The upcoming ‘Thursday Night Football’ game features two quarterbacks over 40, Joe Flacco and Aaron Rodgers.
This is the second matchup in NFL history with two starting quarterbacks over 40. Tom Brady and Drew Brees faced each other multiple times in 2020.
Former NFL quarterback Warren Moon, who also played into his 40s, noted that recovery is more difficult for older players, especially on a short week.

With the ages of both starting quarterbacks beginning with the digit four, the NFL’s own promotional material for the Oct. 16 “Thursday Night Football” matchup between the Cincinnati Bengals and Pittsburgh Steelers referred to the game as “Battle of the uncs.” 

And if you don’t know what an “unc” ia – short for “uncle” and a term of endearment bestowed to an elder by a younger person, usually in a lighthearted way if the age gap isn’t severe – then you definitely are one. 

Joe Flacco, 40, of the Cincinnati Bengals, and the Pittsburgh Steelers’ Aaron Rodgers, 41, will become the second over-40 duo to face off against one another. (Tom Brady and Drew Brees faced each other three times during the 2020 season.) They are two of the six active quarterbacks who have won a Super Bowl, and both were named the game’s MVP.  

“Both backups better be ready to go in,” ex-NFL quarterback Warren Moon jokingly told USA TODAY Sports. 

Moon made his final start in the NFL after his 44th birthday to cap a 17-year career that started in the Canadian Football League. He made the Pro Bowl during his age-41 season with the Seattle Seahawks and knows that neither Flacco nor Rodgers are playing into their 40s by pure luck. But having to bounce back on a short week after playing Sunday won’t be easy for them, Moon said. 

“You don’t bounce back as fast as you used to when you were younger,” he said. 

The jokes write themselves, with Steelers defensive lineman Cam Heyward – no spring chicken himself at 36 years old – crashing Rodgers’ media session this week to declare the game as the “IcyHot Bowl.” 

But on a serious note, quarterbacks have the benefit of limited contact, Flacco said. 

“It’s not like you’re ramming your head against the wall 24/7,” he said. 

Moon joked about wishing the league protected quarterbacks during the 80s and 90s as it does in the present – he’d still be playing, he said. 

“I wish they protected the quarterbacks back when I played the way that they do now,” said Moon, the 1990 Offensive Player of the Year and Hall of Fame inductee. “I’d still be playing. That is a luxury. It’s something that was definitely needed.” 

The two quarterbacks’ (current) teams have had opposite starts of the season. In his 21st NFL season but first with Pittsburgh, Rodgers and the Steelers have as many wins as the other three AFC North teams combined (four). Cincinnati has already moved on from the second edition of the Jake Browning experiment and brought in Flacco in an attempt to stay afloat until Joe Burrow returns from his foot injury sometime in December, supposedly. 

Flacco likely wants to spend extra time with Bengals receivers Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins to learn tendencies and build rapport. He was traded to the Bengals in the middle of last week and started against the Green Bay Packers on Sunday. 

Rodgers, however, had the benefit of an early-season bye in which he sought time with his various body gurus. 

“The first couple weeks (of the season), I was a little tighter,” Rodgers said. “I felt like I’m starting to loosen up and feel a little more like myself.” 

Asked how those sessions go for him, Rodgers replied: “Very carefully.” 

Moon said that once he advanced in playing years, he started going to the chiropractor and massage therapist twice a week rather than once. He leaned into improving his diet and weight training and spent more time in the sauna. Guys have invested more money in their bodies over the years, Rodgers has said, and offseason training has completely transformed too. 

Limiting hits is especially important for a quarterback in his 40s, Moon said. The Pittsburgh offense has clearly been designed to help in that regard. Rodgers – other than the Minnesota Vikings’ Carson Wentz – has the quickest time to throw stat in the league (2.57 seconds), as well as the lowest average intended air yards (5.4), per Next Gen Stats. 

“I think as you get older you kind of know where you’re going with the ball as soon as you break the huddle based off what you see in the defense,” Moon said. “Unless they’re a defense that likes to disguise a lot, you kind of know where you’re going with the ball because of your knowledge.

