Week One Gave Us Everything. All at Once. We Are Not Okay.

Let's just say it right up front: week one of the 2026 NFL season was a lot. Huge performances. Crazy finishes. Comeback wins. Records broken. A few surprises nobody saw coming. And unfortunately, some injuries that landed like a gut punch before the season even got rolling.

Oh, and all three of our teams went 1 and 0. So we are choosing to start there and hold onto that energy as long as possible.

Welcome back, girlfriends. Let's get into it.

The Bills Did What They Needed to Do

Beth started us off with the Buffalo Bills and there was a lot of emotion in that recap. Good emotion, mostly.

The Bills went into Houston and pulled off a 36-31 win over the Texans in a game that had everyone in Beth's house checking on her at regular intervals. Josh Allen had two rushing touchdowns, passed for 334 yards, and delivered the game-winning touchdown to Palmer with under two minutes left. Beth may or may not have been horizontal on the floor at some point during that drive.

Here is the stat that blew everyone's minds: Josh Allen now has 81 career rushing touchdowns, which ties him for 20th among all NFL players. Not all quarterbacks. All players. Most of the people above him are running backs who played twelve to fifteen years to get those numbers. Allen is nine years in. We can all just sit with that for a moment.

DJ Moore was fantastic. Dalton Kincaid is back after rehabbing a PCL injury most of last season and showed up immediately. The "everybody eats" philosophy the Bills committed to after trading away Stefon Diggs is actually coming to fruition now because they genuinely have enough weapons to scare opposing defenses.

The one asterisk: Buffalo only controlled the ball for 23 minutes. They still scored a ridiculous number of points while doing that, but the defense has some work to do. We are noting it. We are not spiraling about it. Yet.

The Lions Win in Overtime. Laura's Nervous System Has Not Recovered.

Laura's Detroit Lions played the New Orleans Saints. In overtime. Against a rookie quarterback nobody had really heard of.

Tyler Shough, drafted by the Saints in the second round this past April, previously played at Oregon, Texas Tech, and Louisville. Laura had not recalled his name before Sunday. She will not be forgetting it anytime soon. He threw for 410 yards and made the Lions look genuinely uncomfortable in ways nobody expected from a guy making his NFL debut.

The Lions did win. In overtime. With a 1-0 record. Laura is choosing to focus on that.

She also introduced the group to the concept of a scoragami, which is when a final score in an NFL game is so statistically rare that it has never or almost never occurred before. The Bears-Panthers game ended 59-37, which qualifies. There were actually two scoragamis in week one, which tells you everything you need to know about how unpredictable this opening weekend was.

Dezi was watching both the Bills and Lions games simultaneously and described it as praying for her friends while also being very grateful the 49ers played on Thursday and she could watch Sunday's chaos from a slightly calmer place.

The 49ers Won in Australia and Dezi Was on the Internet Immediately

George Kittle came off the injury report. Christian McCaffrey came off the injury report. Mike Evans came off the injury report. The 49ers went to Melbourne and played Myles Garrett's Los Angeles Rams at the Melbourne Cricket Ground on Thursday night on Netflix.

They won.

Dezi was wearing her Kittle jersey. She was fully at peace. She enjoyed her night.

As for Myles Garrett and the rest of the Rams, we will get to that in the injury section. And it is not great news.

Sports and Medicine: The Week One Injury Report

This is where the episode got heavy, because week one was brutal in this department.

Kyler Murray, Minnesota Vikings

If you watched the Vikings-Packers game on Sunday, you saw the hit. Kyler Murray was scrambling at full speed, which he absolutely can do, and took a shot from two defenders near his shoulder, neck, and head area. His helmet started coming off on impact. As he fell, his hands curled and his right leg went into what is called a fencing posture.

Beth walked us through exactly what happened clinically. The stretch of the brainstem through the base of the skull can cause that fencing posture, where a limb extends involuntarily. It looks terrifying on camera. What she wanted viewers to know is that this kind of posturing, while visually scary, does not necessarily indicate a more severe concussion than a hit that looks less dramatic. The scary appearance is not always the full story.

That said: Kyler Murray was out for a significant period before walking off under his own power. He was ruled out with a concussion. And Dezi was clear that she would like to see him out for at least a month.

Beth took it further. She feels strongly that when a player exhibits neurological symptoms of this severity, there should be an automatic mandatory minimum time out of the game, not just a five-step protocol that a team can hustle a player through under pressure to return. The data from last week's brain health discussion is still fresh: neurodegenerative disease mortality among NFL players runs nearly four times higher than the general population. That context matters every time we watch a hit like this one.

A viewer named Rob made the comment in the live chat that if a player delivers an illegal hit and knocks someone out, the offending player should be out for the same amount of time. Everyone on the panel thought that was a genuinely interesting proposal worth discussing.

Carson Wentz stepped in for Murray and led Minnesota to a 39-22 win over the Packers. Terry Bradshaw, incidentally, had predicted before the game that the Vikings were underrated and Wentz should be their guy. Dezi had said something similar before the game.

De'Zhaun Stribling, San Francisco 49ers

This one hit Dezi particularly hard. Stribling had been turning heads all through training camp and was expected to add meaningful depth to the 49ers receiver room. In Australia, he came off the field with an ankle injury, was checked and sent back in, and then couldn't bear weight on it at all. Non-contact. Everyone held their breath.

Dezi pulled up an anatomy diagram and walked us through the deltoid ligament, which is a thick band of tissue on the inside of the ankle that does not get injured commonly. To sprain it, you have to roll the ankle in the opposite direction of a typical sprain, a motion called pronation combined with an inward twist of the forefoot.

