2019 NFL season's top 10 storylines told in movie posters
It’s finally here. Games that count. Fantasy lineups to sweat over. Trash talk tailored for rivals.
Rejoice over the start of the 2019 NFL season.
Yahoo Sports decided to identify some of our favorite league storylines heading into this NFL season and created our own movie posters.
Enjoy and be grateful that football is back in our sporting lives.
Tom Brady is the greatest threat to parity the NFL has ever faced. He has won six Super Bowls, more than any other player, and wields his gauntlet over this dominion of reality. The work is done. It always will be. He is inevitable.
Or at least it seems that way. No matter what the rest of the league does, Brady and the Patriots snap them out of the running. But there’s a plan to stop him. Whether it’s a powerful force in Kansas City, or a vanquished foe rising again in Los Angeles, plenty of teams and stars are intent on rallying together and dusting this dynasty for good.
Battles will be waged at different points in time. They’ll put everything they have into this. Most of them are going somewhere they know. That doesn't mean they should know what to expect.
This is the fight of their lives. Whatever it takes.
— Joey Gulino
Jerry Jones never met a star he didn’t want to pay. But what happens when there are too many stars to fit under the salary cap?
Amari Cooper wants to be one of the highest paid receivers in the NFL. Dak Prescott reportedly is angling for as much as $40 million a year. Ezekiel Elliott was so fed up with his contract, he spent most of the preseason in Cabo San Lucas.
It’s not like those are the Cowboys’ only three players. They had a lot of hefty salaries before dealing with their offensive triplets. Making everyone happy while fitting everyone under the cap will be a white-knuckle thriller for Jones and the front office.
— Frank Schwab
The Raiders are intent on doing things backward. Team owner Mark Davis and co. are making a host of regrettable decisions before they arrive in Las Vegas.
In the past two years, the Raiders have committed 10 years and $100 million to a coach who’s stuck in the 90s, traded away a franchise cornerstone and seen what looked like their best move explode into a soap opera of frostbite, helmet drama and confrontations with the general manager.
And they haven’t even arrived in Vegas yet. When they do, their strategy may not result in any sort of tangible success. But it should be an entertaining show worthy of Vegas billboards.
— Jason Owens
Eli Manning is 38, which isn’t old in most professions. It’s ancient in the NFL.
Manning is aging fast, though the Giants resisted replacing him. That changed in April when general manager Dave Gettleman made the controversial decision to draft Duke quarterback Daniel Jones with the sixth overall pick. The move didn’t look bad in August, as Jones dominated in the preseason.
The transition from Manning to Jones will be awkward, but there’s a good chance it happens this season. Manning is a Giants icon and always will be, but time marches on in the NFL. Soon it will be Jones’ time to shine.
— Frank Schwab
The blown pass interference call in the NFC championship game didn’t just unleash upon us the worst Super Bowl matchup in recent memory. It left us all to suffer incessant noise of a jilted franchise and fan base.
The Saints losing out on a Super Bowl bid has led to lawsuits, public protests and accusations of the league “trying to determine the outcome” of a game. It also resulted in a major rule change allowing coaches to challenge pass interference calls and non-calls.
In addition to having the potential to impact the outcome of future games, the new pass interference rule will most assuredly lead to another blight upon the league — more whining.
— Jason Owens
Some teams’ injured reserve lists looked like a horror show, not an uplifting sci-fi flick, by the end of last season: expensive franchise quarterbacks, Hall of Fame caliber defenders, explosive offensive playmakers, all down due to injury.
The injured stars have had an offseason to recover and some hope to be better than ever. Carson Wentz and Cam Newton are healed and ready to lead their teams. Devonta Freeman leads what could be an improved Falcons running game. Cooper Kupp is back to make the Rams’ passing game whole again. Earl Thomas has moved from Seattle to Baltimore, where he should be his usual dominant self.
Football is a violent game, and injuries are inevitable. But thankfully, most of last year’s injured players are returning to starring roles.
— Frank Schwab
Redskins fans subject themselves to pain and disappointment 16 weeks every fall. But at least they have a choice in the matter.
For the players under contract with one of the worst owners in sports, they can’t simply turn off the TV on Sunday afternoon.
Dan Snyder is entering year 21 of his grand experiment to run his boyhood team into the turf. After buying a proud franchise that came equipped with three Lombardi Trophies, Snyder has guided Washington to a grand total of two playoff victories and a 43.5 percent win rate since 1999.
In the process, he has run through numerous front-office and coaching hires to various degrees of failure. Team president Bruce Allen and head coach Jay Gruden are the latest figures unable to lend an air of competence.
Fans are tuning out. And despite what Allen says, Pro Bowl left tackle Trent Williams appears to be following suit.
— Jason Owens
The Chiefs have found themselves a franchise anchor for the next phase, an avenger of heartbreaking history more powerful individually than anyone in this universe.
Mahomes has a laser cannon for an arm that flings footballs further than anyone else in the league. He also seems to be able to bend space to his will, drawing the attention of defenses wherever he goes and shifting his launch vector to impossible angles to make throws.
The reigning NFL MVP pushed Kansas City to the brink of the Super Bowl. We’ll no doubt marvel over the heights he hits and plays he makes next.
— Joey Gulino
What do you get when you cross a cocky All-Pro quarterback with a rookie head coach just four years his senior?
The makings of a power struggle.
When Aaron Rodgers dubbed the practice strategy of head coach Matt LaFleur running live special teams drills in a joint practice with the Houston Texans as not “very smart,” the internet had a field day.
After the internet ran with his comments, Rodgers took the now time-tested defensive steps of blaming the media, calling the coverage of his comments “click bait” and “fake news” despite the fact that he actually said the things that he said.
In the end, it should provide a valuable lesson for Rodgers. After a messy divorce with former coach Mike McCarthy, any criticism he levels toward LaFleur will be of great public interest. The next time he calls out LaFleur, he’ll likely really mean it.
— Jason Owens
A ragtag group of castoffs and miscreants bands together to lift a team from last place to first. It's a decades-old story. The Browns are hoping it's the story of their 2019 season.
Baker Mayfield is the quarterback, an under-recruited former walk-on who refuses to ditch the chip on his shoulder. Odell Beckham Jr. is the receiver, as distracting when he's not playing as dazzling when he is. Freddie Kitchens is the coach, who's never had the top job at any level and is tasked with holding it all together. There are big personalities up and down the locker room. The ups and downs of the NFL will test them.
These are the Cleveland Browns, the losing-est of losers, the ohs of 0-16, the ones who were 1-31. Can they turn things around? Definitely.
Can we expect them to be drama-free? I'm afraid we've got some bad news.
— Joey Gulino
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