{"id":213478,"date":"2025-10-14T19:58:14","date_gmt":"2025-10-14T19:58:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/213478\/"},"modified":"2025-10-14T19:58:14","modified_gmt":"2025-10-14T19:58:14","slug":"aaron-rodgers-joe-flacco-to-make-nfl-history-during-steelers-vs-bengals-showdown-on-thursday-night","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/213478\/","title":{"rendered":"Aaron Rodgers, Joe Flacco to make NFL history during Steelers vs. Bengals showdown on Thursday night"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Getty Images<\/p>\n

Thursday night’s game between the Steelers<\/a> and Bengals<\/a> will feature a unique quarterback matchup between 41-year-old Aaron Rodgers<\/a> and 40-year-old Joe Flacco<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

This will be only the third game in NFL<\/a> history between two starting quarterbacks who are over 40 years old, according to Elias Sports (h\/t Gerry Dulac<\/a> of the Post-Gazette). The only two prior matchups included games between Tom Brady<\/a> and Drew Brees that both took place during the 2020 season.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“I think it’s great for all the old guys,” Rodgers said<\/a> of his upcoming matchup with Flacco. “I know that when I watch other sports, maybe it’s because I’m the older guy, I tend to pull for the older guys to win championships. … I’ve known Joe for a long time. He’s been great coming to my charity event. He’s been a great ambassador for the league. He’s had a great career, and it’s fun that we’re both still playing.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

Rodgers has been playing at an exceptionally high level this season, his first with the Steelers. The four-time MVP enters Thursday night’s game with 10 touchdowns (against just two interceptions) and is completing 68.8% of his passes while helping lead Pittsburgh to a 4-1 start.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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While Flacco hasn’t been as good, his situation this season has been vastly different. The former Super Bowl<\/a> MVP was the Browns<\/a>‘ opening day starter before being benched in favor of rookie Dillon Gabriel<\/a> after just four games. He was then dealt to the Bengals in a trade that Steelers coach Mike Tomlin referred to as “shocking<\/a>” earlier this week.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

NFL Week 7 picks and score predictions: Bengals shock Steelers, Rams top Jaguars in London<\/p>\n

\n John Breech <\/p>\n

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\u00a0Less than a week after joining the Bengals, Flacco started and threw for 219 yards and two touchdowns during Cincinnati’s Week 6 loss to the Packers in Green Bay.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Tomlin’s clear annoyance with the Browns dealing Flacco to Cincinnati is understandable. Instead of facing\u00a0Jake Browning<\/a>, Tomlin’s team will instead have to face a quarterback in Flacco who has played the Steelers 25 times over his 18-year career. During their most recent encounter, Flacco came off the bench in Week 3 of the 2024 season to lead the\u00a0Colts<\/a>\u00a0to an upset win over the previously unbeaten Steelers.<\/p>\n

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Thursday night’s is a big one for both teams. For the Steelers, it’s a chance to increase their stranglehold over the rest of the field in the AFC North standings. Conversely, the Bengals need a win to increase their odds of playing meaningful football deep into the 2025 season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Getty Images Thursday night’s game between the Steelers and Bengals will feature a unique quarterback matchup between 41-year-old…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":213479,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[559],"tags":[626,64,63,1252,1270,593,1241,85],"class_list":["post-213478","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nfl","tag-aaron-rodgers","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cincinnati-bengals","tag-joe-flacco","tag-nfl","tag-pittsburgh-steelers","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/213478","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=213478"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/213478\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/213479"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=213478"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=213478"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=213478"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}