Justin Herbert throttled his potential and the 5 nicest QBs of Week 16

Let’s change things up a bit. Normally, this column is anchored on the worst performances of the week — it’s called “grossest quarterbacks” for a reason.

But Week 16 was a smorgasbord of inspiring play. Sure, there were a few clunkers — Josh Allen probably ruined a few fantasy playoff runs — but the majority of this week’s passing performances were significant improvements from veteran QBs angled toward the postseason or young players making a modest leap. Cam Ward provided vital proof of concept in his quest to be the Tennessee Titans’ franchise cornerstone. Matthew Stafford potentially locked down his first-ever MVP, even in a Thursday night loss.

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And that’s just a taste of a long list of passers who shined brightly this weekend.

To get a better idea of who performed best relative to expectations in Week 16, I’ve compared every starting quarterback’s expected points added (EPA, found here in real time thanks to some exceptional work from The Athletic‘s Ben Baldwin) to their 2025 average. The guys who went above and beyond their per-game averages the hardest? They’re the ones we’re going to talk about today. Dak Prescott did a nice job putting up empty numbers in his loss to the Los Angeles Chargers, but he’s been putting up big numbers all season and, thus, unable to escape his own gravity for inclusion.

But, since we’re not done bathing in the schadenfreude of poor performance, let’s take a quick look at the guys who underwhelmed the most in Week 16 before we get started.

Bo Nix, Denver Broncos

• Difference: 7.5 points worse

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Brady Cook, New York Jets

• Difference: 7.7 points worse

Jaxson Dart, New York Giants

• Difference: 11.1 points worse

Josh Allen, Buffalo Bills

• Difference: 12.0 points worse

With that out of the way, let’s talk about the guys who outperformed even the loftiest expectations (or, in Cam Ward’s case, very low ones).

5. Cam Ward, Tennessee Titans

• Difference: 15.2 points better

Ward has had a brutal rookie season, but even the NFL’s perennial MVP candidates would have a tough time maintaining a positive EPA with the supporting cast in Nashville. The Titans’ 37.3 pressure rate allowed is eighth highest the NFL. Their 25.1 percent blitz rate faced is eighth lowest. It’s a tough sled even before you get to a lineup of receivers and tight ends that peaks at Chig Okonkwo, Chimere Dike and Elic Ayomanor.

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On Sunday, Ward got some help from Tony Pollard and his third-straight 100-yard rushing performance. More importantly, he found room to pick apart a slightly disinterested Kansas City Chiefs team who’d been eliminated from the postseason and relegated to playing its third-string quarterback. Ward was able to escape pressure and find creases downfield to lock in the Titans third win of 2025.

Ward’s average target only went 6.1 yards downfield, creating the short-short-long game that allowed him to complete 75 percent of his passes while connecting on five of eight throws to travel more than 10 yards beyond the line of scrimmage.

Tennessee’s 30.1 percent third down conversion rate was worst in the NFL through 15 weeks. In Week 16, they converted nine of 17 (53 percent) thanks in large part to a 50 percent success rate on Ward’s dropbacks. The Titans picked up meaningful yardage early in drives and six of those nine conversions came on third-and-three or shorter. Pollard played a role there, but his 39 percent success rate on carries wouldn’t even crack the top 50 when it comes to full-time runners this fall.

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This was largely a Cam Ward production — and a personal record 10.9 completion percentage over expected (CPOE) reflects that.

4. Trevor Lawrence, Jacksonville Jaguars

• Difference: 15.5 points better

Lawrence has leveled up his game in a season where it seemed where he threatened to fall short of his potential once more. With Jakobi Meyers serving as the adult in the Jaguars’ receiving room, Jacksonville has taken flight. Its sixth straight victory came at the expense of the Denver Broncos’ 11-game win streak. Lawrence stared down a top-three scoring defense and hung 34 points on Nik Bonitto, Patrick Surtain II and company in the thin air of Mile High Stadium.

It wasn’t Meyers or Brian Thomas Jr. who gleaned the most from Lawrence’s glorious radiation Sunday. That honor instead belonged to, huhParker Washington.

Perfect placement beats tight coverage. While Lawrence wasn’t perfect all day — and got about 90 yards after catch from Washington in his six-catch, 145-yard performance — he was good enough for a 5.5 CPOE and four different plays worth at least 2.9 EPA. He also added 20 rushing yards and a touchdown on the ground without turning the ball over (which, granted, isn’t as much of a problem as you’d expect; the Broncos have only 12 forced turnovers this season).

Over his last four games, Lawrence has thrown 12 touchdown passes without an interception. He’s run for 112 yards and two touchdowns without a fumble. He’s only been sacked eight times — five of which came against the dynamic Denver pass rush but only resulted in 14 lost yards.

