Review of week 8 in the NFL

A huge week for the Titans since they proved that not only can they beat good teams they also opened up a 4 game lead in their division.  They are eaily the team to beat at the moment along with the Giants.  In fact I found it pretty funny that lots of experts were billing the Steelers – Gaints game as a preview of the Super Bowl.  Personnally I think that the Steelers are an average team and I expect them top struggle through the next 8 games.  Big Ben just won’t stay healthy getting sacked that many times in a season.

In the other games the Cowboys showed they can win with Brad Johnson at QB but even then they are thinking of dropping him for the game aganist the Giants due to their superior pass rush.  The Saints showed how over rated the Chargers are and the Jets struggled to get by the pathetic Chiefs.

The Redskins showed that while they have the ability to beat any team they also have the ability to beat themselves in any game.  Though at this point in the season they have the best player in the league, Clinton Portis, and the only QB not to turn the ball over, Jason Campbell.  Both of these things could be important down the stretch.

The 49ers new coach, Mike Singletary,  tried to stamp his authority down on his team by sending Vernon Davis to the locker room for his lack of commitment.  If he is going to do this in every game there is going to be alot of roster spots available in San Fran soon.  This is an ugly team that has lots of problems and making one of their best players sit down isn’t going to help.

Last week I managed to get 9 results right and 5 wrong.  Still not really lighten the heather on fire with my predictions then.

Finally someone challenged me to a game of ‘Word Challenge’ on Facebook and it really is doing my nut in!  So my task for next week is to finally beat my friend at ‘Word Challenge’ and to get 80% of predictions right on the NFL.

Preview of week 8.

After forgeting to make any predictions last week I’ll have another go this week. So here goes:

Ravens to beat the Raiders – Yes the Raiders won last week but the Ravens defence should be good enough to win this one.

Panthers to beat the Cardinals – This all comes down to Panthers being at home.  It’s that simple with both of these teams.

Bucs to beat the Cowboys – When you are struggling on offence one of the last teams in the world you want to play is the Bucs with their excellent Kiffin lead defence.  The Cowboys have issues all over the park and this wll result in another defeat this week.

Redskins to beat the Lions – Detroit wil remain winless this week with the Redskins winning this on the back of their running game.  Portis is teh MVP through the first 7 weeks of the season for me.

Bills to beat the Dolphins – Trent Edwards and the Bills to continue winning and looking good.  Some grab by Evans last week!

Pats to beat the Rams – Yes the Rams have been great recently but they need a full strength Jackson to have any chance of winning.  On the injury front the Pats must be worried about Brady.

Saints to beat the Chargers – The Saints to win the London Bowl this year.

Jets to beat the Chiefs – The Chiefs can’t win without Johnson in the back field so suspending hm rules out any chance of them beating the Jets.  The Jets and Favre will be happy they are playing the Chiefs to get back into the winning feeling.

Eagles to beat the Falcons – Matt Ryan and the Falcons will seem some intersting blitzs from Johnson this week.  This is when the rookie Ryan needs to really step up if the Falcons are to be taken seriously.  The Eagles are good but not as good as some people think since they are still the worse team in the NFC East.

Jags to beat the Browns – Browns are improving but the Jags should be too strong for them in Jacksonville.

Texans to beat the Bengals – Bengals are getting better slowly but the Texans are improving again and should win this game.  Look for Williams to have a big game.

Steelers to beat the Giants – The Steelers and Big Ben will hand the Giants their first defeat of the season.  To do this they need to have excelent ball control.

49ers to beat the Seahawks – Nice first game to have for the new 49ers coach.  Should be a easy win for them since the Seahawks have massive problems.

Titans to beat the Colts – The Colts can’t defend the run and the Titans love to run the ball.  Simple really and Chris Johnson and White will run all day.  Manning looked shocking last week and must improve if the Colts have any chance to win this season.

Review of Week 7

In what can only be described has the most open season that I can ever remember in NFL history week 7 continued with the general behaviour of this season by throwing up some big shocks.

