NFL Power Rankings Week 8 Patriots retake No. 1 Pack back

Wiki Article

NFL Power Rankings, Week 8: Patriots retake No. 1; Pack back? Published: Oct 25, 2016 at 01:12 AM Elliot Harrison The Week 8 Power Rankings are in ... but not without a hot sports opinion fresh out of the oven. How people could consider between the and bad football vexes me. I get it: Your fantasy running back didn't score. What we saw was a clash between two inspired defenses hell-bent on not letting the other win the game, a contest played with unwavering intensity. It was emblematic of the very fabric the sport was built on. Many of the penalties were personal fouls, pulling guys off the pile ... or holding because the pa s rushers were playing out of their minds. NOT SLOPPY FOOTBALL. Gue s how many turnovers there were? None. Now, tell me that's sloppy football. Now, on to some of your hot takes ... It's not my fault! the Freddie Hamilton Kids Jersey moving up about 4 spots this week in the power rankings Vin (@VinnieManenti) Now that Vin is for the Dodgers, evidently he's replaced Dodger blue for the Honolulu blue. Is it po sible that the won the bye week and move into the #2 spot... Jason Ignaczewski (@OvrTheEdge) Won the bye week, huh? That's a new one, man. But I like it. Don't you worry, though: The didn't climb up there, either. For the full rundown, see below. Curious where fans think their team should be. All of your thoughts are welcome ... is the place. Let the di sension commence! The lineup below reflects changes from . It wasn't the cakewalk the pundits (though ) predicted, but it was for the , who are 3-0 since returned from suspension. That's why they are ahead of the and . New England continues to impre s on offense, even if all the numbers didn't jump off the page Sunday. The key figure: 7 of 12 on third-down conversions (58 percent). Also worth mentioning are the second-half adjustments from Bill Belichick and staff. The vaunted tight ends were barely involved in the first half at Heinz. Gronk rocked the place in the second half, cruising down the seam for a in the third quarter, and a 37-yard catch-and-run in the fourth. . The curse of the top spot continues. For the fourth time in the last five weeks, our No. 1 team fell. (Yes, fans, it happened to your team, too.) This might've occurred last week had the not been on a bye. The bottom line comes down to age-old football logic: turn the football over four times, and it doesn't matter how good your team is. gave his former squad the last laugh ... in the form of three giveaways. Next up: . It was an off week for Dallas, a time when decided to rather than get into what a suddenly famous quarterback could get into. One not-so-well-known factoid to come out of the bye week: Dallas entered Week 7 leading the NFL with 17 drives of 10 plays or more while only allowing nine, a figure that is in the bottom half of the league. That speaks to a rested, effective defense, don't you think? All those people on Twitter who complained that was an awful football game need to rea se s what the sport is all about. What I saw was a defense that that game badly. On a night the offense couldn't move the football, Pete Carroll's defense and special teams did everything in their power to produce a scoring opportunity. Now if the general fantasy fan wants to hate on something, how about hating on coaches always playing for the field goal? Thought Seattle should've kept moving for a touchdown. The offense hadn't turned over the football all night. Carroll shouldn't have worried they were about to start almost 75 minutes in. for the on Monday night, with a blueprint I'm sure Gary Kubiak would love to replicate going forward: The defense held the to nine points, eclipsed 100 yards rushing and only was asked to make plays in spots. That said, it's just not fair for broadcasters to keep comparing the contracts of Siemian and . Not fair because Siemian makes so much le s money. And he's better. The questions regarding ' play should slow down for a week. Well, until he fails to throw for 300 yards and post a 100-somethin' pa ser rating again. Has any player established a higher bar for himself to hit? (Did it look like he and all his teammates were going to go do Bar Method I digre s.) was dynamic out there replacing , but based on the number of times he tapped his helmet to come out, I don't think he's quite ready for the workload. Maybe he should do Bar Method. When you win, you can pull off a . While will continue to have praise heaped on him in scoops, it was the ' defense that rea serted its will After a subpar outing in Washington, Philly's defense forced four turnovers while holding the to 282 yards. Through six games, Jim Schwartz's defense has allowed 81 offensive points. That's 13.5 per game, folks. halted the ' winning streak, and frankly, the tie makes the a jumbled me s. It also means will be a must-win if this group is to earn a home playoff game. Loved the slugfest and how hard both defenses fought on an evening that points were hard to come by. That said, I am genuinely worried 's legs are going to fall off around Week 14. Consider much more in line with what we expect from the this season. Well, all except for all the quarterbacks who have torched the secondary late in games ( , ), a trend that, thankfully, was put on hiatus versus the . , who had been averaging more than 40 pa s attempts per game, was closer to his more familiar totals Sunday, throwing 24 high-percentage pa ses against the . once again a sumed much of ' workload with 131 scrimmage yards and a tug. Can't wait until