Jordan Love is entering his sixth NFL season, and he’s getting his third quarterbacks coach.
Former NFL quarterback Sean Mannion was promoted to the job after Tom Clements retired. Luke Getsy was the team’s quarterbacks coach for Love’s first two seasons.
Mannion, whose playing career ended in 2023, was a first-year NFL coach last season when he served as an offensive assistant for the Packers. But Mannion is bringing his experience as a backup quarterback to the quarterbacks room, pointing to 2017 when he was with the Rams, who had Packers coach Matt LaFleur as offensive coordinator.
He expects to use that “transformative” experience with LaFleur to get the best out of Love.
“I think it’s ownership of our progressions and timing and reading with our feet,” Mannion said of the position, via Ryan Wood of the Green Bay Press-Gazette. “And then just the fundamentals of the position. For me, it really starts with footwork. That’s something that all quarterbacks need to focus on, but I know really when I first was exposed to it was with Matt in L.A. in 2017. It was kind of a foundational moment in my playing career. I got so much better from understanding how the footwork helps your accuracy; it helps your decision making; it helps the timing of the play.
“That’s really the starting point with any quarterback, but Jordan in particular. We really just always want to have that point of emphasis at the forefront of our mind.”
Love has been a solid starter, with an 18-15 record, 60 touchdowns and 25 interceptions, but there is room for improvement. Love has yet to make a Pro Bowl.
“It’s the same staff,” Mannion said. “It’s the same system. Now I’m stepping into a role that Tom had, so I want to make it familiar with Jordan, but I kind of sprinkle in some things from my own experience to maybe just change things up here and there, try to stimulate a couple things with his development. But we want it to be familiar with Jordan and really just getting feedback from Matt, [offensive coordinator Adam Stenavich], everybody in the QB room on how we can best support Jordan. Because, ultimately, that’s what is most important.”
Another former player is buying into a team’s ownership group.
Per Dianna Russini of TheAthletic.com, Hall of Famer Charles Woodson is buying 0.1 percent of the Browns from the Haslam family.
Jimmy and Dee Haslam are the Browns’ majority owners.
The sale to Woodson is contingent on him removing his name, image, and likeness from the packaging of new bottles of the wine and whisky business he’s involved in so as to not violate the league’s alcohol policy.
He also will be subject to similar broadcasting rules as Tom Brady, though Woodson does not regularly do color commentary for games.
Woodson is a Fremont, Ohio native, which is about 85 miles west of Cleveland.
The Raiders’ No. 4 overall pick out of Michigan in 1998, Woodson played 254 career games over 18 seasons for the Raiders and Packers. He was a three-time All-Pro, 1998 AP defensive rookie of the year, 2009 AP defensive player of the year, and won Super Bowl XLV with Green Bay.
He was enshrined in the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2021.
Earlier this week, Fox announced that it will televise a Week 16 Saturday doubleheader featuring the Packers at the Bears and the Eagles at the Commanders. The official schedule contains an odd glitch regarding those games.
The NFL.com version of the 2025 schedule currently shows that those games will happen on Friday, December 19.
Also, the official website schedule for each of the four teams contains a TBD as to the time AND the date of the Week 16 games. (For confirmation — and acknowledging the possibility they might change it before you click on it — here are the Eagles, Commanders, Packers, and Bears.)
Again, there are other indications that the games are indeed set for Saturday, December 20. But if the use of “Friday, December 19" on the main NFL.com schedule is a typo, it’s a bizarre one. It wasn’t the result of a misplaced finger; someone specifically picked Friday, December 19 as the date for those two games.
While there’s no reason to think the games will be played on Friday, it makes us wonder whether at some point the plan was to play the games (which supposedly will begin at 4:30 p.m. ET and 8:00 p.m. ET) on Friday.
It meshes with the notion that, in time, the league will take even greater advantage of the fringes of the Sports Broadcasting Act of 1961, which allows the NFL to televise games on Friday night and Saturday before the second weekend in September and after the second weekend in December.
Is it crazy to think that, as of last week, those games were going to be played on Friday night and that, after Senator Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) said in a committee hearing regarding the pivot from broadcasting to streaming that the NFL has “tiptoed up to the rule,” the NFL decided to move the games from Friday to Saturday, which is the far more traditional spot for late-season non-Sunday games?
Whatever the explanation, it’s one of the very weird things we noticed when scouring over the schedule. And it could be a sign that, sooner than later, late-season Fridays will become the newest spot in the pizza into which the cheese is stuffed.
It’s still not clear whether the Steelers will be getting a new quarterback. It is clear that they’ll be getting a new look or two in 2025.
Owner Art Rooney II has confirmed that the Steelers will have a new throwback uniform, along with a new second helmet. Via Steelers.com, Rooney said the outfit will debut in prime time.
“We are going to have a new throwback uniform this year, and with a new helmet to go with it,” Rooney said. “We’re planning to wear our new throwbacks for the Packers game on Sunday night, Oct. 26. It’ll be fun to wear our throwbacks against one of the older franchises in the league — that just seems to be appropriate.”
In the past, the Steelers have worn a yellow helmet. The alternate helmets for the Steelers and four other teams are reportedly due to be unveiled this summer.
It seems appropriate for Rodgers to wear a yellow helmet in his first ever game against the Packers, for whom he wore a yellow helmet for years.
Rooney also said the team’s Color Rush uniform is expected to be worn during the Monday night home game against the Dolphins, on December 15. It also would be fitting for the late season visit from the Dolphins to find a way to properly commemorate this unforgettable moment from a Monday night game played 18 years ago.
The 17th weekend of the 2025 season starts with a trio of Christmas games. It continues with a Saturday tripleheader, capped by an exclusive prime-time game on Peacock.