The Rams were once again the team to provide the big shock.  After beating the Redskins last week they hammered another NFC East powerhouse, Dallas, at home.  Yes Dallas didn’t have their starting QB but that isn’t the reason they gave up so many rushing yards or that the defence in general couldn’t stop anything.  Dallas are a team in serious trouble after being considered a favourite by many people to win the Super Bowl they are going to struggle to finish 9-7 with the schedule they have left.

The Bears and the Vikings decided to stop worrying about defence and see who could score the most points.  Didn’t really see that coming but the fans must have liked it.

Oakland showed they can play semi decent by beating a very over rated Jets team.  Still not convinced by the Jets and still believe that they will struggle to reach that playoffs with all 3 teams in the division looking better than them at times.

The Colts also showed that they are far from being back.  The run defence is still shocking and Manning still looks very rusty.  If the Colts want to make the playoffs they can maybe afford 1 more defeat but thats about it.

Overall the two teams that are looking good are the Giants and the Titans.  The Titans are dominating both sides of the trenches.  While Manning and the Giants remind you of older Manning and the Colts the other season when they scored as many points as they wanted.

Finally, when will teams work out that sacking coaches so often isn’t going to help them.  It isn’t a shock that the Titans that have had the same coach for 15 years and have plenty of decent seasons in that time.  Yes there has been rough times but I’m sure that the fans will have had many more good memories over the last 15 years.

Power Rankings 15-10-08

Not going to say very much about this weeks action except for holy cr*p.  Did anyone and I mean anyone see the Redskins losing to the Rams, the Cowboys losing to the Cardinals and the Giants losing to Browns?  Come on what were the odds on all those teams being beaten?  Worse result for the day has to be the Redskins losing to the Rams but fair play to the Rams. 

 

Other classic moments were the Bears celebrating only for the Falcons to win it at the death.  Plus we now get to see what Dallas are really made of when they have the 40 year old Brad Johnson at QB.  I am also surprised that they traded for Williams but I guess it’s to try and take away the fact that they have been dreadful the last few weeks.

 

Anyway onto the Power Rankings

 

1. Titans – easily number 1 since they never got beaten but then it is hard to lose when you don’t play.
2. Giants – a tough lose to the Browns means that they lose top spot.
3. Steelers – again another team that moves up without even playing.  Need to get back on track this week versus the Bengals.
4. Bills – the third and final team that has moved up without even playing They really need to get Edwards healthy or they will struggle with Losman.
5. Redskins – yes they really did lose to the Rams but they still look like one of the teams to beat in the NFC.
6. Buccaneers – good win versus divisional rivals Carolina put them high up the rankings this week.
7. Cardinals – great win versus the Cowboys but they need to learn how to win away from the desert.
8. Panthers – they need to start beating teams like the Bucs if they want to be taken seriously.
9. Cowboys – bad lose at the weekend and losing Romo means this team are in serious trouble.
10. Falcons – Matt Ryan is already a shoe in for rookie of the year and a great last 11 seconds to beat the Bears.
11. Broncos – the high scoring offence needs to get going again or this team will suffer badly since their defence is just not good enough.
12. Colts – Manning to Harrison is an old story but still an effective one.
13. Jets – the Jets and Favre look better each week but they need to beat the Bills to have any chance of the divisional title.
14. Pats – pushing the Jets hard for second place in the division but Sunday night showed they have really problems on offence and defence.
15. Saints – red hot offence means that this team is probably the best of the 3-3 teams in the league.
16. Jaguars – this team needs to get the running game going if they want to catch the Colts and the Titans.
17. Chargers – great showing on SNF and need to keep this form rolling into their bye week.  Interesting game coming up versus the Saints in London. Let’s hope it isn’t raining this year.
18. Eagles – need to start beating teams in their division or they will never reach the play-offs.
19. Bears – huge lose to Falcons may hurt they for a while yet.
20. Packers – this team needs to establish a consistent offence or they will struggle throughout the season.
21. Vikings – AP and Chester having got going this season at all and this must be a worry for this team.
22. Ravens – bad day at the office for Flacco but it is all part of growing up in this league.
23. Dolphins – losing to the Texans will annoy them for weeks.
24. Browns – great win on MNF and this should give Anderson some much needed confidence.
25. 49ers – the offence looks ok with Martz at the helm but their lack of quality at WR could hurt them.
26. Texans – its always good to get a win and now they need to keep it going.
27. Chiefs – any team with Larry Johnson should be decent but alas the Chiefs somehow manage to prove that this isn’t the case.
28. Seahawks – Hasselbeck is this team and they need him healthy.
29. Raiders – any team with Al Davis at the helm are going to be bad and indeed the Raiders are bad.
30. Bengals – they need a win soon and a healthy Palmer.
31. Rams – this team are still bad but fair play to them beating the Redskins.
32. Lions – easily the worse team in the league and trading Williams means they are already looking towards next season.