“The game is so much easier and so much slower as you get older.” 

For Flacco, playing this long is a choice that, once made, demands commitment. 

“You take all the necessary steps to make sure your body’s ready to go and you’re mentally still energized by learning game plans,” Flacco said

No matter the profession, even playing a child’s game, Flacco said, it “does become work to a certain extent.” But once a player’s mind is made up, he’ll do everything possible to stay on the field. Flacco said that meant sitting as a backup with the Denver Broncos and New York Jets, and last season with the Indianapolis Colts, in hopes of receiving another shot. 

In 2025, between the Bengals and Cleveland Browns, where he was the Week 1 starter before being traded, he had two chances; Cleveland traded Flacco after benching him for rookie Dillon Gabriel. 

“I’ve been in a locker room my whole life – age isn’t something I think about,” Flacco said. “I just view myself as one of those 20-somethings.” 

Flacco and Rodgers both became starters in 2008 – Flacco as a rookie with the Baltimore Ravens and Rodgers finally taking over for Brett Favre on the Green Bay Packers. Rodgers has fond memories of Flacco attending his charitable events. An example of Rodgers’ longevity is that with 116 passing yards on Thursday, he will pass Steelers legend Ben Roethlisberger for the fifth-most regular-season passing yards in NFL history.

“In order to keep playing at an advanced age, you have to have some level of consistency to give you the opportunities,” Rodgers said. “Obviously, Joe’s done it, and I’ve done it.”

The NFL survivor pool graveyard is filling up just in time for Halloween.

‘Spooky Season’ is in full swing and this Week 7 slate is evidence that there are more tricks than treats available to us. Navigating bye weeks, planning ahead and limiting risk are the foundation of any good run in survivor.

It’s the reason why that person in your pool with the Kansas City Chiefs still available can’t wipe that grin off their face. As that person will learn in Week 7, sometimes it’s just about living to fight another day.

For the less fortunate, there are still some spots to take advantage of in the coming days. Just buckle up for what promises to be a wild ride.

Here are the best survivor picks for Week 7.

NFL survivor picks Week 7

Kansas City Chiefs (vs. Las Vegas Raiders)

The Chiefs are finally getting back to full strength. Xavier Worthy is back in the fold and now the team will welcome Rashee Rice back in Week 7. Kansas City has been a difficult squad figure out through six weeks, which is fitting considering their 3-3 record.

They are in the perfect spot to finally get above .500 in Week 7 as the Raiders come to town. Geno Smith has been a turnover machine, leading the league with 10 interceptions in just six games. The 35-year-old has been sacked 18 times in that span – tying him for third-most. The Chiefs’ defense should have a fun day at the office.

New England Patriots (at Tennessee Titans)

Under normal circumstances, we’d be inclined to back the Titans in their first game after firing Brian Callahan. However, this week is far from normal. Mike Vrabel makes his return to Tennessee after his shocking firing after the 2023 season. Revenge should be on the mind for the now-Patriots coach, who doesn’t appear to have any mementos from his time with the Titans, telling reporters that the Goodwill in Nashville likely got a good haul.

The Titans are overmatched on both the field and sideline. This one shouldn’t be close.

Carolina Panthers (at New York Jets)

The Panthers are trending in the right direction and the Jets are not. While the belief is that the Jets are due for a win, that is not a strategy. New York still trails in the talent department, especially on offense. Garrett Wilson is expected to miss a couple of weeks with a hyperextended knee, leaving an already below average receiver room in a tough spot. Couple that with the fact that Justin Fields’ struggles and it’s a recipe for disaster. It’s risky, but Carolina could be a good way to zig when everyone else zags.

Denver Broncos (vs. New York Giants)

Somehow even riskier than the Panthers, we have the heavily favored Broncos. Denver’s defense should be able to slow down Jaxson Dart and Cam Skattebo, but can their offense score enough to find a win at home? After returning from a disappointing offensive showing in London, we’ll trust the Broncos to get back on track.

