NFL Week 6: Arizona won without scoring a touchdown

Jalen Hurts will miss the rest of the season. Philadelphia’s quarterback has deep vein thrombosis and blood clots in both lungs, and is being treated with blood thinners (CBS Philadelphia). That is a serious condition, and where it leaves the Eagles’ season is a long way down the list of what matters about it.

This is the publicly known Jalen Hurts timeline: • The team says he was cleated in the calf vs. the Rams in Week 4 but didn’t ask for treatment until a few days later, practicing in full in between. • After the #Eagles flew to London, an ultrasound found a superficial blood clot in his calf. Doctors still cleared him to play. • However, the night before the game, he spent time in the hospital and was told not to sleep because it was a risk. He played the full game without much sleep. • He then took the roughly 7-8 hour flight from London back to Philly and started practicing in full that week. Speaking to the media, Hurts called it a "very unique experience" but didn’t want to get into details. • A follow-up ultrasound then showed the clot had moved, and he was ruled out for Week 6. • Further testing has now diagnosed him with deep vein thrombosis and blood clots in both lungs. He’s on blood thinners and expected to miss the rest of the season.

— Ari Meirov (@MySportsUpdate) October 19, 2026

The football was strange in its own right. Arizona beat the Rams 18-16 on Sunday without scoring a single touchdown, which takes some doing, and the Rams lost partly because they had run out of fit kickers.

The NFL Week 6 results

Scores via ESPN.

Following the Raiders? They lost 33-30 to Buffalo and sit at 3-3. The game is broken down in the Raiders Week 6 review.

How you win a game without scoring a touchdown

Arizona did not reach the end zone once. They still won, because Chad Ryland kicked six field goals from six attempts, and six times three is eighteen.

A field goal is the consolation prize of a drive. When an attack stalls short of the end zone, the kicking unit comes on and tries to put the ball between the posts for three points, rather than the seven a touchdown and its extra point are worth (how scoring works has the full breakdown).

"Quite frankly, [the Rams] are not a good football team right now. There has got to be a full team, look-in-the-mirror moment." 👀 @DHx34 reacts to the Rams’ loss to the Cardinals. #NFLPostgame https://t.co/lS3e64QQ9a

— NFL on CBS 🏈 (@NFLonCBS) October 18, 2026

It is the smaller score, so a team that lives on field goals is usually a team that cannot finish. Arizona made that maths work anyway, with the last of the six, from 43 yards, landing with three seconds left.

What made it possible was the state of the other kicker. The Rams had already sacked Harrison Mevis days earlier, after his misses in the overtime loss to Buffalo (CBS Sports). His replacement, Blake Grupe, made a 44-yard kick in the first quarter and was then injured in that same debut (Yahoo Sports). By the fourth quarter the Rams’ extra point was being kicked by Ethan Evans, who is their punter and had spent the afternoon as the holder.

So one team had a kicker who could not miss, and the other had nobody left to kick. The margin was two points. If you have ever wondered what the special teams actually are, and why clubs carry a specialist whose entire job is a handful of kicks, this is the game to point at.

When I first started on my journey into Football, the special teams had been something I had not really paid serious attention to and did not understand the importance of them. Especially the Kicker. However, the Rams have been a great case study for me as a Rookie NFL fan. Sorry, Rams fans – but you have a great sense humour from some of the comments I saw on X!

@MySportsUpdate Time to make a call, @RamsNFL https://t.co/zoNyupc8V3

— @KDVincent 🇺🇸 (@kdvincent) October 19, 2026

Not at all how I envisioned my time in LA. The energy and excitement I felt going into this game was incredible. I couldn’t wait to step on that field and show what I could do. No choice other than to attack rehab and come back stronger and more prepared than ever. 💙💛 I will continue to trust and follow His plan. Thank you to everyone that’s reached out. 🫡

— Blake Grupe (@blakegrupe) October 19, 2026

What a general manager actually does, and why Indianapolis sacked theirs

The Colts dismissed Chris Ballard, their general manager of ten seasons, after Sunday’s 26-20 home defeat to Tennessee left them 2-4 (NFL.com, Colts.com).

We have relieved Chris Ballard of his duties as General Manager. https://t.co/BleD6bfTsG

— Indianapolis Colts (@Colts) October 19, 2026

The head coach decides what happens on Sunday; the general manager decides who is available to him, they do not coach. Drafting, signing, trading, releasing, and keeping all of it inside the salary cap, that is the GM’s remit.

The draft is the part of the job most visible from outside, and the part a GM is judged on longest. So when a team sacks a general manager rather than a coach, the message is that the problem is judged to be the roster rather than the gameplan.

Owner and chief executive Carlie Irsay-Gordon said the change was deliberately made during the season rather than after it, because “waiting would only delay the important work that needs to begin now” (Colts.com). In-season changes at that level are unusual. For how the wider machinery fits together, how the NFL works covers it.

What “dead last in EPA” actually means

Expected points added scores a play by what it does to your chances of scoring, rather than by how far the ball travelled. Every spot on the field, at every down and distance, carries an average points value drawn from what has historically happened from there. Move into a better spot and that value rises, so the play earns positive EPA. Go backwards, or throw it to the other team, and it falls.

Minus 0.27 per dropback means that on average, Tennessee’s pass plays were leaving them slightly worse off than before they started. That is the appeal of the stat, and why it has largely displaced passing yards in analysis: a quarterback can throw for 300 yards in a heavy defeat and still have cost his side. Passer rating versus QBR covers why the older numbers flatter people, and the QB stats page tracks the season.

Carnell Tate’s first NFL TD ties it! TENvsIND on FOX/FOX One Stream on @NFLPlus https://t.co/Dbvm9z4Htt

— NFL (@NFL) October 18, 2026

However, I have one caveat, because the article is doing the rounds. It is analysis rather than reporting, it quotes no club officials, and Patra’s own conclusion is that Ward “should get the rest of the season to show strides.”

“The coaches they prepare us the right way each and every week. No matter the outcome we know we’re the best prepared team in the league.” @JenHale504 caught up with Titans QB Cam Ward after their first win of the season https://t.co/6TfgcCwdVk

— FOX Sports: NFL (@NFLonFOX) October 18, 2026

Tennessee also won on Sunday. A headline about quarterbacks at risk and a piece that says they will probably keep their jobs are not the same thing, which is worth remembering any time one of these lands in your timeline.

The Kicker – A true MVP this week

Arizona’s six field goals will be a trivia answer by Christmas. The thing underneath it lasts longer: every team carries one player whose entire contribution is a handful of kicks, and no obvious way to replace him if he pulls up lame in the first quarter. Los Angeles found that out, and lost by two.

Each week the pace keeps building, we are almost at the half way point and I think post season there will be so much to look at, if the pace keeps building! Roll on Week 7!