 

 

 

NFL Predictions Week 6

Again last week there was a variety of shocks and must win games.  This week will probably be the same for shocks and there certainly is a number of must win games for some teams.   For the winless teams in the division they seriously need to start thinking about moving some players out through trades and maybe even making a few key trades of their own.  The Lions in opinion should be trying ot get a young QB in that they can build the team around, the Bengals need to try and get high draft picks for either Chad or TJ since both aren’t performing to their full potential.

Anyway onto my predictions for this week.

Bears to beat the Falcons – Matt Ryan as surprised a few people this year but I doubt that he will enjoy playing a Bears defence that is playing well at the moment.

Dolphins to beat the Texans - The Fins are on a roll and the Texans can’t help shooting themselves in the foot.

Colts to beat the Ravens- Strange match up with a quality QB playing badly (Manning) and a rookie QB playing better than people expected (Flacco) but I still believe the Colts will win this one.

Vikings to beat the Lions – Vikings to win again after a very strange victory down in New Orleans last week.  Lions well lets not even talk about them.

Saints to beat the Raiders - The Saints will put up huge numbers again on offence and hopefully this will actually result in a victory this weekend.

Bengals to beat the Jets - Have a funny feeling the Bengals might actually sneak this one since they are playing slightly better.  Though now I have said that look for Favre to have another career day.

Bucs to beat the Panthers- Kiffin has the defence playing well enough to win this game at home. 

Redskins to beat the Rams- Fantasy teams all around the world will be loaded with Redskins this weekend.  Look for Portis and Moss in particular to have good days.

Broncos to beat the Jaguars – Cutler to get his offence going again after a couple of indifferent weeks.

Cowboys to beat the Cards- The Cards need all their offensive weapons working to win this game but the Cowboys D should be good enough to hold them to 35 points or so.  Low enough for Romo to win the game for the Cowboys.

Eagles to beat the 49ers – The 4th best team in the NFC East should get back to winning days.  In fact they would love to swap divisions with the 49ers since they would have this division wrapped up in a few weeks.

Packers to beat the Seahawks – Aaron Rodgers and the Packers must win this game or they will be struggling to make the playoffs.

Chargers to beat the Pats- Yes the Pats own the Chargers but I fancy San Diego to sneak a win here.

Gaints to hammer the Browns – Manning looks so good right now and the Browns defence looks so bad.  Pretty easy result to pick really.

