The Thursday of Week 14 is already a stressful enough day for the Philadelphia Eagles—the surging Dallas Cowboys are playing—without these crushing injury reports to worry over.
Meanwhile, things are looking way up in Los Angeles for the Chargers, Philly’s Monday Night Football opponent this week.
Not only will the Eagles surprisingly be without one of their best defensive players, Jalen Carter. But the Chargers' own QB, Justin Herbert—who just had surgery on December 1—is looking on track to play.
At the start of the week, the Eagles were big favorites to win in L.A. Then came reports that Jalen Carter is getting surgery on both of his shoulders to fix an ongoing issue this season. That puts him out of commission for about a month. Different kind of surgery, clearly.
However, Herbert got his second “optimistic to play” tag from the Chargers coaching staff in as many days. This time the seal approval came from offensive coordinator Greg Roman, who said, "for this game in particular, we're really optimistic Justin is going to play," per Daniel Popper.
Both coaches repeating the same word could lead to some conspiracies. But it really seems like Herbert is coming along nicely. He's already back throwing on the field.
Justin Herbert is back at practice and throwing pic.twitter.com/K2L5gsTJQS
— Daniel Popper (@danielrpopper) December 4, 2025
The surgery was on his non-throwing hand, after all. And if 42-year-old Aaron Rodgers can do it, why can’t 27-year-old Herbert?
Jalen Carter out, Justin Herbert in means Chargers could shake up both AFC and NFC playoff pictures
With Carter out and Herbert likely in, the Chargers could very well pull off an upset as home underdogs this week. Not an uncommon occurrence, but something that would create a much more interesting run-in for both the AFC West and the NFC East.
If the Dallas Cowboys (6-5-1) win on TNF to open the week and the Eagles (8-4) lose on MNF to close it, that would put Dallas a mere half-game behind Philly for a division crown that seemed won back in October.
At that point, the Cowboys would have won four straight. The Birds would have lost three on the trot. That would put both teams on clearly opposing trajectories. It’s almost a shot-for-shot remake of what happened in this division to finish the 2023 season.
Meanwhile, in the AFC West, the Chargers would push themselves to 9-4 against everyone’s expectations. Even if the 10-2 Denver Broncos win to go 11-2, the Chargers would remain just two games down on Denver.
That means any other slip up from the Broncos could result in a winner-take-all matchup between the two AFC West favorites in Week 18. The Chargers won the Week 3 matchup, giving them the chance to earn a meaningful sweep in 2025.