NFL winners and losers from Week 5: Packers pummel Bears, Nick Sirianni costs Eagles

As wet weather swirled around the Northeast, chaos reigned in the NFL in Week 5. The NFC East alone had its share of boneheaded decision making on Sunday while the Green Bay Packers proved to Ben Johnson that he might actually need to get his quarterback back to contend in the division.

The NFC West also has a clear front runner after San Francisco’s impressive showing in Seattle while Tennessee appears to be in big trouble. Read on for our latest look at the biggest Winners and Losers from another NFL Sunday, starting at Lambeau Field as the Packers put together their most impressive effort of the season.

NFL Week 5 Winners

Green Bay Packers

It has certainly been a mixed bag for the Packers thus far but their dominance against the Bears on Sunday is the kind of effort that can help a team turn the corner. Green Bay obliterated their biggest rivals, winning 31-7 as Jordan Love feasted against a suspect Chicago defense, completing 25-of-31 passes for 367 yards and two touchdowns to deliver a 137.5 quarterback rating.

Ben Johnson, who has gone on record publicly saying how much he enjoys beating Matt LaFleur, was embarrassed as the Bears turned the ball over five times and only rushed for 3.4 yards per carry. After it looked like the sky was falling following a Week 3 humiliation ritual on Thursday night against Atlanta, the Packers have now won two straight as they move ever closer to getting Micah Parsons back on the field to add rocket fuel to their defense.

Drake Maye

It appears seeing the Buffalo Bills in Week 4 got Drake Maye back on track, which makes his Week 5 performance against the Raiders extremely encouraging. Las Vegas had no answer for Maye’s passing attack, which saw him complete 26-of-34 passes for 374 yards and four touchdowns without a pick in a 45-17 humbling of the previously 3-1 Raiders.

It certainly was encouraging to see Maye spread the football around to the open man, connecting with nine different receivers instead of trying to force the ball into tight windows. That performance also came without A.J. Brown, who is eligible to return from injured reserve for Week 6’s matchup with the Jets, which is prime time for Maye to make a push to help the Patriots defend their AFC East title.

David Bailey

On yet another rainy Sunday in East Rutherford for a Jets’ home game, there may not have been a more impactful player on the field than David Bailey. The No. 2 pick in April’s draft had been getting criticism for not making a big impact over the past few weeks, but he had his coming-out party in the rain on Sunday, sacking Deshaun Watson three times, adding seven tackles and four quarterback hits for good measure.

The pressure that Bailey generated made life miserable for Watson, who couldn’t get much going against an underrated defense despite being the beneficiary of some questionable calls from the officials. If Bailey can be a game-wrecker on defense like he was on Sunday the Jets have an opportunity to be a very tough out for anybody on their schedule going forward.

Aaron Rodgers

No one expects to see vintage Rodgers every week but the future Hall-of-Famer picked a good time to showcase the peak of his powers at rainy Acrisure Stadium on Sunday. Rodgers came out of the gate quick against the Indianapolis Colts, completing his first 11 passes en route to a 22-of-31 day with three scores to help Pittsburgh pick up a 34-22 victory.

The savvy veteran wisely didn’t try to force the ball down the field in trying conditions, instead peppering Jaylen Warren and Germie Bernard with shorter targets to allow them to utilize their speed in the open field. The strategy worked nicely as Warren took a screen 80 yards to the house on his first reception while veteran tight end Pat Freiermuth also snagged two scores from Rodgers.

San Francisco 49ers

The game of the week was the big NFC West showdown between the Seahawks and 49ers and it ended up being an impressive victory for San Francisco. Despite seeing George Kittle play through an illness and playing in front of the 12th man, the 49ers asserted their will to gain complete command over the NFC West.

The game was truly fantastic as two juggernauts kept throwing haymakers with the lead changing hands five times over the course of the afternoon. The 49ers came up with a key stop in the end, narrowly preventing Cooper Kupp from getting a critical first down to keep the Seahawks’ final drive alive, and are now two games clear of both of their biggest rivals with a head-to-head road win over each.

Detroit Lions Defense

There may not be a more maligned unit in the NFL than the Detroit defense, which has been routinely shredded over the first month of the season. Drawing the Cardinals fresh off the Marvin Harrison Jr. trade proved to be an elixir for the unit, which put up their best performance of the season by allowing just 21 points in a blowout win for Detroit.