What team should you pick in NFL survivor pools this week?

The Kansas City Chiefs.

After weeks of hearing about the Bills having the inside track to finally winning the AFC, Buffalo dropped two straight and here come the Chiefs again. The Week 7 slate is one of the tougher ones we’ve seen in the season to this point, especially if you want to stand out from the crowd.

While we certainly endorse going off the board and taking the Panthers on the road, picking the Chiefs is about surviving and advancing.

And, barring some event commonly listed in an act of God clause or an alien abduction, Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs will improve to 3-2.

Kansas City gets it done and we’re on to Week 8.

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FIFA has backed away from a potential conflict with President Donald Trump over his assertion that he could move some of next summer’s World Cup matches out of U.S. cities he deemed unsafe.

In suggesting earlier this week that parts of Boston had been ‘taken over’ by recent unrest, Trump said FIFA president Gianni Infantino would ‘very easily’ move 2026 World Cup matches away from designated host cities if he asked him to.

In response, FIFA conceded that host countries are ultimately responsible for making sure their World Cup venues are safe.

‘Safety and security are the top priorities at all FIFA events worldwide. Safety and security are obviously the governments’ responsibility, and they decide what is in the best interest for public safety,’ a FIFA spokesperson said in a statement.

Earlier in the day, Boston mayor Michelle Wu implied the city was ready for a faceoff with Trump if he tried to move the matches scheduled for Gillette Stadium in nearby Foxborough.

‘Much of it is locked down by contract so that no single person, even if they live in the White House currently, can undo it,’ Wu said on the ‘Java with Jimmy’ show. ‘We are going to continue to be who we are and that means, unfortunately, we are going to continue to be in a conversation in a way that is targeting Boston’s values.’

The United States is scheduled to host 78 of 104 matches in the 2026 World Cup, expanded to 48 teams for the first time. FIFA had no comment on any of the cities or stadiums mentioned by Trump.

Trump also suggested that he would consider moving the 2028 Summer Olympics out of Los Angeles for similar reasons.

‘If I thought L.A. was not going to be prepared properly, I would move it to another location if I had to.’

Several preseason college football favorites, including Clemson, Florida State, and Penn State, have underperformed in the first half of the season.
Texas quarterback Arch Manning has faced scrutiny for the Longhorns’ slow start and inconsistent play.
Coach Bill Belichick’s move to North Carolina has been labeled a historic bust, with the team struggling significantly against Power Four opponents.

No. 12 Georgia Tech and No. 19 Virginia have climbed to the top of the ACC at the expense of Clemson, Florida State and North Carolina, which head into the heart of the regular season a combined 2-6 in conference play.

The ACC doesn’t have a monopoly on disappointment. Flops, failures and fiascoes dot every Bowl Subdivision conference at the year’s midway point, redrawing a College Football Playoff race that no longer includes preseason favorites such as Penn State, Kansas State and Florida.

No player has come under more scrutiny than No. 17 Texas quarterback Arch Manning, who has shouldered the blame for the Longhorns’ slow start.

No coach has been a bigger bust than 73-year-old Bill Belichick. North Carolina hasn’t even come close in three games against Power Four teams and could be headed for a historically unsuccessful finish.

These teams, players and coaches lead the biggest disappointments from the first half of the regular season:

Clemson leads most disappointing teams

Clemson dropped three of four to open the year but has rebounded with a pair of ACC blowouts against North Carolina and Boston College. Now up to 2-2 in league play, the Tigers could make a run to the ACC championship game.

Those two wins could signal an in-season turnaround similar to the one that landed the Tigers in last year’s playoff. Then again, the Tar Heels and Eagles are terrible. Based on the first half, Clemson is the biggest disappointment in the FBS.

The notable flops from other FBS conferences include:

American: Army lost to Tarleton State and was blown out by East Carolina in one of the program’s worst starts under longtime coach Jeff Monken.

Big 12: Kansas State’s four losses have come by a combined 11 points thanks to careless play in the second half.