NFL Power Rankings 8-10-08

1. Giants – unbeaten and looking like true champions.
2. Titans – they keep finding ways to win games and with their defence anything is possible.
3. Redskins – 2 impressive road wins gives them 3^rd spot.
4. Denver Broncos – if the defence can get itself together this will be the Titans opponents in the AFC championship game.
5. Carolina Panthers – the return of Steve Smith, 2 quality running backs and a reborn Moose means this team has lots of offensive weapons.
6. Dallas Cowboys – Last weeks defeat and a unconvincing win over the Bengals means that the Cowboys drop to 6^th. 
7. Buffalo Bills – depending on how badly hurt Edwards depends on how well this team does the rest of the season.
8. Pittsburgh Steelers – If Big Ben keeps getting hit it is going to catch up with him sometime.  Without him this team is in trouble.
9. Chicago Bears – Forte looks like the business, the defence is mean and Orton isn’t blowing up like Grossman means this team have a good chance of winning their division
10. New England Patriots – Yes they have Cassel at QB but their schedule means that they have decent chance of reaching the playoffs.
11. Tampa Bay Buccaneers – Doesn’t really matter who is at QB since the running game and defence is the keys to this team.
12. Atlanta Falcons – Turner proves that he is a quality back, Ryan looks the real deal and they just won a moral boosting game in Green Bay.
13. Baltimore Ravens – Defence looks scary, Flacco doesn’t do anything really stupid.
14. Miami Dolphins – Two big wins over two big AFC teams means that they should be rated this high.
15. Arizona Cardinals – Quality WRs and a up in coming running back means that this team does well even if an old man at centre.
16. Indianapolis Colts – Yes they are lucky to be 2-2 but with all their offensive weapons they can win any game at any point.
17. New York Jets – Yes Favre is in New Jersey but I still think this team is no better than a .500 team.  No doubt they will prove me wrong.
18. Philadelphia Eagles – Getting beat off the Redskins in their own back yard will have seriously hurt this team.
19. San Diego Chargers – LT needs to find some form soon or this team will need to use back up running back Sproles more.
20. Jacksonville Jaguars – Other team that needs to get back to running the ball.
21. New Orleans Saints – How they lost on Monday night only they will know.
22. San Francisco 49ers – This teams looks good at times but they too often fail to put a whole game together.
23. Minnesota Vikings – Unconvinced by them but they seem to win.  Plus any team with AP has a chance to win.
24. Green Bay Packers – Rodgers needs to find some form again and the defence needs to start producing the goods again.
25. Seattle Seahawks – This team can only get better once players start to get healthy.  Though with their lack of running game I’m not sure why they let Shaun Alexander go.
26. Cleveland Browns – I still believe in Anderson but if he doesn’t start winning soon then the calls for Brady are only going to get louder.
27. Oakland Raiders – All depends on what finally happens with the coaching situation and whether or not the old git Davis disappears.
28. Kansas City Chiefs – Good show versus the Broncos followed by the usual versus the Panthers.  They need to get LJ going on the ground.  Congrats to Tony for breaking another record, even more impressive with this team.
29. Cincinnati  Bengals – Have look ok in their last two games but need to start putting teams away. Lewis must also be close to getting fired.
30. Houston Texans – Sad when Sage Rosenfels ignites your offence but alas that’s what happened last weekend.   Though he did hand the game to the Colts.
31. Detroit Lions – Dreadful team and they seriously need to start rebuilding again.  This means getting rid of Kitna and finding a QB who might still be in the league in 3 years time.
32. St Louis Rams – Who will be the new long term coach? Who will they pick number 1 next year?  Can they go the whole season without winning?  These are the important questions in St Louis right now.

Review of week 5 of NFL

Well this week I wasn’t much better than the last two in fact if anything it was slightly worse.  I only got 8 right and 6 wrong which is pretty poor.  What is worse is the fact that I have gotten my own team, the Redskins, wrong for the past two weeks.  Though since they have won two hard road games in that two weeks I might just keep going for the opposition in case it is luck.

Main points from this weeks games.

The Dolphins have to be taken seriously and teams surely have to realise what is happening when Ronnie Brown lines up as QB.  No really surely the Chargers had watched some film from the other week and saw what had happened versus the Pats.  Or are they so sure of themselves they just decided not to bother.

The Redskins are easily the 3rd best team in the NFL at the moment.  Only third because the Titans and the Giants remain unbeaten.  The Skins are playing well on both sides of the ball and the quality play of Portis and Campbell should help this team into the playoffs.  With the next three games versus poor teams the Redskins have chance of being 7-1 when they play the Steelers, a team that I would fancy them to beat.