The Cardinals aren’t exactly bereft of talent as Trey McBride and Jeremiyah Love are capable playmakers, making Detroit’s dominance on the defensive side quite encouraging. Embattled coordinator Dennard Wilson is surely hoping this breakthrough can carry forward against the red-hot Packers following next Sunday’s bye.

NFL Week 5 Losers

Nick Sirianni

When you get games in the NFL where you have a win probability of over 97 percent in the fourth quarter, you need to find a way to seal the deal. Philadelphia has now blown games in those spots in back-to-back weeks, with Sunday’s 19-17 loss resulting from a very horrible decision-making process from Nick Sirianni.

After Jake Elliott booted a go-ahead field goal with eight seconds left, Sirianni made the mind boggling decision to kick the ball into the field of play when a touchback would have almost assuredly ended the game with a victory. Ameer Abdullah returned the kick 53 yards to the Eagles’ 39 before scooting out of bounds, setting up Cam Little for a game-winning 57-yard field goal attempt to help Sirianni snatch defeat from the jaws of victory for a second straight Sunday.

Tennessee Titans

The Robert Saleh-Brian Daboll pairing isn’t going well for Tennessee, which dropped to 0-5 when they got blown out 26-3 at home by the Houston Texans, who also entered the game at 0-4. While bad talent is certainly an issue for the Titans, seeing sloppy mistakes like the one left tackle Dan Moore made on Sunday to allow a free runner at Cam Ward is not a good sign for the regime’s ability to teach.

Ward avoided the sack but has looked incredibly sloppy through five games as Tennessee has a great shot to land the No. 1 pick again. A look at the Titans’ schedule makes it hard to see exactly where a win will come from, which is not a good position to be putting a former No. 1 pick in as he approaches the critical third year of his career.

Tyler Shough

There were plenty of Tyler Shough truthers in the offseason who believed the Saints struck gold with a second-round investment in him last year. Shough ran into the reality of a Brian Flores defense on Sunday and was ill-equipped to deal with it, throwing for just 96 yards and tossing two interceptions in a 23-13 loss at home.

The chaos that Flores throws at quarterbacks clearly rattled Shough, who averaged just 3.8 yards per attempt over the course of the afternoon. New Orleans, which was hopeful of building off a strong second half in 2025, is now sitting at 1-3 and has to hope that Shough’s confidence isn’t too shaken by running into the elite Vikings’ defense.

Las Vegas Raiders

We gave the Raiders the rare moral victory in this space last week for going toe-to-toe with the Chiefs and coming up just shy of an incredible victory. It appears that Las Vegas got too eager to buy into their hype, laying an absolute egg on the road as they lost 45-17 at New England in a performance that aligned with the preseason expectations for the Raiders.

The defense couldn’t stop Drake Maye at all and Ashton Jeanty didn’t do much on the ground, turning 10 carries into just 27 yards. The blowout did allow Fernando Mendoza to complete his first NFL passes in garbage time, but if the Raiders can’t turn things around, the question of when it is time to start the Mendoza era will get rather loud.

Ben Johnson’s Backup Quarterbacks

Week 4’s blowout win over the Jets appeared to be a big boost to Johnson’s ego, who felt that he could beat anyone in the league with his backup quarterbacks. Both Tyson Bagent and Case Keenum showed why they were backups against the Packers on Sunday, taking a pair of sacks each, throwing three combined interceptions and adding a lost fumble from Keenum for good measure.

Johnson is going to hope that Williams is back soon as the Bears are now 0-2 in NFC North games, which could be a big issue for tiebreaking purposes. Not having Kyle Monangai available after a finger injury hurt the running game but Johnson got a reality check that it isn’t going to be an automatic for him to put together a winning game plan without his starting quarterback.

The NFC East

It was not a good Week 5 for the NFC East, which came out of the weekend without a win despite two of its own teams playing each other. We already covered Philadelphia’s brain cramp above, but Week 5 also saw the Cowboys blow a game at home on Thursday to winless Tampa Bay and some true theater of the absurd stuff in overtime of the Giants-Commanders contest.

The tie benefited the Giants by default, who maintain their lead in the division with a 3-1-1 start, but a solid effort from Jameis Winston masked another continuing dumpster fire out of their defense. Considering how injured the Eagles are and how bad Dallas’ defense is, it wouldn’t be shocking to see the division be a race to nine wins at this point.