Welcome to the Monday edition of the Pick Six newsletter!
The countdown is officially on. As of today, we are just three days away from the start of the first game of the NFL preseason. That will be coming on Thursday when the Chargers face the Lions in the Hall of Fame game, and although I’m sure those two teams will be excited to kick off the 2025 NFL preseason, I have some bad news for those two fan bases: No team has ever played in the Hall of Fame game and gone on to win the Super Bowl in the same season. Of course, the Chargers and Lions have both never won a Super Bowl, so maybe this won’t bother them.
Anyway, before we get to Thursday’s game, we have a lot of ground to cover with training camps going on around the NFL, and we’re going to cover those thoroughly in today’s newsletter.
As always, here’s your daily reminder to tell all your friends to sign up for the newsletter. To get them signed up, all you have to do is click here. Let’s get to the rundown.
1. Training camp takeaways: Terry McLaurin shows up, Giants rookies show out
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It was a newsworthy weekend in the NFL, and luckily for us, Garrett Podell rounded up everything that happened with our latest edition of training camp takeaways.
Here are several things that happened over the weekend:
- Terry McLaurin shows up for camp. McLaurin’s holdout from training camp is now over. McLaurin opted to take a yoga class away from the team facility Wednesday instead of participating in practice while vying for a new contract, but on Sunday he did report to camp, even without a new deal. NOTE: McLaurin was fined $200,000 for missing four days of camp, and he’s been placed on the PUP list with an ankle injury. So it appears that he’ll be “holding in” until he gets a new contract.
- Rashawn Slater gets paid. At every stop of Jim Harbaugh’s coaching career, he has prioritized physicality and running the football. That’s why it’s not surprising that Harbaugh’s Los Angeles Chargers made two-time Pro Bowl left tackle Rashawn Slater the highest-paid offensive lineman in football. Slater agreed to terms on a four-year, $114 million contract extension with $92 million guaranteed. His new $28.5 million average per year salary tops Tampa Bay’s Tristan Wirfs’ $28.1 million APY on his five-year, $140.6 million deal.
- Giants first-round rookies are locked in. Jaxson Dart struggled out of the gate at training camp, but he turned it around on Sunday in a major way. He hit on his first 10 throws and completed 11 of his 13 passes on the day. … Abdul Carter, the third pick, appears as advertised early on. Carter, No. 51, absolutely cooked starting right tackle Jermaine Eluemunor multiple times.
Podell’s got a few more takeaways, and you can check those out here.
2. Injuries are piling up at training camp: Breaking down the biggest injuries from the weekend
If there’s one downside to training camp, it’s that we see several injuries happen almost every year and those injuries usually happen at the beginning of camp, because players go into practice after having been away from football for six weeks.
There were several key injuries that came up over the weekend, so let’s break them down:
- Matthew Stafford won’t practice this week. The Rams QB was out of practice last week due to back sorness and won’t be returning this week. Over the weekend, Sean McVay said Stafford WON’T be practicing this week and that the team’s only objective with Stafford is to make sure he’s on the field in Week 1 against the Texans. “The goal in mind is Houston and I do think that this is the best plan for him and I wanted to let you guys know about that,” McVay said. You can read more about Stafford here.
- Kenny Pickett likely out for at least a week. The Browns QB competition took a unforeseen turn over the weekend after Pickett suffered a hamstring injury. He’s expected to be re-evaluated later this week, but isn’t expected to practice for now. Pickett was off to a solid start in camp, but with his injury, that could open the door for Joe Flacco, Dillon Gabriel or Shedeur Sanders to take a step forward in the QB battle. We’ve got more on Pickett here.
- Joe Mixon dealing with leg injury. The Texans running back could be sidelined for the next few weeks after suffering an ankle injury. Not only did Mixon cross the 1,000-yard mark last season, but he also rushed for 11 touchdowns, so if he’s not ready to go by Week 1, that would be a big blow for the Texans’ offense. With Mixon out for now, that could mean a bigger workload for Nick Chubb, who was just signed in June.
Titans receiver Treylon Burks also went down with a broken collarbone over the weekend. Burks missed 12 games last season after tearing his ACL in October, and now, the 18th overall pick from the 2022 NFL Draft will likely miss some time to start the season. We have more details on Burks’ injury here.
3. Aaron Rodgers responds to Terry Bradshaw’s comments: Three things to know
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Two months ago, Terry Bradshaw ripped the Steelers for their decision to go after Aaron Rodgers at quarterback. “That guy needs to stay in California. Go somewhere and chew on bark and whisper to the gods out there,” Bradshaw said.
Rodgers finally got asked about those comments over the weekend. Here’s what he had to say:
- Rodgers took the high road. The four-time MVP could have fired back at Bradshaw, but instead, he complimented the four-time Super Bowl winning QB. “Terry’s a legend. He’s an absolute legend. He won four Super Bowls,” Rodgers said. “He’s had a legendary career in the media. But Terry, like a lot of people, doesn’t know me. And so he’s got an idea of what he thinks about me based on what I’ve done, the documentary, what I’ve said, darkness retreat, whatever the hell you want to talk about.”