The Colts are a very  lucky team to still be in their division right now since they are struggling in so many different departments it is scary.  BUT the Jaguars fail yet again to get the job done, why this team isn’t running the ball is beyond me.

NFL Week 5 – Predictions

Last weeks results :- 8 correct and 5 wrong.

Well the Chiefs decided that last week they would ruin everyone’s predictions by beating the Broncos.  Maybe that high scoring offense needs some help from the defensive unit.

This weeks there are some key match ups, with the Redskins away to the Eagles and the Colts at the Texans.  If the Redskins come away from Philly with a victory then they will have played all three of their divisional road trips with a record of 2-1.  This will give them a real chance of getting out the division and into the play offs.  The Colts versus Texans match up is interesting in an entirely different way.  If Peyton and the Colts fail to win on Sunday then their season is pretty much over.  They have a tough schedule left after this week plus two games versus the Titans who are unbeaten and who will have a 3 game advantage over the Colts at least.  Worrying times in Indy at the moment.

Predictions.

Titans to beat the Ravens - Ravens were unlucky last week versus the Steelers but a Titans mean defense and a good offensive line will see the Titans remain unbeaten.

Panthers to beat the Chiefs – LJ finally got the running game going last week for the Chiefs but the Panthers are playing well at the moment and should win this one.

Bears to beat the Lions –  Millen is gone (finally) but alot of the deadwood that he helped bring in is still hanging around Detroit so the Lions fans will have a long wait until the start winning alot of games again.  The Bears look strong on defense and have a running game again since they cut the useless Benson and gave the rock to Forte.

Packers to beat the Falcons – After two rough weeks for the Pack a winnable game versus a steadily improving Falcons is just what the doctors ordered.  If Rodgers gets seriously hurt this week then the Packers season could well be over.

Colts to beat the Texans – The bye week will have helped the Colts get healthy again and Peyton will win this one and keep the Colts season going.

Chargers to beat the Dolphins – Good win for the Fins a couple of weeks ago but its back to reality for their fans this week when the Dolphins kick their arses.

Giants to beat the Seahawks – Like the Colts the Seahawks will have been thankful for the bye week but the Giants should be too strong for them.  Though losing Burress for a week might slow down that passing game so look for Jacobs to get alot of carries.

Eagles to beat the Redskins – Redskins looked great last week but the Eagles will be up for this game and should sneak it.  Though this game might come down to a field goal.

Bucs to beat the Broncos – Kiffin has this defense playing well so look for them to slow down the Broncos point scoring machine.  Then Griese and co can play around with a weak defense for the victory.

Bills to beat the Cards – The Bills will be too strong for a banged up Cardinals team.  Edwards is looking good and so is Lynch, keeping both of these healthy will be the key for the best team in the AFC East.

Cowboys to beat the Bengals – Now that Oakland and St Louis have both fired their coaches, Marvin Lewis becomes the favourite to go next.  The Cowboys should get back to winning ways with a victory over a poor team.

Pats to beat the 49ers – The bye week will have been welcomed by the Pats with open arms especially after the Fins turned them over.  Watch out for the Pats defense to have a big game after being shouted at for 2 weeks.  

Steelers to beat the Jags – Have a funny feeling the Steelers are going to sneak this one.  Though for this to happen the defense must really step up to the plate.

Saints to beat the Vikings – Team have sussed out that the Vikings don’t have a QB capable of beating them so they load up on the run and win games versus them.  The only time this doesn’t happen is when AP has one of his big games which won’t be this week.  Add in the fact that the Vikings have a poor pass defense and the Saints have a greta passing game.  A Saints victory is the only likely outcome.

Finally on the subject of the Raiders.  What does the old git Al Davis think he is doing at the moment other than destroying a once proud franchise.  He really does talk so rubbish at times and it is interesting that he slags off some of the great players and franchises around the league, such as Moss and the Pats.  Hopefully Kiffen will get teh money he deserves and since I really really dislike the Raiders I hope Al Davis hangs around and destroys them properly.