The 32 things we learned from Week 8 of the 2018 NFL season:
1. The deadline to trade players is 4 p.m. ET on Tuesday. Hard to say if teams might be especially active or, with so many still viable, it's also quite conceivable a seller's market just won't develop. Heading toward Week 9, 17 of the league's 32 teams are .500 or better, while another five are within a game of .500.
2. Entering Sunday night, Week 8 has so far been devoid of overtime. This is the first season to feature OT in each of the first seven weeks.
3. Speaking of OT, the Browns may be hitting the wall. They've played bonus football in half of their eight games but avoided it in Sunday's 33-18 loss at Pittsburgh. Cleveland's first two losses this year were each by three points. But they're succumbing by an average of 14 points in their current three-game skid, and that's despite a three-point OT defeat in Week 7.
4. Move over, Franco. Move over, Bus. Move over … never mind, Le'Veon, you already made way. After finding the end zone twice against Cleveland, James Conner became the first Pittsburgh player with three consecutive games scoring at least two TDs. Conner now has nine total, two shy of Bell's high-water mark for a season.
5. Despite trailing by double digits for the first time this season, the Rams survived the Packers to improve to 8-0 for the first time 1969.
6. Sunday's matchup between Green Bay's Aaron Rodgers and L.A.'s Jared Goff was the first NFL battle of Cal Bear quarterbacks since … well, if you said Steve Bartkowski vs. Vince Ferragamo in 1983, you win our admiration.
7. The Chiefs failed to score on their opening drive for the first time this season, causing panic in the streets of Kansas City … but only briefly. QB Patrick Mahomes burnished his MVP case with four more TD passes against Denver. He now has a league-high 26 (matching Alex Smith's 2017 total for K.C.), which also happens to be a record for a player's first nine NFL games.
8. Speaking of the MVP, the Rams' Todd Gurley and Aaron Donald could cannibalize the other's case for league honors even if both repeat as offensive and defensive player of the year, respectively. Gurley scored his 15th TD on Sunday but showed what a team guy he is by forgoing a 16th in the final minute, going to the ground rather than scoring so his team could run out the clock. Donald, meanwhile, collected two more sacks — he has 10 in his past five games — and could make a prophet of teammate Aqib Talib, who predicted Donald will finish with 22.
9. We understand it was a frenetic weekend for Los Angeles sports … but couldn't the Coliseum grounds crew have avoided the "USC Rams" look? (Or did former Trojans LB Clay Matthews, who exhorted a heavily pro-Packers crowd Sunday, grease a few palms?)
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