NFL Preseason Week 2: Biggest Winners and Biggest Concerns

Last Updated on agosto 17, 2026 5:40 pm by Erwin Noguera

Mike McCarthy beat his former team 28-9 in his Pittsburgh debut. The first overall pick threw for a touchdown and a 100.3 passer rating in a loss. New England forced four turnovers and still could not win.

And the quarterback who was the story of the entire preseason did not play a single snap.

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Here is what actually mattered from Thursday’s slate.

BIGGEST WINNERS

Mike McCarthy and the Pittsburgh Steelers

The most complete performance of the week, and the most meaningful.

Pittsburgh beat Green Bay 28-9 in McCarthy’s debut against the franchise he coached for a decade. The scoreline is the headline. The detail underneath is what should encourage Steelers supporters.

The defence was disciplined; tackling and physicality both stood out, which is not always guaranteed in an August game full of roster hopefuls. On offence, McCarthy installed the basics of his West Coast system and his quarterbacks executed them cleanly, including eleven play-action calls.

Drew Allar and Will Howard both impressed enough for McCarthy to describe them as “very poised” afterwards. For a team whose starting quarterback turns 43 this season, seeing young arms operate the system competently is not a footnote.

Fernando Mendoza

The first overall pick lost the game and won the evening.

Mendoza finished 10 of 16 for 97 yards with a touchdown and a 100.3 passer rating in his first NFL action, showing the kind of composure that is difficult to fake. Las Vegas fell 27-14 to Arizona, but nothing about that result is on the rookie.

This complicates the plan. Klint Kubiak has been clear that he prefers a veteran starting from day one, with Kirk Cousins penciled in for Week 1 and Mendoza on a Drake Maye-style timeline. One performance does not overturn that. Two might.

Deshaun Watson

Genuinely unexpected, and worth stating plainly.

Watson finished 11 of 15 for 126 yards with no touchdowns and no interceptions. That is a clean, efficient line from a quarterback who threw six interceptions across four practice days earlier in camp.

It does not resolve Cleveland’s quarterback competition, and it does not erase 66 missed games over five seasons. It does mean the Browns have a genuine decision rather than a formality, and Todd Monken now has evidence pointing in both directions.

New England’s Defence

Four turnovers forced against Indianapolis. That is an emphatic performance regardless of the opposition’s depth chart.

New England has spent the offseason being discussed almost entirely in terms of A.J. Brown and Drake Maye. The defence quietly making that kind of statement is the sort of thing that shows up in January.

The Denver Broncos Offence

359 total yards, 162 of them on the ground, and a thirteen-minute advantage in time of possession.

Denver already had the third-best scoring defence in the league last season. If the offence is going to control games like this with Bo Nix healthy and Jaylen Waddle added, the case for them as a genuine contender gets considerably stronger.

The Rookies Who Helped Themselves

Jam Miller rushed for 55 yards on 14 carries for New England, pushing his case for the RB3 role that opened up when Terrell Jennings suffered a season-ending injury.

De’Zhaun Stribling caught seven of eight targets for 63 yards for San Francisco — and did it against most of Tennessee’s defensive starters, which makes the production considerably more meaningful than a typical preseason stat line.

Barion Brown continued a strong camp with a 28-yard sideline catch from Zach Wilson.

BIGGEST CONCERNS

Carson Beck Did Not Play

The story of the preseason so far, and he was in street clothes.

Beck suffered a rib injury in the Hall of Fame Game; the same night he went 15 of 19 for 188 yards with a 125.4 rating and looked like the best player on the field. The injury is reportedly not serious, but he missed Thursday entirely.

Arizona won 27-14 without him, which is fine. The problem is momentum. Beck had one outstanding half of football and a clear opportunity to build on it against Las Vegas. Instead, he has one game of evidence and two preseason weeks remaining to prove the first was not a fluke.

For a rookie trying to force his way up a depth chart behind Jacoby Brissett’s reworked $15.5 million deal, lost reps are expensive.

Aaron Rodgers Watched in Street Clothes

This one is a genuine reversal.

Mike McCarthy said publicly and repeatedly that he wanted Rodgers to play during the preseason, and Rodgers indicated he was on board. It was the most-discussed subplot heading into Thursday: a 42-year-old quarterback facing the team he defined, in his new coach’s debut.

He did not dress. Rodgers is now expected to make his preseason debut on August 21 against the Jets.

There may be nothing to it. But when a coach spends weeks saying he wants his quarterback on the field and then holds him out of the exact game everyone was watching for, it invites questions Pittsburgh does not need to be answering in August.

Baía Verde

A 28-9 defeat, and the context makes it worse.

The Packers are already without Micah Parsons until at least mid-October following his torn ACL, and Josh Jacobs has been dealing with a groin injury on top of the domestic violence investigation hanging over him.

Losing a preseason game by nineteen points means very little on its own. Losing it while your two best players are unavailable and your former coach is on the opposite sideline is a worse night than the scoreline suggests.

New England’s Offence

Four turnovers forced. Thirteen points scored. A tie.

The defence handed the offence four extra possessions, and New England still could not win the game. Drake Maye and A.J. Brown were never going to play meaningful snaps, so this is not a referendum on the starters. It is a sign that the depth behind them is thin, and the Patriots face a considerably harder schedule this season.

The Raiders’ Supporting Cast

Mendoza was excellent. Las Vegas lost by thirteen.

That gap is the story of the Raiders’ season in miniature. Whatever the rookie becomes, the roster around him is not close to capable yet, and starting him early would mean handing a first overall pick to a team that cannot protect or support him.

How Our Predictions Did

Worth being straight about this, since we published picks on Wednesday.

Steelers to win: correct. We predicted 20-16 and got 28-9.

Under 37.5 in Pittsburgh: correct, by half a point. The game finished on 37 total.

Cardinals +1.5: correct. We took Arizona to be getting points, and they won outright 27-14. The predicted score was 24-20: right side, wrong margin.

Colts +1.5: correct. We picked New England to win 21-17 but recommended Indianapolis with the points. The 13-13 tie means the underdog covered and our score prediction missed.

Three from four on the bets, and a sign that preseason score predictions are close to worthless while the sides and totals are handicappable.

What Carries Into Week 3

Beck’s availability. Arizona’s most interesting story cannot develop from the sideline. Watch the injury report.

Rodgers on August 21. If he plays against the Jets as expected, the street-clothes decision becomes a footnote. If he sits again, it becomes a story.

Cleveland’s quarterback competition. Watson’s clean line changes the shape of it. Monken has confirmed both he and Shedeur Sanders will start one of the first two preseason games, so Sanders gets his turn next.

Mendoza’s second act. One strong outing keeps him on schedule. A second forces a conversation about Week 1.

Preseason Week 3 runs August 20 to 22. Cutdown day is August 30. The regular season opens September 9.