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Five NFL games we can’t wait to watch in the 2025 season<\/p>\n
The NFL schedule for the 2025-2026 season has been released. Here are a few games on our must-watch list.<\/p>\n
Brock Purdy\u2019s relevance hasn\u2019t been in question for some time now. But after finally and deservedly joining the ranks of the NFL\u2019s top-compensated quarterbacks<\/a> Friday, it\u2019s time for the former \u201cMr. Irrelevant\u201d to evolve into Mr. Eminent \u2013 who may or may not be a distant relative of Mr. Unlimited<\/a>. (Sorry, onward.)<\/p>\n For the past three seasons, the San Francisco 49ers<\/a> have had a roster full of Tiffany players surrounding a Costco quarterback, which is not shade aimed at Purdy \u2013 if you\u2019ve ever found a high-quality bargain at the wholesale warehouse, then you know. But even once the newly extension-eligible Purdy landed his long-awaited, five-year, $265 million ($181 million guaranteed) windfall, it was already fully apparent that the 2025 Niners were going to be far less accessorized.<\/p>\n The NFL is something of a zero-sum game by design \u2013 hence the parity that keeps things interesting on one level or another for all 32 of its fan bases. With a bag paying out an average of $53 million annually, Purdy, 25, now finds himself tied with the Detroit Lions<\/a>\u2019 Jared Goff, from that financial benchmark’s perspective, for seventh place on the league\u2019s salary scale. And that feels about right for a guy who\u2019s reached two NFC championship games, one Super Bowl and earned a Pro Bowl nod while crafting a gaudy a 104.9 passer rating over the course of 40 NFL games. Sure, it\u2019s ridiculous he\u2019s averaging more money than Patrick Mahomes and Lamar Jackson \u2013 but it\u2019s equally outrageous that Tua Tagovailoa and Trevor Lawrence remain ahead of Purdy on the QB check-cashing order.<\/p>\n To say Purdy needs to now start earning his dough would be bogus considering the final pick of the 2022 NFL draft has banked about $2.6 million \u2013 total \u2013 during his first three seasons as a professional, a figure many of the NIL-enriched QB1s from the Power Four college football conferences would sneer at. Still, after years of thriving with passers who didn\u2019t command top dollar \u2013 Jimmy Garoppolo also led San Francisco to the Super Bowl \u2013 Purdy does need to affirm that GM John Lynch and coach Kyle Shanahan were right to fully invest in a player basically no one wanted coming out of Iowa State.<\/p>\n Purdy inherited a Lamborghini midway through the 2022 campaign, when the 49ers had initially given the keys to Trey Lance \u2013 he cost far more in terms of asset expenditure than the No. 3 pick of the 2021 draft \u2013 before he and, then, Garoppolo were injured. Purdy won all seven of his starts as a rookie before his throwing elbow disintegrated during the NFC championship game in Philadelphia. But he recovered from his subsequent surgery quickly and sufficiently enough to get the team all the way to overtime of Super Bowl 59 a year later \u2026 before the Niners guessed wrong on the coin toss<\/a> and ultimately bowed the knee to Mahomes and the Kansas City Chiefs.<\/p>\n But Lamborghinis are high-maintenance vehicles, and the battered Niners spent most of 2024 in the shop. They\u2019ve since been stripped of Pro Bowl-caliber parts like Deebo Samuel<\/a>, Charvarius Ward, Talanoa Hufanga, Dre Greenlaw, Javon Hargrave, Aaron Banks and Leonard Floyd \u2013 in part to reset an aging roster, but also to recalibrate their finances in order to slot Purdy’s new money into their cap structure. Now the question is whether the Lambo has become a Jetta.<\/p>\n “We knew that we had to make sacrifices around the roster to make sure that you can pay a quarterback,” team owner Jed York told NFL Network last month.<\/p>\n All-universe back Christian McCaffrey barely played in 2024, dogged by injuries. Purdy\u2019s favorite receiver, Brandon Aiyuk, barely played in 2024, dogged by injuries. Pass rusher Nick Bosa appeared mortal on a talent-drained defense. Left tackle Trent Williams, soon to be 37, remains prone to injuries and barely played half the season, leaving Purdy’s blind side too often exposed.