Big Ten: While not the only contender for the distinction, Wisconsin gets the nod for the pure level of incompetence in three league games.

Conference USA: After going 10-3 last season, Sam Houston State are one of three winless teams in the FBS under new coach Phil Longo.

Mid-American: Toledo is 1-2 in the MAC after a loss to rival Bowling Green and has dropped all three road games.

Mountain West: Air Force has given up 8.1 yards per play and nearly 500 yards per game in a 1-5 start.

SEC: Florida was No. 17 in the US LBM Coaches Poll heading into the season but has gone 1-4 against FBS teams.

Sun Belt: Texas State started fast, putting coach G.J. Kinne on the map for openings such as Oklahoma State, but have since dropped a pair of Sun Belt games and are sitting near the bottom of the West division.

Bill Belichick hits rock bottom at North Carolina

The six-time Super Bowl champion has been a historic bust.

Belichick’s résumé is one reason why his foray into college football has outsiders rubbernecking the scene in Chapel Hill. Another is a landscape that allows for new coaches to overhaul their rosters in a single offseason instead of the more laborious, multiple-year rebuilding projects of the recent past.

Given the chance to build a competitive roster — after all, he said UNC would be the NFL’s “33rd team” — the group Belichick constructed has weaknesses nearly across the board. Despite his reputation, he hired an unimpressive staff that seems to have no answers for the Tar Heels’ issues.

UNC has won twice, against Charlotte and Richmond, and been outscored by 87 points in losses to Clemson, Central Florida and TCU.

Arch Manning fails to match unrealistic hype

Manning has not completed every pass he’s thrown as the Longhorns’ starter. In fact, he even completed less than half of his attempts in last month’s win against Texas-El Paso.

He hasn’t won every game he’s played. Texas has lost twice, actually, and have dangerously little room for error in the second half.

Manning is in part a victim of oversized expectations. It’s also true that he’s missed the mark more often than not, putting up duds against No. 1 Ohio State and Florida but rallying for his best start to date in last Saturday’s win against No. 13 Oklahoma.

The redshirt sophomore has thrown for 1,317 yards and run for 194 yards with 17 total touchdowns. He’ll need to step up his game in the second half to get the Longhorns back into the playoff mix.

Penn State’s historic disappearing act

In the span of just over two weeks, Penn State went from No. 2 in the US LBM Coaches Poll to unranked and in the market for a new head coach.

Few promising seasons and even fewer established coaching tenures have unraveled with such speed. But the cracks were showing during non-conference play, when the offense really struggled, and then were fully revealed in Big Ten play.

The search for Franklin’s replacement is now the dominant storyline of Penn State’s season, replacing the quest for the program’s first national championship since 1986.

The schedule does play out nicely for interim coach Terry Smith, though, and the Nittany Lions could still win seven or eight games in the regular season even after losing quarterback Drew Allar to injury.

Another lost season for Florida State

Florida State seemed revived during a win against No. 6 Alabama to open the year. What’s followed has been more the same, unfortunately, and the lack of progress could result in massive offseason changes.

The Seminoles are winless in the ACC and have virtually no shot at playing for the conference championship, which would be the only way they’d make the playoff.

To have another season run off the tracks by the midway point should make coach Mike Norvell very antsy about his job security nearly two years after he was at or near the top of the list for Alabama opening.

Worse yet, the Seminoles are sliding while rival Miami has climbed to No. 2 in the US LBM Coaches Poll and is looking more and more like one of the teams to beat for the national championship.

Time runs out on the Luke Fickell era

The next Big Ten program to make a coaching change will be Wisconsin, which hit a new low with last weekend’s 37-0 loss to Iowa at Camp Randall Stadium. Amid injuries and general inexperience, the Badgers have dropped four in a row, three in the Big Ten, and are almost definitely not going to make the postseason.

The next two games are against No. 1 Ohio State and No. 9 Oregon. After hosting Washington, the Badgers go to No. 3 Indiana and then end the year against Minnesota and Illinois. Winning two of this group is unlikely; winning three seems impossible; winning the four needed to reach bowl eligibility is just unimaginable.

