priority for 2026 as he tries to establish a winning culture for a team that has struggled mightily in recent years.

Maye seemed to have injured his shoulder during the Patriots’ AFC title game win over the Broncos. Patriots head coach Mike Vrabel was vague when asked about Maye’s practice status for the coming weeks. “This is a sport where there’s gonna be things that come up. We’ll talk about whatever status each player has for the game once we’re required to,” Vrabel said. If Maye is struggling with an injured shoulder, he’ll have a while to recover ahead of New England’s Super Bowl matchup against a tough Seattle defense. Joshua Dobbs is the Patriots’ backup QB.