<\/p>\n And Purdy \u2013 the man now scheduled to pull down a quarter of a bil \u2013 suffered through his worst season, throwing a pedestrian 20 touchdown passes while posting a career-worst 12 interceptions as his 96.1 passer rating dipped to 13th in the league. It all added up to a campaign when San Francisco plummeted from NFC champs to a 6-11 outfit.<\/p>\n Purdy pressed too often and was clearly and understandably hindered by his diminished supporting cast in 2024. But his new payday is now going to make that a fact of life. Purdy\u2019s most strident critics \u2013 and there are plenty \u2013 will also rewind to the Super Bowl loss to the Chiefs and the missed throws and reads that arguably precluded the 49ers from capturing a record-tying sixth Lombardi Trophy. Unlike truly elite passers such as Mahomes, Josh Allen or Joe Burrow, maybe Purdy hasn\u2019t yet definitively proven he\u2019s a bona fide truck and not just a fancy trailer.<\/p>\n Yet it’s worth noting his coach would vehemently disagree.<\/p>\n “Brock is the leader of our team,” Shanahan said at the end of the largely disastrous 2024 season. “I’ve loved these three years with Brock. I plan on being with Brock here the whole time I’m here.<\/p>\n \u201cHe’s a guy I\u2019ve got a lot of confidence in just as a human, but it starts with what he’s done in the field these last two and a half years and capable of winning a Super Bowl with him. We just almost did. And I know he is capable of getting the Niners a Super Bowl in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n Maybe Purdy gets nitpicked by the rest of the world because he\u2019ll always be a seventh-rounder. Maybe his unremarkable size and outwardly apparent physical skills limit his shine. Or perhaps it\u2019s a perception that Shanahan is such a brilliant offensive mind, that you or I could take the snaps in Silicon Valley and get this team into the playoffs (speaking for myself, patently untrue). And, heck, he\u2019s still just barely cracked the top quartile of the league-wide QB1 salary scale.<\/p>\n But it is time for Purdy to show he can propel this franchise \u2013 one that hasn\u2019t won a championship 30 years. He needs to be a leader on a squad breaking in quite a few green players. He\u2019s now the youngest, richest quarterback in what could be the league\u2019s toughest division top to bottom \u2013 and it\u2019s just as easy to foresee the 49ers finishing in fourth place as first. However coming off a last-place finish did help arm them with the league\u2019s easiest schedule in 2025<\/a> \u2013 based on their opponents\u2019 2024 winning percentage anyway.<\/p>\n They are certainly relieved to have their main arm locked up, too.<\/p>\n In just three seasons, Brock Purdy has:<\/p>\n \ud83d\udcb0 9,518 passing yards EARNED every penny of that $265M extension \ud83e\udd11 pic.twitter.com\/pkn1fvfoag<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 NFL (@NFL) May 16, 2025<\/a><\/p>\n “I’ve been in situations where you have a great roster and the quarterback isn’t set, and it’s hard to have sustained success,” York said. “We want to make sure that Brock is a long-term partner. We want to make sure that he’s a part of our team for a long time.<\/p>\n “(I)t’s like, ‘Alright, he’s our guy.’ And if he’s our guy, you have to know that and make those decisions, and that’s where we are right now.”<\/p>\n Now it\u2019s up to Purdy to prove that he\u2019s more than another Jeff Garcia or Alex Smith or Colin Kaepernick and that his new contract isn\u2019t pyrite \u2013 but a means to finally get the 49ers back into the Super Bowl goldmine they used to raid with regularity.<\/p>\n All NFL news on and off the field.\u00a0Sign up<\/a>\u00a0for USA TODAY’s 4th and Monday newsletter.<\/p>\n
\ud83d\udcb0 64 passing TDs
\ud83d\udcb0 4 Playoff Wins
\ud83d\udcb0 NFC Championship
\ud83d\udcb0 Pro Bowl<\/p>\n