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If Lawrence started the season like this he’d be at the forefront of way-too-early MVP conversations. Instead, he’ll have to settle for making the Jaguars a team no one wants to face in the playoffs.

3. Matthew Stafford, Los Angeles Rams

• Difference: 17.5 points better

Stafford was already the NFL MVP betting favorite. Outperforming his own lofty standard means having a borderline ludicrous performance.

457 yards and three touchdowns? That qualifies.

Stafford turned 51 dropbacks into 463 total yards (including six rushing, bringing his season-long ground yardage total up to… -2). While he wasn’t especially accurate — 29 of 49 passing with five completions in 10 attempts that traveled at least 15 air yards downfield — he kept LA’s offense thriving even without Davante Adams in the lineup.

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Granted that mostly came via targeting Puka Nacua, who turned his off-field turmoil into nearly half his team’s passing yards and two of its three passing touchdowns.

There were seven plays Thursday night that resulted in at least three EPA for either team’s offense. Stafford passes made up five of those, and only one — a 41-yard strike to Nacua — resulted in a touchdown. The veteran’s ability to spin plays out of the ether and create drive-extending magic made his night even more impressive than his 450-plus yards suggests.

2. Joe Burrow, Cincinnati Bengals

• Difference: 25.0 points better

The Bengals had nothing to play for in Week 16. That’s fine; neither did the Miami Dolphins, a team so thoroughly done with the Tua Tagovailoa era that seventh round rookie Quinn Ewers was named the team’s starter earlier in the week. Burrow took advantage of that opportunity to remind us all what the Cincinnati offense is capable of, slinging four touchdown passes in a 45-21 win in which the fourth quarter was strictly ornamental.

While two of Burrow’s four touchdowns came late in a game Miami had little chance of making competitive, his performance was a reminder how dangerous his presence makes the Bengals. The oft-injured QB didn’t merely default to Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins and ride that all-star duo to a predictable finish. Chase had 11 targets, but he was one of nine different Cincy players to finish with a catch. Burrow’s touchdowns went to Higgins, Chase Brown (x2) and Mike Gesicki, who of course celebrated with the AFC’s worst griddy (and potentially the NFL’s, depending on how J.J. McCarthy is feeling on a given Sunday).

The former AFC champ thoroughly punished the league’s 26th-ranked passing defense. He threw nine passes that traveled at least 10 yards downfield and completed seven, including two touchdown passes and a perfect 158.3 passer rating. He avoided pressure and negative plays, getting sacked twice on 36 dropbacks and infusing a bit more hope into Cincinnati’s 2026.

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Burrow alone won’t fix Cincinnati’s problems. But there will be days he can overcome a shoddy defense and leaky offensive line because he’s a borderline mutant.

1. Justin Herbert, Los Angeles Chargers

• Difference: 27.0 points better

Herbert was given a gift in Week 16; a matchup against a Dallas Cowboys team lacking the pass rush to exploit the injury riddled offensive line in front of him. He went without being sacked for the first time in 2025. This was very, very bad news for the Cowboys.

Herbert had the kind of performance where his stat line finally matched the eye test. He dropped back 29 times and threw for 300 yards and a pair of touchdowns. He added 42 more yards and a trip to the end zone on the ground, turning an early 10-7 Dallas lead into a 34-17 Chargers win. Quentin Johnston was the primary recipient of his wizardry, hauling in two of his three deepest completions of the day — the bomb above and this nifty one-handed touchdown grab:

Herbert completed nearly 80 percent of his passes despite being pressured on a third of his dropbacks. He completed eight of 11 throws to travel at least 10 yards downfield.

This was a dazzling “what if” performance from a player who has regularly showcased the peak of his potential but rarely been able to sustain it for a bevy of reasons. Week 16 gave us a glimpse of Herbert’s 2025 if both Rashawn Slater and Joe Alt were able to stay healthy, with a quarterback pressured on 44 percent of his dropbacks (second-worst in the NFL among qualified starters) suddenly facing an average amount of static in the pocket. Factor in a useful run game led by a healthy-once-more Omarion Hampton and you get to see Jim Harbaugh’s vision in closer focus.

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Will that matter against a more capable defense? Maybe not; the Cowboys’ 5.5 percent sack rate barely cracked the NFL’s top 25 before Sunday’s showdown and Los Angeles’ final two games are against the Houston Texans (sixth) and Denver Broncos (second). Herbert made the most of his opportunity in Dallas, however, and showed how high the Chargers’ ceiling can be.

This article originally appeared on For The Win: Justin Herbert throttled his potential and the 5 nicest QBs of Week 16