The diagnosis was a deltoid ankle sprain. Surgery has already happened. The expected timeline is at least a month, with the possibility it could be longer depending on what they found when they went in.

Dezi had actually called this in a Twitter space before the official announcement. She felt the team was not telling the full story, and she was right that a simple deltoid sprain would not typically require immediate surgery. Beth noted that this type of injury often comes with a fibula fracture, which would explain the more serious treatment path.

We wish Stribling a full and complete recovery. He deserved a healthy first season.

Myles Garrett, Los Angeles Rams

The Rams made a massive investment in Myles Garrett this offseason and watched him go on injured reserve for knee surgery in week one. He will miss at least four games.

Beth offered some reassurance here. Garrett had been dealing with swelling and issues in his knee for several weeks leading into the season. This was not a single traumatic impact injury. What they are likely going in to clean up is debridement, possibly some cartilage issues or small loose bodies in the joint. Not an ACL. Not an MCL. Smaller things.

And Myles Garrett is, as Beth put it while looking at a training photo, extremely strong. His recovery timeline should be on the faster end of what is typical for this kind of procedure.

Beth also admitted she was privately hoping he would miss week four specifically, when the Bills play the Rams. She said this out loud on a podcast. She owns it completely.

Rate the Fit: Week One Arrivals

Every week we ask the internet to vote on the best pregame arrival fits. Week one delivered.

The conversation started with Debo Samuel, who showed up in a camel collared suit with shades and a pocket square. Our community member and resident DJ Terrerdome tagged Dezi on Twitter immediately and called the anthem: Sade, Smooth Operator. The vibe was earned. The pocket square was essential.

But the winner chosen by the fans? Cason Thibodeau, linebacker for the New York Giants, who arrived in a full Giants blue suit, black shoes, white crisp shirt, beautiful tie, shades, jewelry, and a black bag that Laura described as giving old-timey doctor vibes. It was a flawless look. There was unanimous agreement among the girlfriends. The fans agreed too.

The Giants surprised everyone with a week one win. Apparently their players also surprised everyone with their fits. Week one was full of pleasant shocks.

Game of the Week: Bills vs Lions

Beth and Laura are heavily invested in Thursday night's game and the entire live audience could feel that energy. Dezi is rooting for everyone to have fun and not get hurt, which is very diplomatic of her.

Bills vs Lions in week two. Both teams came out of week one with wins. Both teams have questions on defense. Both teams have explosive offensive weapons. And as our fantasy football analyst Gina Noble pointed out, DJ Moore of the Bills had one of the most favorable matchups of the week against a Lions secondary that just allowed Tyler Shough to throw for 410 yards.

Laura's response to Gina pointing out that Jahmyr Gibbs was a great fantasy start this week: she does not play fantasy football for exactly this reason. Cheering for Gibbs points while not wanting the Lions to lose is not something her nervous system can handle.

The Great Debate: Are We Overreacting After Week One?

This was our inaugural Great Debate segment, where we take the biggest overreaction coming out of the weekend, make the cases, and let the Sunday Squad decide.

Three statements. Three hot takes. Here is where the girlfriends landed.

"The Chicago Bears are legitimate Super Bowl contenders."

Dezi voted yes. 59 points is 59 points. The defense still has to prove itself, but the offense looked like something special. Laura dislikes the Bears but they have a lot of pieces in place, including Ben Johsnon. Beth took the measured approach: real contenders in the NFC, but there are too many strong teams to crown anyone in week one. The consensus was something like: yes, they deserve to be in the conversation, but let's see a few more weeks.

"The Baltimore Ravens are the best team in the AFC.

Zay Flowers has a hamstring injury. Lamar Jackson is Lamar Jackson regardless. The Ravens went into Indianapolis and handled business. Dezi made the case that until the Bills prove they can beat a top-tier team in a big spot, Baltimore has the edge. Beth, understandably, is not ready to concede the AFC to anyone. Laura doesn’t believe it at all.

"It's only week one, but Cowboys fans should already be worried."

Jackson Dart and the Giants put 28 points on Dallas. The Cowboys have had years of "this is our year" energy with results that have not matched. Dezi did not think Cowboys fans should worry so much as expect the pattern to continue. Laura felt the ownership is the core problem and until that changes, the results will not change either. A live chat viewer named Technic put it simply: Cowboys fans should always be worried, but they are never worried. Why is it their year, every year?

Nobody had a good answer. It just keeps happening.

Petty Betty and the Neighbor Cookies

The episode ended with a look at Beth's baking, and it was a moment of pure joy.

New neighbors moved in down the street over the summer. They then put up a Kansas City Chiefs flag. Beth, who described her mindset as "petty slash welcoming neighbor," spent far more hours than she probably should have decorating Buffalo Bills-themed cutout cookies and assembled a care package to welcome them to the street. She delivered it before the Chiefs game on Sunday.

They have not received anything back yet. We are waiting.

Laura’s immediately went online to find Detroit Lions cookie cutters after hearing about this. Etsy was recommended. She confirmed they exist. She has made no commitments but we know what is coming.

Beth's official nickname from this segment forward: Petty Betty.

One Week In. Here We Go.

If week one was any indication of what this season has in store, we are going to have a lot to talk about every single Wednesday night. The highs were very high. The injuries were a sobering reminder of what the sport costs. The Bears scored 59 points. Petty Betty baked cookies.

Football is back. We are so glad to be doing this with you.

Watch or Listen to the Full Episode

Catch the full Week One Recap on YouTube or listen on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Search Girlfriends + Football wherever you get your podcasts. Links are at the top of the page.

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