- Rodgers wants to get to know Bradshaw. Rodgers is under the belief that Bradshaw wouldn’t have said what he said if the he had taken any time to get to know him. “I’d love to get to know Terry on a deeper level, and I feel like if he gave me a chance to get to know him, then we’d have a good friendship because, for me, I have nothing but the utmost amount of respect and deference for what the greats have done,” Rodgers said.
This is a great sign for the Steelers, if only because it shows that Rodgers de-escalated the situation. This could have easily turned into a distraction if Rodgers had insulted the Steelers legend. Instead, Rodgers simply brushed it under the carpet and moved on. You can read more about Rodgers’ comments here.
4. Eagles training camp battles to watch
The Eagles are the reigning Super Bowl champions, but they have some big question marks heading into the 2025 season, so pulling off a repeat won’t be easy. With that in mind, Jeff Kerr decided to take a look at some of the biggest training camp battles going on in Philadelphia right now.
SAFETY
The players: Sydney Brown, Andrew Mukuba, Tristin McCollum, Cooper DeJean
Kerr’s breakdown: This is the competition that’s likely going to take the majority of camp to decide, as defensive coordinator Vic Fangio could use a variety of looks with several players for the starting spot opposite Reed Blankenship. Brown has been the first player up in first-team reps in nickel packages when the Eagles have 11-on-11 periods, but Mukuba has also been splitting those reps.
RIGHT GUARD
The players: Tyler Steen, Kenyon Green
Kerr’s breakdown: This job appears to be Steen’s to lose, as he’s gotten all the first-team reps thus far in camp. Green missed the first two practices (knee) and returned Saturday, but this doesn’t appear to be a competition through the first week.
Kerr, who’s been in Philadelphia covering the team since last week when the Eagles reported to training camp, broke down a total of four battles. You can see his full list here.
5. The 2025 All-Fun team is here: Making a team out of the most electrifying players in the NFL
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What would happen if you took the most entertaining players in the NFL and put them all one team: You’d get our 2025 All-Fun team. Cody Benjamin wanted to know what it would look like if we made an All-Pro team that consisted only of the players who are the most fun to watch, and that’s how we ended up getting our All-Fun team.
Let’s take a look at the skill players on Benjamin’s All-Fun team:
QB: Lamar Jackson (Ravens)
RB: Saquon Barkley (Eagles)
WR: Ja’Marr Chase (Bengals)
WR: Justin Jefferson (Vikings)
WR: Malik Nabers (Giants)
TE: George Kittle (49ers)
OT: Dan Skipper (Lions)
OG: Landon Dickerson (Eagles)
C: Creed Humphrey (Chiefs)
The All-Fun team also had a defense, and if you want to know who cracked the list on that side of the ball, you can see Benjamin’s full story here.
6. Extra points: Every NFL team could soon be playing an international game every year
It’s been a busy 24 hours the NFL, and since it’s nearly impossible to keep track of everything that happened, I went ahead and put together a roundup for you.
- Falcons owner offers possible peak at the future. NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell has said multiple times that he thinks the NFL will eventually play 16 international games per year. If that happens, you can probably expect EVERY team to play one game per season out of the country, according to Arthur Blank. The Falcons owner told NFL Media over the weekend that that’s “probably on the horizon.”
- Steelers set to honor Big Ben. The Steelers have announced the class of 2025 for their Hall of Honor, and the group will be headlined by two-time Super Bowl winner Ben Roethlisberger. Big Ben will be joined by Joey Porter and Maurkice Pouncey. The three men will be inducted on Dec. 14 and then they’ll be honored on the field Dec. 15 when the Steelers host the Dolphins in a Monday night game.
- Cowboys get big extension done, but not with Micah Parsons. Cowboys tight end Jake Ferguson will be sticking around Dallas through the 2029 season after signing a four-year, $52 million extension over the weekend. Garrett Podell, who covers the Cowboys, said the team deserves some credit for getting a deal done with Ferguson, but the whole mess with Parsons is still overshadowing everything. You can read Podell’s take on the situation here.
- Cowboys guard breaks bone in neck. Robert Jones suffered a brutal injury over the weekend when he broke a bone in his neck. The offensive guard is now expected to miss two to three months. We have more details on Jones’ injury here.
- Dolphins sign two defensive backs. After trading Jalen Ramsey and losing Artie Burns to a torn ACL, the Dolphins had a gaping hole on their roster at corner, and they attempted to fill that hole over the weekend by signing both Jack Jones and Mike Hilton, according to ESPN. Hilton started 10 games for the Bengals last season while Jones started 16 for the Raiders. Now, both guys will look to go in and compete for a starting job in Miami.
- Viking safety gets $36 million extension. Josh Metellus has started 27 games for the Vikings over the past two seasons, and the team rewarded him over the weekend with a three-year, $36 million extension. It’s a huge contract for Metellus, who started his NFL career as a sixth-round pick in 2020.
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