The First Read: Five burning questions off Week 2; plus, risers/sliders & Week 3's most intriguing game

In The First Read, Jeffri Chadiha provides a snapshot of the hottest stories and trends heading into Week 3 of the 2023 NFL season, including:

But first, a look at five burning questions after Sunday's games ...

A lot of people will tell you that the first week of the NFL season is the perfect time for overreactions. If you follow this league long enough, you will learn that Week 2 offers ample opportunity for exactly the same thing. Some teams that impressed in their openers come back to earth. A select few that disappointed show significant signs of improvement. And then there is the group we're largely going to focus on today -- the ones that flounder out of the gate for two straight weeks and leave us all wondering about their respective destinies.

We'll start with the simple cliché that is often uttered at this time of year: There's a lot of football left to be played. We'll then pivot to the reality that comes with slow starts: They usually kill dreams fast. The real trick is assessing who deserves the benefit of the doubt when two weeks have passed without much success, and who needs to begin preparing for four months of misery. That will be the theme of The First Read coming out of the weekend: Which teams should be panicking and which ones just need a little more patience?

More specifically, we're exploring interesting questions that are fairly tough to answer at the moment. Here's what has caught the eye of this particular writer, with my verdict on whether it's time to freak out or maintain calm.

1) Can Sean Payton really turn around the Denver Broncos? Payton showed up in Denver with all the requisite credentials to excite a fan base that witnessed a train wreck under former head coach Nathaniel Hackett in