Week 16 Preview: Unlikely AFC division leaders step into the spotlight
The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL
The Athletic
4.6 • 3.3K Ratings
🗓️ 19 December 2025
⏱️ 91 minutes
🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS
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Summary
Jaguars-Broncos is the Game of the Week. Patriots-Ravens is another game of the week, and it's the former that is leading its division as the latter fights for its playoff life. The defining characteristic of this NFL season—true contender turnover in largely unseen quantities—steps to the fore in Week 16. Robert Mays, Derrik Klassen and Dave Helman give it the full preview treatment on this episode of The Athletic Football Show.
Rundown (timestamps are approximate)
2:18 Game of the Week: Jaguars-Broncos
23:33 Game of the Week: Patriots-Ravens
42:08 One Thing From...Packers-Bears
47:18 One Thing From...Buccaneers-Panthers
57:12 One Thing From...Steelers-Lions
1:00:54 One Thing From...Cowboys-Chargers
1:06:07 Under the Hood: Texans offense
1:15:40 Jaxson Dart vs. Tyler Shough vs. JJ McCarthy...who would you take as your 2026 starter?
1:26:26 Falcons-Cardinals and the saddest Spiderman pointing meme ever
1:30:11 What do you wanna know in Week 16
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Host: Robert Mays
Co-Hosts: Derrik Klassen and Dave Helman
Executive Producer: Michael Beller
Video Producer: Katy Duffy
Audio Producer: Michael Beller
Social Producer: Scott Krinch
Follow Robert on Bluesky: @robertmays.bsky.social
Follow Derrik on Bluesky: @qbklass.bsky.social
Follow Dave on Bluesky: @davehelman.bsky.social
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Theme song: Haunted
Written by Dylan Slocum, Trevor Dietrich, Ruben Duarte, Kyle McAulay, and Meredith VanWoert / Performed by Spanish Love Songs
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to the athletic football show. |
| 0:05.5 | I'm Robert Mays. |
| 0:06.5 | The Week 16 preview. |
| 0:08.6 | A lot of fun stuff today. |
| 0:09.6 | Two really good games of the week. |
| 0:11.9 | We got Jags, Broncos, and Patriots Ravens. |
| 0:15.0 | We easily could have had the Bears as another game of the week against the Packers, |
| 0:17.9 | but we just did that like two weeks ago. |
| 0:19.9 | And so we didn't want to give it the exact same deep dive treatment. |
| 0:23.1 | Hit one thing from Bears Packers, also one thing from Bucks Panthers, Steelers, Lions, |
| 0:28.2 | and Chargers Cowboys. |
| 0:29.2 | Did a little under the hood about the Texans offense and whether we think they have enough |
| 0:35.4 | juice to make that defense viable in the playoffs |
| 0:39.3 | against some of the better teams in the league. |
| 0:41.5 | Hit a couple things on Sicko Street, including a little conversation about |
| 0:44.7 | whether you'd rather have Jackson Dart, Tyler, Shuck, or J.J. McCarthy as your 2026 starter, |
| 0:50.0 | and then dug into what we want to know coming out of week 16 in the NFL. |
| 0:54.5 | Let's get to that with me, Dave Hellman, and Derek Klesson right now. |
| 1:02.2 | Taking into the week 16 preview, two games of the week to hit today, |
| 1:07.3 | both of these games presented by BetMGM, kicking things off with the Jaggs at the Broncos. |
| 1:13.5 | Broncos only three-point favorites in this game at home against the Jacksonville Jaguars, which I find |
| 1:17.6 | interesting. Dave, why is Jags Broncos one of our two games of the week in Week 16? Before we get into |
... |
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