The three games for the Saturday slate will come from a group of five games.
The five games earmarked for the Saturday shift are Seahawks at Panthers, Cardinals at Bengals, Ravens at Packers, Texans at Chargers, and Giants at Raiders.
The best of the bunch, as of May 14, is Ravens at Packers. Texans at Chargers is close behind, since it’s a playoff rematch from 2024.
The other games could become more compelling as the season unfolds. And with five games in play to be dropped into prime time on Saturday night, chances are at least one will involve a pair of teams in playoff contention.
The NFL revealed one of the three Thanksgiving games during their pre-schedule release leaks this week and the other two became official on Wednesday evening.
The Lions will host the Packers in the first game of the annual tripleheader and the Bengals will be in Baltimore to face the Ravens in the nightcap. The Chiefs’ visit to the Cowboys in the late afternoon slot was announced ahead of those games.
Green Bay was a yearly opponent of the Lions on Thanksgiving in the 1950s and 1960s, but they have appeared less frequently in recent decades. They beat the Lions 29-22 in 2023 and beat the Dolphins at home last year, so this will be their third straight appearance on the fourth Thursday of November.
The Bengals have only made one appearance on Thanksgiving and lost to the Jets in 2010. The Ravens are 2-0 on the holiday while the Packers are 16-20-2 and the Lions are 38-45-2.
Thursday Night Football will begin its fourth season on Prime Video with a matchup between the Commanders and Packers in Week 2.
Both teams reached the postseason in 2024 and feature exciting young quarterbacks in Washington’s Jayden Daniels and Green Bay’s Jordan Love.
The Dolphins, Bills, Seahawks, Rams, and Broncos will each have a pair of Thursday night games on Prime Video. While the Eagles also will be featured on Prime Video twice, one of those games will be on Black Friday against the Bears.
Prime Video’s final regular season game will be the Christmas Night matchup between the Chiefs and Broncos, with Dec. 25 falling on a Thursday in 2025.
Prime Video will also host an exclusive Wild Card round postseason matchup on Jan. 10 or Jan. 11 to round out its slate.
The full Prime Video Thursday Night Football schedule for the 2025 season is:
Week 2: Commanders at Packers
Week 3: Dolphins at Bills
Week 4: Seahawks at Cardinals
Week 5: 49ers at Rams
Week 6: Eagles at Giants
Week 7: Steelers at Bengals
Week 8: Vikings at Chargers
Week 9: Ravens at Dolphins
Week 10: Raiders at Broncos
Week 11: Jets at Patriots
Week 12: Bills at Texans
Week 13 (Black Friday): Bears at Eagles
Week 14: Cowboys at Lions
Week 15: Falcons at Buccaneers
Week 16: Rams at Seahawks
Week 17 (Christmas night): Broncos at Chiefs
Last year, Aaron Rodgers and the Jets had a slew of early-season standalone games, including a pair of Sunday-Thursday short weeks. This year, Aaron Rodgers (maybe) and the Steelers enter the schedule with only four prime-time games.
The Steelers will visit the Bengals on Thursday night in Week 7, before hosting the Packers under the lights and in front of the NBC cameras in Week 8.
In Week 10, the Steelers face the Chargers in L.A. on Sunday Night Football. In Week 15, they host the Dolphins on Monday night.
Nine Steelers games are set for a 1:00 p.m. ET kickoff, including the Week 1 opener at the Jets and Week 12 at the Bears. It’s odd, to say the least, that Rodgers’s potential return to MetLife Stadium wasn’t earmarked for a standalone spot.
Week 1 isn’t the only potential revenge game for a prominent new member of the Steelers. In Week Two, they host receiver DK Metcalf’s Seahawks.
We know Metcalf is a Steeler. We still don’t know whether Rodgers will be. If it happens, expect it to occur before the OTAs begin on May 26.
Before the Packers took Matthew Golden and Savion Williams in the NFL draft last month, running back Josh Jacobs was outspoken about the team’s need for a No. 1 receiver. None of that sat well with Jayden Reed, who led the team in receptions and receiving yards in each of his first two seasons.
Reed’s agent reportedly recently met with General Manager Brian Gutekunst to “clarify” Reed’s standing with the team.
Reed, though, has taken the new receivers under his wing in the offseason program.
“Probably the biggest growth is the way his leadership has been right now,” Packers passing game coordinator Jason Vrable said, via Ryan Wood of the Green Bay Press-Gazette. “I really want to commend him because he’s standing behind Matthew Golden right now helping him out with every single play. He’s going over with Mecole Hardman, who just got here, and he’s the one guy right now that I feel – all our guys, the brotherhood is strong right now – but he is like, ‘I’m going out of my way,’ because he is a natural leader, and he always has been.”
The Packers ended last season with five active receivers on their gameday roster. All five are back along with the additions of Golden, Williams and Hardman. Christian Watson is expected to begin the season on injured reserve after tearing his ACL in the regular-season finale against the Bears.
“I know that right now we’re as deep as our receiver room has been in my mind in probably four or five years,” Vrable said, “and maybe even better than that. It could be if things go the right way.”
The Packers are set to make another addition to their wide receiving group.
Rob Demovsky of ESPN.com reports that they will sign Jadon Janke. There’s no word of any corresponding moves.
Janke caught 170 passes for 2,800 yards and 30 touchdowns in 67 games at South Dakota State before going undrafted last year. He spent time with the Dolphins and the Texans, but did not appear in any regular season games for either team.
The Packers drafted Matthew Golden and Savion Williams in April. They join Jayden Reed, Romeo Doubs, Christian Watson, Dontayvion Wicks, Mecole Hardman, Bo Melton, Malik Heath, Julian Hicks, and Cornelius Johnson on the depth chart.
