USA TODAY International Edition
Milestones to celebrate, firsts to forget
The things we learned from Week 7 of the NFL season: 1. On the milestone front, Drew Brees became the fourth player to throw 500 touchdown passes, joining Peyton Manning, Brett Favre and Tom Brady. The Saints’ defeat of the Ravens also allowed Brees to match Favre and Manning as the only quarterbacks to defeat all 32 NFL teams. 2. On the opposite side of the milestone spectrum, Baltimore’s Justin Tucker missed the first extra point of his career after converting 222. His misfire, occurring with 24 seconds remaining, proved fatal in his team’s 24-23 defeat. 3. The Rams’ bid for a perfect season continued in style. Wearing their allyellow Color Rush uniforms, Los Angeles USA SNAPSHOTS© moved to 7-0 by beating the 49ers, clad in 1994 throwbacks, 39-10. Todd Gurley scored three TDs, giving him an NFL-high 14 and putting him on pace for 32. (Hall of Famer LaDainian Tomlinson set the season record, 31, in 2006.) On the defensive side, the Rams’ Aaron Donald is clearly past another of his slow starts. After failing to record a sack in the first first three games, Donald — he had a career-best four Sunday — has eight in his past four outings. He had one sack in his first four games of 2017 before turning it on on his way to defensive player of the year honors. The NFL continues to serve up bonus football. The Browns-Buccaneers game marked the seventh consecutive week at least one game went into overtime, extending a record to start a season. Cleveland has reached OT four times — the most of any team in one season since 2011. Tampa Bay K Chandler Catanzaro’s 59-yard field goal, the longest in an NFL overtime game, marked the 13th game this season to be won on the final play. Chicago’s Mitchell Trubisky amazingly covered 71.9 yards on his circuitous 8-yard TD run in the first quarter — per the NFL’s Next Gen Stats, it was the most distance covered on a run that gained fewer than 50 yards this season and most covered by a quarterback in 2018. Unfortunately, he came up just short on his game-ending Hail Mary pass, which was caught by WR Kevin White ... who was tackled at the 1-yard line as New England prevailed 38-31. Minnesota WR Adam Thielen tied Charley Hennigan (1961 Houston Oilers) by surpassing 100 receiving yards in seven consecutive games to start a season. If Thielen does it again in Week 8, he’ll tie Calvin Johnson’s mark for consecutive 100-yard receiving games at any point. Rookie Kerryon Johnson rushed for 158 yards in Detroit’s win at Miami, becoming the first Lions player with multiple 100-yard games on the ground in the same season since Reggie Bush in 2013. Detroit, the NFL’s worst rushing team in 2015 and 2017, exploded for 248 yards, the Lions’ most since 1997 (when Barry Sanders was still playing). Ten-gallon hats off to the Texans, who have reeled off four consecutive triumphs. Sunday’s defeat of Jacksonville gave Houston sole possession of first place in the AFC South. The Texans (4-3) also claimed first place in Texas after the Cowboys, who lost in Houston in Week 5, dropped to 3-4 after coming up short in Washington. Dallas has alternated wins and losses in its past 10 games and is undefeated at home in 2018 but winless on the road. If the Chiefs are going to play defense, too (season-low 239 yards and 10 points allowed to Cincinnati), then Patrick Mahomes doesn’t need to throw for 358 yards and four TDs every week ... even though he did in Sunday night’s 45-10 walkover. The Bengals are 0-6 on “Sunday Night Football’ in the Andy Dalton/A.J. Green era, which dates to 2011.