comes back. Drop for the , who against the suddenly resurgent . This was a game of little things: A) , with a late lead, staring down his receiver and . B) overrunning , allowing the veteran tight end to pick up a huge 11 yards to get in . C) The big mistake: . He might have confidence in his offense to pick up those yards, but it sure revealed a of confidence in his defense to stop another San Diego drive. Punt it. The are 4-0 on the road this season; they've only reached that mark twice in their illustrious history. Even more noteworthy: The two years Oakland pulled off being the Mad Max of the NFL, they made it all the way to the AFC Championship Game -- in 1977 and 2000. Kenny Stabler was the QB for the Silver and Black in '77, and although he doesn't look anything like Stabler, 's free-wheeling style of play resembles Snake's. One other note: is having himself a year. While 's , this was skill. So didn't as much as was prognosticated coming into Week 7. If is the muscle car behind this Pittsburgh offense, consider Jones the '83 Pulsar with an aftermarket moonroof. Roethlisberger's fill-in threw for 281 yards with one touchdown and one pick, but he ultimately couldn't move the chains often enough (6 of 18 on third and fourth downs) to keep pace with the ' offense. Much-needed bye on deck for , who will come out of their weekend off with a date in Baltimore. That's in the AFC North. Why the significant drop following One reason: With all the mi sing personnel this team has endured, the single player it can't afford to be without is . This is a run-first team that's already down its top two wideouts. So it will be difficult for to pick up the slack through the air if Shady is out for any extended period of time. Shocking that this front seven -- or front seven -- let rack up two bills (his second straight week hitting that mark). Yikes. Three in a row for the upstart , who are staying afloat in the NFC North at 4-3. What makes this Detroit run more sustainable (remember, the finished 2015 winning six of eight) is the improved play of since Jim Bob Cooter became offensive coordinator. Stafford has to sed 35 touchdowns to a scant eight interceptions in 16 games with Cooter as his OC. The was a beaut, laid in between two levels of coverage. For his part, Boldin engineered an opening for his quarterback with a swim move past the corner. would be the appropriate word. You know, it's free-agent signings like Boldin that fly under the radar in the spring and win games in the fall -- think signing with the last year. Next up: . Washington couldn't make it five in a row It didn't help that the guy the team expects to motor in the run game couldn't stop putting the ball on the carpet. revived an age-old problem, and Dylan Strome Men Jersey his Achilles' heel, Sunday in Detroit, fumbling into the end zone. The mistake cost the in a game they ultimately would lose by three points. With six lost fumbles since 2015, Jones is tied with for the most among non-quarterbacks. On the bright side, while the #HTTR crowd waits on , it looks like the club has developed a player in . for an organization that took heavy criticism last week. On the field, the ' offense still feels out of sync. That said, we saw glimpses of what this defense can be. Granted, makes fans of the other team want to pull out a case of beers and laugh it up. Keenum gave Big Blue four balls, with taking one of them to the house in what was . Re: Keenum -- didn't play much better. If only the owned a cool theme song that we could sing here. You know, something vintage to blast since they that was donning throwback unis. Maybe a song with a disco beat to it. Too bad San Diego doesn't have something like that. Thought the won this deal when delivered a perfect ball to at the goal line. Not so. That's OK ... when the defense steps up the way it has the last two weeks. Holy cow, has gone all on the NFL. If you like 5-yard ins and none-yard outs, this offense is for you! Much hand-wringing going on in Houston regarding a certain quarterback's contract. Remember, the are not on the hook for the entire $72 million that keeps getting to sed around. Also, it's only Week 8. The offensive line didn't fare well, lost a starter, and was playing hurt. There's more going on with this team than just bad quarterback play. Mini move upward for the , whose three wins have come , . Those teams have celebrated five wins combined this season. The encouraging sign from Cincy was the ground attack, which churned out 271 yards. The oft-maligned accounted for much of that total, posting 168 yards on his stat line. Efficient game from , though his stats were padded by the most ridiculous completion of the weekend. Must Watch: If you didn't see ... you're welcome. "I'm staying with Case." from Jeff Fisher coming off from his quarterback, who to sed four interceptions (though, not all were his fault). That included two in the ' end zone. On the final pick, Keenum appeared to be throwing a 50-50 ball for , but . Oh, wait. This happened in England. (Not sure what the Brits say in that situation. Drat?) The calls for . Maybe fellow rookie 's mediocre showing Sunday will help keep those calls muted. Doubt it, though. My colleague suggested that Warrick Dunn, Mike Alstott, Errict Rhett, James Wilder, Earnest Graham, Charlie Garner and could've run for 100 yards on the The great Ricky Bell was added. I threw in Gary Anderson and Lars Tate for good measure. Care to add any? Tampa Bay racked up almost 250 yards rushing, which means didn't see his usual 250 targets. Only 13 this week. He's on pace for 