The 10 most impressive and impactful individual performances from around the NFL in Week 9.
Jordan Love and Joe Burrow augmented their mounting MVP cases last weekend, reigning NFL Defensive Player of the Year Myles Garrett made up for lost time in his return from injury and rookie linebacker Arvell Reese showed why the New York Giants got a steal in the draft.
Those were just a few of the superlative performances that defined Week 9 in the NFL season.
Ranking The Best Performances In Week 9 Of The NFL Season
With a few days to digest the box scores and crunch the game film, and before Week 10 kicks off Thursday night, it’s time to formally present the 10 Game Balls from last week for the most impressive individual performances, ranked in order.
1. Green Bay Packers QB Jordan Love
How impressive was Jordan Love’s performance in Green Bay’s 45-27 win in New England last Sunday? We made the case — a quite compelling one — that the Packers quarterback is the mid-season MVP.
Despite a faulty running game and unreliable offensive line, Love is playing the best football of his career and as well as anyone in the league right now in leading the Packers to five wins in their last six games.
And he was at his best in Week 9, completing 23 of 29 passes for 372 yards, 3 TDs and 0 INTs while adding a rushing TD as well.
Love torched Patriots star cornerback Christian Gonzalez all game and in general painted the field with one big completion after another in a dominant performance.
Overall, he’s up to 2,618 passing yards, 19 TDs and 6 INTs with 2 rushing TDs.
2. Green Bay Packers WRs Christian Watson and Matthew Golden
How impressive was that Packers’ win over the Patriots in Foxborough?
We’ve never dedicated the top two spots on the Game Balls list to teammates — let alone three players from the same offense.
But Love deserved his own spotlight and Christian Watson and Matthew Golden were each too impactful in their own respective ways to not be on the list.
Watson had 7 catches for a career-high 171 yards and a TD, including receptions of 28, 33, 39 (the TD) and 43 yards with a number of those big gains coming against Gonzalez, the Patriots’ star CB who had no answers against this Packers duo.
Golden had 10 catches for a career-high 164 yards and a TD, including catches for 43 and 49 yards, while doing almost all of that work in the first half.
The duo has combined for eight 100-yard games so far this season, while Watson has three games of over 140 yards.
Watson is third in the league with 879 receiving yards and tied for second with 7 TDs while his 17.9 yards per reception is the most of any player with at least 15 catches. Golden is having a breakout season in his second year with a 53-783-5 line, ranking fourth in the NFL in receiving yards.
It’s fair to say they’ve become the league’s top pass-catching duo in 2026.
3. New York Giants LB Arvell Reese
It seemed fair to say in the moment that the Giants were gifted a draft steal back in the spring when linebacker Arvell Reese fell to them with the No. 5 pick — after the Cardinals misguidedly took RB Jeremiyah Love at No. 3 and the Tennessee Titans took WR Carnell Tate at No. 4.
That seems even more incontrovertible now that the first-place Giants are one of the great surprises in the league this season with Reese playing a starring role in the center of that New York defense.
The leading NFL Defensive Rookie of the Year candidate played his best game of the season Sunday in the Giants’ 19-11 road win over the Eagles, delivering a game-high 12 tackles with 3 sacks and a forced fumble.
He was named NFC Defensive Player of the Week.
Overall, Reese leads the Giants with 68 tackles, 8.5 tackles for loss, 4.5 sacks along with an interception and that forced fumble.
4. Cincinnati Bengals QB Joe Burrow and WR Ja’Marr Chase
While we’re giving the midseason MVP to Love, many have Joe Burrow as the favorite, and understandably so.
Burrow led the Bengals to one-sided 34-17 win over the Falcons over in Madrid, Spain, completing 24 of 29 passes for 271 yards, 3 TDs and 0 INTs, plus a rushing TD.
Burrow has to share this Game Ball, though, because Ja’Marr Chase was every bit as sensational with 10 catches on 12 targets for 155 yards and a score.
Burrow leads the NFL with 298.3 passing yards per game (2,386 yards) and 23 TDs with 6 INTs, putting him on pace for the best season of his career (with his 2024 line of 4,918 yards, 43 TDs and 9 INTs being his top mark so far).
