Two NFL stories, one about a venue and one about a quarterback, and both land on the same question: what does a team do when the convenient answer and the honest one point different directions?
Start in Paris. The NFL says the Week 7 meeting between the Pittsburgh Steelers and New Orleans Saints will be played Oct. 25 as scheduled, civil unrest and protests in France notwithstanding. That is the right call, and it is also the only call the league could make. The international series is the NFL's growth engine, and a fixture that has been sold and marketed for months doesn't get moved because the host country is restless. My read: the Steelers and Saints play this game unless French authorities decide it for them. A change in the security assessment is what would prove me wrong, not a change of heart at league headquarters.
The cost falls on Pittsburgh and New Orleans in ways that won't show up in a box score. Both clubs are being asked to treat an international trip as routine business while the ground under it is not routine at all. Preparation, sleep, security, family logistics. That is a competitive-conditions question the league has effectively answered by not addressing it. New Orleans has the most to lose from a disrupted week, because a team that needs rhythm to function is the worst candidate for a week that has none. The Steelers, built to grind, at least travel with a style that tolerates chaos. I'd rather be Pittsburgh in that environment than the Saints.
Then there's Josh Allen, who enters Week 6 leading the league in rushing touchdowns. He is also tied for 16th in passing touchdowns, with seven.
Everybody is going to read the first number as a compliment. It is closer to a diagnosis. When a quarterback leads the league in touchdowns on the ground, it usually means the offense is finishing drives with his legs because it isn't finishing them with his arm. Allen is the Bills' short-yardage and red-zone answer, and every one of those touchdowns is a car crash he volunteers for. Buffalo will take the points. The bill for them comes later, in the portion of the season where the games get colder and the hits accumulate.
I expect the passing touchdown number to climb and the rushing touchdown lead to shrink, because defenses will dare the Bills to throw it in close and coordinators will stop asking Allen to solve short-yardage with his body. If that correction doesn't happen, Buffalo is running an offense that treats its most valuable asset as a battering ram, and that story has an ending nobody in Western New York wants to read.
Put the two items together and you see how the NFL operates. Commitments get made early on the calendar and defended on the back end, whether the commitment is a game in Paris or a quarterback run on third and goal. The league and its clubs are consistent that way, and consistency is not the same as wisdom.
My verdict: the Steelers and Saints play in Paris, and Allen does not finish the season leading the league in rushing touchdowns. The NFL keeps its calendar. It loses the stat.