Falling short of six wins should spell the end of the line for Luke Fickell, who in the span of three seasons has gone from one of the most foolproof hires the Group of Five has recently produced to a cautionary tale about finding the right Power Four fit.

Nothing is working for Hugh Freeze

One of four teams still winless in SEC play, Auburn will need to hold serve against Arkansas, Kentucky and Mercer simply to reach bowl eligibility in Freeze’s third season.

Picked as a dark-horse contender in the preseason, the Tigers have been ruined by an abysmal offense that ranks second from the bottom in the SEC in yards per game and yards per play. The Tigers have managed just four touchdowns in three conference games.

If not to Fickell’s level, the odds of Freeze’s tenure continuing past this season are dropping by the week. Beyond a nonsensical offense, supposedly his area of expertise, Freeze has completely failed in building a roster through normal recruiting and the transfer portal.

The SEC hosts three games between ranked opponents, including No. 5 Mississippi at No. 7 Georgia.
Other significant ranked matchups include No. 22 Utah at No. 14 Brigham Young and No. 15 Notre Dame versus No. 21 Southern California.
In the ACC, No. 2 Miami (Fla.) plays on Friday, while No. 12 Georgia Tech faces Duke.

Our panel of pigskin prognosticators returns to weigh in on the college football contests involving the Top 25 in the US LBM Coaches Poll. The Week 8 slate skews heavily toward SEC country, but opinions might differ on several other games as well.

There are three ranked-on-ranked pairings in the SEC alone, headlined by the top-10 clash matching No. 5 Mississippi and No. 7 Georgia between the hedges. Elsewhere in ‘just means more land,’ No. 6 Alabama hosts No. 11 Tennessee in their traditional third Saturday in October encounter, and No. 10 LSU heads to No. 18 Vanderbilt.

OF course, there are other locales where the games this weekend also mean a lot. It’s Holy War week in the Beehive State as No. 22 Utah visits No. 14 Brigham Young. There is also the annual showdown between No. 15 Notre Dame and No. 21 Southern California, with this year’s version likely to serve as a playoff eliminator.

In the ACC, No. 2 Miami (Fla.) gets a jump start on the weekend hosting a Friday night tilt against Louisville, and No. 12 Georgia Tech puts its perfect record on the line at Duke, which is also off to a 3-0 start in conference play. Here’s how our staffers think all the action will unfold.

With the season more than a third of the way through, there are only two ways to improve your rosters — waiver wire and trades.

Evaluating a fantasy trade can be a daunting task. Most managers value their players more than they’re actually worth. That’s where the Week 7 fantasy football trade value charts come in.

The charts can be used as your very own fantasy football trade analyzer in standard, half-PPR (point per reception) and full PPR leagues. Someone sends you an offer? Simply pull out a calculator (on your phone, you don’t need an actual calculator) and plug in the values for each player. Don’t worry, six-points-per-passing-touchdown and superflex leagues are covered as well.

Important note: If you’re offered an uneven trade (i.e., a 2-for-1 or 3-for-1), include the values for the players you’d be moving to the bench or dropping within your calculation. Example: If someone in your league offers you Alvin Kamara, Tee Higgins and Cooper Kupp (combined value of 88) for Bijan Robinson (73), it might look like you’re getting the better end of it. However, if you’re bumping down, say, Tyjae Spears and Kendrick Bourne (combined value of 42) in the process, it’s a net negative deal for you.

The rankings are based on how players should be valued in 12-team leagues. Players are sorted in order of their half-PPR values.

Quarterback trade value chart

(Note: ‘6/TD’ is for leagues that award six points for passing touchdowns and ‘SFLEX’ stands for superflex.)

Running back trade value chart

Wide receiver trade value chart

Tight end trade value chart

Overall Week 7 fantasy football rest-of-season rankings

Note: These values are for 12-team, one-QB leagues with half-PPR scoring.