John Elway gave Kyle Orton(notes) his freedom on Tuesday, allowing the Broncos' former franchise quarterback another shot at starting – and, it turns out, paving the way for a return trip to Denver on the final Sunday of the regular season.

Think about that: Elway, the Broncos' executive vice president, released a player who, in theory, could lead the Chiefs past the Broncos in a game with potential AFC West title implications. I know it's not likely, but it could happen, and I can't think of another NFL powerbroker who would have taken the chance.

The Chiefs claimed Orton off waivers Wednesday, beating out two other teams, the Cowboys and Bears, for the right to secure his services for the remainder of the season. Orton's reported destination of choice was Chicago, where he spent the first four seasons of his career before being shipped to Denver in the Jay Cutler(notes) trade.

The Bears (7-3), who just lost Cutler for a reported six to eight weeks to a broken thumb on his passing

He spent Saturday night on the side of the stage at The Fillmore Detroit, getting his groove on to the countrified sounds of Jamey Johnson.

Then Jim Schwartz snuck in a few hours of sleep, made his way to Ford Field on Sunday morning and prepared for perhaps the most hectic and invigorating work week of the 2011 regular season.

That 100-hour odyssey began Sunday for Schwartz, the Lions' third-year coach, with a come-from-behind, 49-35 victory over the Carolina Panthers at Ford Field, and it will culminate Thursday in the same building when Detroit hosts the undefeated and defending Super Bowl champion Green Bay Packers – a Thanksgiving game every Dick and Jane and their respective brothers-in-law will be checking out without complaint.

"You don't have to be around here long to understand that it's an important game – to the history of the NFL, and to the people of Detroit," Schwartz said about 90 minutes after Sunday's victory, having already relocated to his office at the team's

How did Rex Ryan and the New York Jets not see it coming?

Third-and-4 from the New York 20, Broncos trailing by a field goal, 1:06 to go in Thursday night's game at Sports Authority Field at Mile High, Tim Tebow(notes) lined up in the shotgun.

I'm no defensive genius – nor are my sons (ages 12 and 9), for that matter. Yet if all three of us were screaming at the television, "He's gonna slip outside and run!" as Tebow received the snap and processed Ryan's all-out blitz, you'd think someone in a Jets uniform might have been down with the concept of outside contain, no?

Evidently not: Against all reason, against a defense that ended Tom Brady's 2010 season and was built to shut down blatantly one-dimensional offenses, Tebow swept around left end and bulled his way toward the goal line. Duh. Soon, he was Tebowing in the corner of the end zone, and later celebrating a 17-13 victory that pushed his record to 4-1 since supplanting Kyle Orton(notes) as the Denver Broncos' starting

They are left-out lefties with a hefty challenge, a pair of backup quarterbacks thrust into dicey circumstances and charged with making everything right.

In rapid succession on Monday, the Chiefs' Tyler Palko(notes) and Texans' Matt Leinart(notes) went from afterthought to unquestioned starter – likely for the rest of the season. With both teams fighting for playoff berths, and injured starters Matt Cassel(notes) and Matt Schaub(notes) possibly headed for injured reserve, there's a lot riding on those left arms.

These abrupt, potentially season-altering transitions at the sport's most important position are what makes pro football maddening to so many fans, but it's also kind of invigorating.

For Leinart, a former Heisman Trophy winner, first-round draft pick and Cardinals starter, it's a chance to get back in the limelight without having to resort to starring in a reality show. While Schaub is an established, productive starter who has helped push Houston (7-3) into first place in

SAN FRANCISCO – The 49ers' most competitively charged week in nearly nine years began with the coaching staff putting its faith in one Smith's arm and ended with another Smith putting his arm in the way of Eli Manning's(notes) last-minute comeback attempt.

By the time the Niners' work week was complete Sunday afternoon, every player in the home locker room at Candlestick Park had earned the right to flex.

In the biggest test of legitimacy thus far for the NFL's most surprising team of 2011, San Francisco pulled out a 27-20 victory over the New York Giants, moving to within half a game of the undefeated, defending Super Bowl champion Green Bay Packers in the race for home-field advantage in the NFC.

If you'd read that previous sentence in early September as a sneak preview of the future, you'd have assumed it was lifted from The Onion. But here we are in the middle of November and the 49ers (8-1), led by a rookie coach undaunted by the challenge of a lockout and a quarterback who spent

I will spend Sunday in a house of worship, searching for clarity and significance in a charged, chaotic world. The house of worship is a football stadium, and the pressurized, artificially intense universe it contains has the power to reveal the feats and failures of men on a grandiose scale.

It's a potent setting, and the payoff is palpable: Every so often football gives us a defining moment – a bold coaching decision, a collective show of defiance, an inability to overcome one's nerves or emotions.

As the drama plays out, we draw conclusions. We feel as though we know the strengths, weaknesses and personalities of the participants. And we cast them alternately as heroes and villains, resolving most of our arguments by pointing to the scoreboard.

This weekend, however, the notion of football-as-religion should make a lot of us feel very, very squeamish. As we absorb one of the most alarming sports scandals ever, the child-rape allegations at Penn State that led to the abrupt firing of

SAN DIEGO – The Packers were halfway to perfection after Sunday's 45-38 victory over the Chargers, but veteran cornerback Charles Woodson(notes) didn't feel like celebrating. Standing at his stall in the visitors' locker room at Qualcomm Stadium – actually, it was the defense's private locker room, as the Pack's offensive players were clustered in equally cramped quarters a few yards away – Woodson gave his unit a failing midterm grade.

"Yeah, we're 8-0," Woodson said. "Offensively, we're outstanding. Defensively, we're a liability on the team."

Woodson vented for awhile before I brought up a topic I assumed would get him even more riled up: The possibility that the Packers could win out to join the 2007 Patriots as the only 16-0 team in NFL regular-season history. I figured he'd dismiss the possibility as unrealistic, premature or insignificant.

Most NFL players are programmed to think about two things: Winning the next game, and winning a championship. Everything else is just noise.

SAN DIEGO – The challenge was daunting: Defeat the best team in football, a green-and-gold-clad crew of talented, undefeated, still-hungry champions led by a nearly unstoppable quarterback.

Not unpredictably, Philip Rivers(notes) failed.

Despite a valiant effort that included 385 passing yards and a near-comeback from a 21-point deficit with 10:27 remaining, the San Diego Chargers' struggling, overburdened quarterback face-planted near the finish line: With 33 seconds remaining in Sunday's 45-38 defeat to the Green Bay Packers at Qualcomm Stadium, Rivers dropped back and lofted a downfield duck that settled into the hands of a defender, an unnerving sensation he has experienced with greater frequency than any NFL passer in 2011.

After serving up a career-high three picks on Sunday, two of which were returned for first-quarter touchdowns, Rivers has thrown 14 interceptions – three more than any other NFL quarterback, and one more than he had in all of 2010. In fact, in five previous