Top teams to watch ahead of the 2025 NFL trade deadline
USA TODAY Sports’ Joe Rivera and Chris Bumbaca break down which teams to keep an eye out for ahead of the November 4th NFL trade deadline.
For the fourth consecutive week, there’s a new team at the top.Bucs take quite tumble after unfortunate Monday night showing in Motown.Where does league’s lone six-win team check in?
NFL power rankings entering Week 8 of the 2025 season (previous rank in parentheses):
1. Kansas City Chiefs (10): Yes, they’re a mere 4-3. Yes, if the season ended today − it doesn’t − they’d miss the playoffs. Yes, you probably hate this because you have Chiefs fatigue like much of America. Sorry. Not sorry. While acknowledging that parity is currently running amok in a league when the alleged best teams routinely lose to apparent bottom feeders, Andy Reid’s crew just provided the coach the first shutout of his distinguished career. QB Patrick Mahomes appears to be back in MVP-caliber form and certainly leveraged the long-awaited return of WR Rashee Rice in Sunday’s 31-0 defeat of the Raiders. The next four games will shed further light, coming against three 2024 playoff squads and the upstart Colts. But for now? We’re saying this dynasty is alive and well.
2. Los Angeles Rams (3): It took a round-trip of more than 10,000 miles − further than the Bengals will travel during the entire regular season − to collect wins in Baltimore and London. The Rams notched both in impressive style, by a collective 52-10 margin over the Ravens and Jags, and head into their Week 7 bye and Week 8 bye (Saints) before reaching the meat of their schedule, when WR Puka Nacua will hopefully be healthy.
3. Indianapolis Colts (5): It remains fair to malign the quality of a schedule that next serves up Tennessee. And Indy needed a special teams blunder to beat the Broncos in Week 2. That said, no team has more wins the Colts’ 6 or a more impressive point differential, their +92 28 points clear of the field. We’ll learn more about this team in the second half of the season. For now, let’s appreciate how impressively they’ve already exceeded nearly every preseason expectation of them.
4. Green Bay Packers (2): Look who moved atop the very premature NFC playoff seeding following the Bucs’ loss Monday night. It’s the Pack who will be in prime time next as they prepare to encounter former QB Aaron Rodgers for the first time since he left Wisconsin in 2023.
5. Detroit Lions (11): Did you know they’ve gone 51 games, a league high, without successive losses − an impressive run dating to the 2022 season?
6. Seattle Seahawks (4): When you can win a game by eight points despite being -3 on the turnover front, then you’re playing pretty dominant football.
7. Denver Broncos (6): Sunday’s historic comeback was truly something to behold. Also, it truly shouldn’t be that hard for a team with this much talent to beat the Giants. Or the Jets.
8. Philadelphia Eagles (8): Effectively swapping in un-retiring DE Brandon Graham for retiring DE Za’Darius Smith seems like a net win … even as we wait to see what GM/EVP Howie Roseman might have up his sleeve ahead of next month’s trade deadline.
9. Buffalo Bills (7): Yo, Mafia − might be a good time to distract Carolina QB2 Andy Dalton and start plying him anew with charitable donations.
10. Tampa Bay Buccaneers (1): It’s not like they’d had WR Mike Evans in the lineup much recently, but losing him to a busted collarbone and concussion Monday night is a real bummer. Hopefully he’s back for the playoffs.
11. Pittsburgh Steelers (12): Just wait until you see Rodgers take on the Pack for the first time. No seriously, from a distance − or the upper deck of Acrisure Stadium − it’s going to look like he’s wearing a wrestling singlet.
12. New England Patriots (13): Crazy to think this team won three road games in three weeks, something Tom Brady never managed. Also, the feat requires a scheduling quirk − you’ll recall TB12 and current Pats coach Mike Vrabel were on a team that won all its road games in 2007, which the Drake Maye Pats also have a shot of doing.
13. Chicago Bears (14): It’s becoming apparent that rookie HC Ben Johnson is the hub here and second-year QB Caleb Williams is merely a spoke. The Bears have rushed for 367 yards in the two weeks since their bye and have generated 15 takeaways during their four-game winning streak.
14. Jacksonville Jaguars (9): Now we’re gonna force-feed rookie WR/CB Travis Hunter 14 targets, twice as many as Brian Thomas Jr. got Sunday? What’s going on here?
15. San Francisco 49ers (16): However the Niners have little choice but to force-feed RB Christian McCaffrey if they’re to remain relevant. CMC had never had a 200-yard game for them prior to Sunday night’s explosion (he’d had three for Carolina earlier in his career).
16. Carolina Panthers (19): Quite the feast-or-famine defense, holding two opponents to six or fewer points … while the other five averaged more than 29.
17. Dallas Cowboys (22): They rank first in total offense and last in total defense. They’ve scored the third-most points per game and surrendered the third-most points per game. They made a great trade for WR George Pickens and made a terrible trade of DE Micah Parsons. Remarkable balance in Big D.
18. Atlanta Falcons (20): They have yet to allow 160 net passing yards in a game this season … for all the good it does on a night when they can’t stop a player like McCaffrey.
19. Washington Commanders (15): They could well have a heckuva time throwing for 160 net passing yards given the cascading injuries to QB Jayden Daniels and seemingly all of his wide receivers.
20. Los Angeles Chargers (17): The Bolts are getting jolted of late, but don’t blame Oronde Gadsden II − just the third rookie tight end in the Super Bowl era (since 1966) with at least 150 receiving yards and a touchdown grab in a game.
21. Minnesota Vikings (21): Been a while since a quarterback took apart Brian Flores’ defense the way Jalen Hurts did on Sunday. Justin Herbert and Jared Goff, Flores’ next two assignments, surely took note.
22. Houston Texans (18): Now three games behind Indy in the AFC South, at least they get to play their next three games at home … albeit against three teams currently sporting winning records.
23. Cincinnati Bengals (25): Expect the good feels to linger with the winless Jets coming to town. After that? The schedule suggests QB2 Joe Flacco has a daunting task ahead if he’s to successfully pass the baton back to Joe Burrow.
24. New York Giants (23): Bad as Sunday’s loss in Denver was, let’s not lose sight of how well this young offense performed for three quarters against what’s perhaps the league’s preeminent D.
25. Baltimore Ravens (24): QB Lamar Jackson still isn’t practicing on the other side of a Week 7 bye. What happens when you push a panic button anyway?
26. Arizona Cardinals (26): They’re the third team ever to lose five consecutive games by no more than four points apiece.
27. Cleveland Browns (29): They’re unbeaten in their new, all-brown “Alpha Dawg” uniforms … and winless otherwise. Pencil the Brownies in for 3-14.
28. Las Vegas Raiders (27): They gave up 31 points and 30 first downs to K.C. on Sunday, when the Silver and Black also ran 30 plays − the fewest in the league this century.
29. New Orleans Saints (28): Congrats to RB Alvin Kamara, the first player in franchise history to surpass 12,000 yards from scrimmage. Moving ahead, how much longer will he be with this franchise …
30. Tennessee Titans (31): Rookie QB Cam Ward now leads the NFL in sacks taken (30), fumbles lost (5) and head coaches played for (2) in 2025.
31. Miami Dolphins (30): A dreadful offense is providing LB Jordyn Brooks the opportunity to lead the league in tackles − he’s already up to 75.
32. New York Jets (32): A team on a seven-game skid has also gone eight straight quarters without a touchdown.
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