The NFC Report: Week 10
Listed in: FootballSo with every team in the league having played eight games, Ben and I figured it was time to renew a feature we did last season: the AFC/NFC Report. Each week, he'll look at the current shape of the AFC and I'll do the same with the NFC.
Week Nine was a pretty damn bad one for the NFC. The conference's only unbeaten team suffered a humiliating home loss, several other highly touted teams either lost to bad teams or struggled mightily to beat them, and the Cardinals' bye week is over, meaning we have to see them again on Sunday.
The Big Wins:
New Orleans Saints: The Saints bounced back from a drubbing at the hands of the Baltimore Ravens to post an impressive beat-down of Tampa Bay on the road. Marques Colston continued his Pro Bowl-caliber season, while Drew Brees continues to make his mother proud. The defense got burned deep twice by Joey Galloway, but otherwise contained the explosive Buccaneers offense...ok, fine, maybe they're not explosive...I hate Cadillac Williams. Plus, with some help from Detroit, the Saints are now back alone in first place in the NFC South. The feel-good story of the decade is going strong right now.
Seattle Seahawks: Yes, it was a home win against the Raiders. But remember, Oakland was on a little two game winning streak while Seattle had dropped two in a row. The outcome of the game was never in doubt, which is a good sign for a team that has struggled mightily this season. Yes, the offense was far from impressive, but the Raiders actually have a decent defense, and of course the Hawks were without Hasselbeck and Alexander. The defense utterly dominated the Raiders offense, and while that may not be too impressive it's far better than I had expected. It gives Seattle a one-game lead in the NFC West and a chance to thoroughly seize control of the division with a home win this week over St. Louis.
The Wins That Were Better Than Losing:
New York Giants: It was an ugly win, at home, over a bad Texans team. But it was still a win, and with the other goings-on around the NFC (and particularly the NFC East) it put the Giants in great shape at the midway point. They've got a two-game lead in the division, and look like a pretty solid bet to get back to the playoffs. Plus, with the Meltdown at the Midway and a home game left against the Bears, they've still got a decent shot at a top-two seed in the conference.
The Sorta-bad Losses:
Dallas Cowboys: Sure, this game probably had Cowboy fans ready to jump from any elevated surfaces they may have been near, but at the same time at least they lost on the road to a division opponent. Considering what else happened in the conference, that has to qualify as just a sorta-bad loss. On a side note, is Bill Parcells the most overrated coach in the NFL or what? He's got the most talented team in that division but has managed to massively underachieve. He's 1-3 in the division, he stuck with Drew Bledsoe way too long, and went for a two-point conversion in the first half...not having that point cost his team the game, while having it would have merely made it a two-point win instead of a one-point win. There is never a circumstance where a team should go for two in the first half, and almost never should they go for two before the fourth quarter. Take the damn point and be happy with it.
Parcells has won next to nothing since Bill Belichick left his staff, and won nothing without him. Considering all the success Belichick has had with the Patriots, isn't it entirely possible he deserves most of the credit for those two Giants Super Bowl wins? Parcells may be a great motivator, but his grasp of in-game strategy is tenuous at best. He needs to retire after this season, and for good this time.
St. Louis Rams: A home loss is never a good thing, but the Chiefs are playing some very good football right now. Plus, the Rams really aren't that good, so this doesn't come as any kind of surprise to me. They have a porous defense and their offense has four good players: Marc Bulger, Torry Holt, Steven Jackson, and Orlando Pace. Only Holt (and maybe Pace) are truly elite players. The rest of the offense is mediocre at best, which means the Rams just can't score like they used to. They're an average team, but with the way the rest of the division is playing out they're still very much in the race.
Minnesota Vikings:
While the 49ers are better than most people wanted to give them credit for at the beginning of the season, this is still a must-win game if you want to be a playoff team. Even worse, managing just three lousy points against a not-very-good defense is a joke. The Vikings are another team that would normally be in an even-worse category, but they've been spared the humiliation by a pair of teams that played even worse. This team, like the Rams, isn't all that good, but some team has to be the sixth seed in the playoffs and they've got about as good a shot as anyone else.
The Throw Your Remote At The TV Losses:
Atlanta Falcons: Let's see, you follow up two big wins over AFC opponents with a trip to Detroit to face the hapless Lions. A win gets you two games clear of the rest of the wild card pack and keeps you tied for the division lead. What happens? You get your ass handed to you by one of the worst teams in the league. All that talk about Mike Vick being the MVP can probably take a week off after he turned the ball over three times and just barely completed half his passes. Plus, Jon Kitna shredding your defense is never a good thing, Plus, it could have been worse, since the Lions had to kick field goals inside the red zone on three different occasions. In short, this is the kind of loss that leads me to believe that the Falcons are the Jacksonville Jaguars of the NFC: talented enough to astound you with a huge win any given week, but inconsistent enough to crap themselves at any moment. Maybe that's what happens when you have a black quarterback...
Chicago Bears: Wow. I picked the Dolphins to cover the spread and even I was amazed they actually won. As Ben and I like to say, "Rex Grossman giveth, and Rex Grossman taketh away." For all the talk of the Bears as the best team in football, they should have two losses, and both would be to some of the worst teams in the league. What a strange team. With three straight road games coming up they could easily go from 7-0 to 8-3 in the blink of an eye, and they might even lose what at one point seemed like an unbreakable grip on a first-round bye. Still, they're a game up on everyone else on the conference and play in a putrid divison. They're gonna be there come January, but they'd better hope that Rex Grossman giveth, not taketh.