5. Dallas Cowboys WR CeeDee Lamb
The Cowboys remain highly underwhelming and barely beat the decimated Colts, 27-23, on Sunday, but thankfully they had the best player on the field with wide receiver CeeDee Lamb.
Lamb had 10 catches for 195 yards and a TD for his third game this season with at least 150 yards.
Lamb is having a tremendous season with 70 catches (third in the NFL) for 904 yards (second) and 7 TDs.
6. Houston Texans QB C.J. Stroud
C.J. Stroud is answering a lot of doubters this season and had one of his best performances Sunday with 384 yards passing, 5 TDs and an INT (plus 20 rushing yards) in a 44-22 road win over the Chargers.
The Texans are hanging on to the fringe of the playoff picture at 3-5 while waiting for their defense to return to the form it showed last season, but Stroud is doing his part.
Overall, he’s passed for 2,251 yards, 16 TDs and 2 INTs.
They aren’t sharing top billing here, but Texans WRs Kayshon Boutte (4 catches for 125 yards and 2 TDs) and Tank Dell (4-105-1) deserve mention.
7. Los Angeles Rams WR Puka Nacua
The bad news is that Puka Nacua sustained a strained MCL, PCL and turf toe at the very end of the Rams’ 20-13 road win over the Commanders.
Before that, he had piled up 14 catches for 150 yards and a TD plus 20 rushing yards.
Nacua is set to miss “a significant period of time” but will avoid injured reserve for now.
It’s a major blow to the Rams as Nacua has been elite once again this season with 70 catches for 715 yards and 4 TDs plus 41 yards and a rushing TD in seven games.
8. Kansas City Chiefs RB Kenneth Walker III
After two quiet games, Kenneth Walker III returned to his prodigious early-season pace while rushing 18 times for 102 yards and a TD and catching 4 passes for 41 yards and 2 TDs in a 35-12 win over the Jets.
It was Walker’s fifth multi-touchdown performance in eight games with the Chiefs, as he’s up to 872 yards and 7 TDs on 5.5 YPC along with 172 receiving yards and 4 scores. His 109 rushing yards per game leads the NFL.
9. Los Angeles Rams EDGE Myles Garrett
After being sidelined since Week 1 while undergoing arthroscopic knee surgery, Myles Garrett returned to action in Week 9 and notched 3 sacks and a forced fumble in 35 snaps in the Rams’ win over the Commanders.
The reigning NFL Defensive Player of the Year was acquired in the offseason from the Browns with the expectation he’d be a game-changing force for the Rams’ defense in their Super Bowl quest, and Sunday was a reminder the impact he can make at any time.
10. Green Bay Packers S Xavier McKinney
In addition to Love, Watson and Golden torching the New England secondary, the Packers gave Patriots’ QB Drake Maye an equally rough time in that 45-27 win while intercepting him three times.
Safety Xavier McKinney had two of those picks along with 4 tackles.
He set the tone with an interception on the second play of the game, returning it 36 yards to the New England 14 to set up a quick touchdown drive for the Packers. His second interception came late in the second quarter with the Patriots in Green Bay territory and the game still separated by 10 points.
Honorable Mentions
Cleveland Browns LB Carson Schwesinger: It came in a losing effort as the Browns fell 23-22 to the Saints, but Schwesinger was everywhere for Cleveland with 15 tackles, 2 sacks and a forced fumble.
Atlanta Falcons RB Bijan Robinson: It came in a loss, but Robinson was typically productive vs. the Bengals with 19 carries for 100 yards and a TD and 6 catches for 47 yards.
Kansas City Chiefs DT Chris Jones: Jones was named AFC Defensive Player of the Week after racking up 5 pressures, 2 sacks and a batted pass in the Chiefs’ lopsided win over the Jets.
Chicago Bears DB Jaylon Johnson: The Bears got up big early on the Buccaneers before the momentum flipped on a day when QB Caleb Williams threw 3 interceptions, but Johnson delivered one of the biggest plays of the game with a 67-yard interception return for touchdown late in the third quarter to make the score 24-13 on the way to Chicago’s 27-24 win.
Dallas Cowboys QB Dak Prescott/RB Javonte Williams: Prescott threw for 335 yards, 2 TDs and 0 INTs in the Cowboys’ narrow win over the Colts, while Williams rushed for 101 yards and a TD and added 23 receiving yards. It was just his second 100-yard game of the season.