200. I'm not joking. Not sure what to make of , who seemed to disappoint everyone -- Miami, the fans, fantasy owners -- this preseason and in the early goings of the regular season. Ajayi rushed for more than 200 yards , making it two straight games he's pulled off that feat. It also marks the fifth time in NFL history a player has cruised past the 200-yard barrier in consecutive games. The last guy to do it? Ricky Williams, in a uni. Wonder if Ajayi can handle the Ricky Williams workload better than Ricky Williams did. **Power Rankings side note:** Those throwbacks were sweeeeet </content:power-ranking> After closing the deal on three close contests to start the season, the suddenly 3-4 can't buy a clutch win. The good news: No one is running away with the AFC North right now. The are also 3-4 and haven't looked any sexier than Baltimore (the team, not the town). The are in first, but they've lost two in a row and are starting at quarterback. Both they and the are on a bye, before . Might've been a on Sunday for the , who were coming off their most devastating lo s of the season in a campaign chock full of them. Central to the win in Nashville was putting the team on his back -- seemingly the central theme for this group every week. On "NFL Live" on Sunday morning, I felt real smart spinning a yarn about how had never scored a touchdown in eight career meetings with the . I don't feel so cool anymore. Nice work, T.Y. was a game the should have won. Check that: to win. Tenne see hasn't bested Indy in Nashville since 2011. Heck, the haven't beaten the since 2011, period -- and it took Curtis Painter starting for Indy for that comet to fly by. didn't play poorly, but -- like in -- his run-based unit can't be spotting the defense six points on giveaways. Next up: . Much like the , the ' fortunes come down to whether or not their quarterback can keep them ahead in the weekly track meet. Coordinator Dennis Allen's defense has shown signs of improvement, even if the unit is far from playoff-viable. New Orleans allowed 326 yards -- OK-ish, and certainly not a number. The also limited the to three of nine on third-down conversions. But in the early portions of the contest, when was so-so, the rest of the roster couldn't pick up the game for the quarterback like the were able to do And that's been the case all too often over the last several seasons. Been hollering, screaming, whining and everything in between for the to start using more effectively, like they managed to do the first couple of weeks of the season. Finally, the dude received a heavy workload, even in a tough matchup and rewarded his coaching staff for its commitment. Forte piled up 154 yards from scrimmage after posting 125 in the previous three games . Is it fun or weird that , the guy many point to as having ruined the season, might've saved it Sunday? Neither. Fitzmagic got the to 2-5, though. #getexcited At 1-5, Ron Rivera to go home and get their minds off football over the Week Barrett Hayton Men Jersey 7 bye. Maybe that was Riverboat Ron's best risk to take, flirting with the danger of encouraging players to get away from the game when the season's results thus far scream that more preparation, film watching and hard work are needed. The reality is, the defense has been terrible of late, having allowed 35.3 points and 469.7 yards per game over the three games heading into the break, and one way to snap the chain of bad performances is to remind the guys what and who they're playing for: family, love of the game, whatever. You get perspective in any career by taking time away from the job. Not sure where to go here. fans -- please send along your take. I'm serious. It's easy to point the finger at , who hasn't, for the most part, played well this season. Bortles' turnovers often come at the worst times -- he simply throw that interception in the red zone. That said, where was the pa s rush on QB ? And once again, no takeaways from the defense. Even the punter Ever since the literally can't stop anyone on the ground. You saw it happen as soon as he left the field against the , when the Dallas offensive line took over late. San Francisco gave up 249 rushing yards to the Bucs the Niners allowed to the . And then there were the 172 rushing yards the put on the Niners Talk about all you want. It doesn't matter. ... starting versus the defense ... If reading that felt as awful as it did to type, be thankful was as of Monday -- although sentence has its own distasteful qualities. 's means he without having struggled. Why is that relevant? Because if the bra s is impre sed with what it saw in Hoyer, Chicago could draft a quarterback and retain Hoyer over Cutler. The organization has already paid out most of Cutler's guaranteed money, which means the guaranteed money is no longer an impediment to moving on. Question is, what's the plan? When is the last time a quarterback ran for over 100 yards in a game while throwing for 100 yards or QB 's 104-yard rushing outburst (he threw for exactly 100 yards) was the first such game of the NFL season. In fact, it marked only the eighth time since 1960 that a quarterback pulled off that feat. It's also the only time since 1960 that a quarterback rushed for over 100 yards in his first career action. Wow. Oh, the are 0-7. This article has been reproduced in a new format and may be mi sing content or contain faulty links. Please use the Contact Us link in our site footer to report an i sue.
https://garrettdvjx86430.wikitron.com/317105/sauce_gardner_for_dpoy_whats_next_for_mac_jones_afc_east_analysis
Click here Click here