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DenBronx
09-09-2008, 06:14 PM
http://www.nfl.com/news/story?id=09000d5d80aabf38&template=without-video&confirm=true

This is how the NFL's 32 teams stack up after Week 1:

In the hunt
Teams that look good enough to be among the 12 playoff qualifiers, but not based on conference.
Rank Team Record Comment
1. Dallas Cowboys 1-0 It didn't figure to be quite so easy in Cleveland, but that's the type of thing a legitimate Super Bowl contender does.
2. New York Giants 1-0 The defending champs should make it two in a row at St. Louis.
3. Green Bay Packers 1-0 Brett who?
4. Carolina Panthers 1-0 A healthy Jake Delhomme makes an enormous difference -- enough to overcome the absence of Steve Smith.
5. San Diego Chargers 0-1 Tough loss, but this team still has all of the ingredients to be a major factor in the wide-open AFC.
6. Chicago Bears 1-0 Making the Indianapolis Colts look feeble is no easy task, yet the Bears did exactly that.
7. Indianapolis Colts 0-1 The Colts can't really be that bad … can they?
8. Buffalo Bills 1-0 Knocking off the perennial NFC West kingpins is a big deal, especially in as thorough a fashion as the Bills did.
9. New Orleans Saints 1-0 No team adapts better in a crisis than the Saints.
10. Pittsburgh Steelers 1-0 The Steelers won big with a familiar formula: Powerful running game and smothering defense.
11. Philadelphia Eagles 1-0 Disposing of the hapless Rams was easy. A much harder test is coming in Dallas.
12. Denver Broncos 1-0 A win's a win, but how much can you really gauge from beating up on an opponent as pathetic as the Raiders were Monday night?


http://www.sportsline.com/nfl/story/10968862

After opening week of the season, we're already seeing some knee-jerk reactions to the craziness that went on during the games:

• The NFC is better than the AFC, which none of us expected. So maybe the Carolina Panthers and Chicago Bears pulled off big road victories against two of the AFC's elite in San Diego and Indianapolis. They should be lauded for that, but the AFC is still the top conference. Maybe Carolina and Chicago are better than most thought, but I get the feeling they're both glad to get those AFC teams out of the way now.

• There's something wrong with the Colts. They looked bad against the Bears, but it was Peyton Manning's first action and the Colts traditionally hold light camps, which, in turn, could have led to the tackling problems on defense. They'll be fine.

• The Jets made the right move getting Brett Favre and they're now Super Bowl contenders. Hey, the team they beat went 1-15 in 2007. I watched that game live and then watched it again, and Favre wasn't nearly as good as he was portrayed. He was just OK.

• The Dallas Cowboys will win it all. They were dominant against the Cleveland Browns, but they were the best team in the NFC last season before choking away their chance to get to the Super Bowl with a home playoff loss. They're good. But let's slow that coronation down a bit. Win a playoff game first, maybe?

One week does not make a season -- unless you're the New England Patriots. Theirs is over. OK, so that's a bit of a rush. I'm guilty.


Felix Jones had a strong debut for the Cowboys. (AP)
I keep hearing all this talk about how the Patriots will regroup under Bill Belichick, how he will work his magic like he did in 2001 when Tom Brady came off the bench to lead the Patriots to the Super Bowl title.

With Brady out for the season with a torn ACL, that puts Matt Cassel into the Brady role this season. He will make his first start since high school against the Jets this week.

Brady at least had Michigan.

Again, aside from the Patriots, one week does not make a season. It does make for a messy second set of the CBSSports.com Power Rankings.

The Colts were my top team last week, and they lost. The Patriots were in the second spot, won, and still dropped way down. No Brady, no respect.

The Chargers lost and dropped. The Jaguars also lost and fell, which means three of my top seven teams lost and the Patriots fell way down.

The new No. 1 team is the Cowboys, although I'm not in that rush to make them world champs yet.

Not a lot of rushing to judgment here. Remember, I like the passing game anyway.

The Power Rankings after Week 1:




http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/powerranking?season=2008&week=2&lpos=spotlight&lid=tab2pos1



If Week 1 was any indication, we're in for a wild NFL season.

In their regular-season debuts, starting rookie quarterbacks Joe Flacco and Matt Ryan played with the calm of 10-year pros. Meanwhile, four reigning division champions stumbled in their openers -- the San Diego Chargers, Indianapolis Colts, Seattle Seahawks and Tampa Bay Buccaneers each suffered losses -- while a fifth needed a last-second goal-line stand to win.

Yes, the New England Patriots escaped an upset bid by the Kansas City Chiefs with a four-play stand at the end. But nothing could prevent the Patriots, who lost quarterback Tom Brady to a season-ending knee injury early against the Chiefs, from falling from their perch atop the ESPN.com NFL Power Rankings.

The Patriots, who ended the 2007 season atop the ladder and reigned atop the Week 1 rankings, are now ranked ninth in the league, according to the weekly poll of our experts.

The new kings of the hill are the Dallas Cowboys, who turned in an impressive romp over the homestanding Cleveland Browns in Week 1. The Cowboys vault from third to the top position, just past the Pittsburgh Steelers. After rocking the Houston Texans in Pittsburgh, the Steelers moved up four spots to No. 2.

ESPN.com's Power Rankings
The rankings were determined by a poll of ESPN.com's NFL staff: writers John Clayton, Jeffri Chadiha, Tim Graham, Matt Mosley, James Walker, Kevin Seifert, Paul Kuharsky, Pat Yasinskas, Bill Williamson, and Mike Sando; and Scouts Inc. Insiders Jeremy Green and Matt Williamson.





We've called upon some of our voting members to provide team-by-team commentary. Thus, for your reading pleasure, you'll have:

• Tim Graham on the AFC East
• James Walker on the AFC North
• Paul Kuharsky on the AFC South
• Bill Williamson on the AFC West
• Matt Mosley on the NFC East
• Kevin Seifert on the NFC North
• Pat Yasinskas on the NFC South
• Mike Sando on the NFC West


Despite a last-play home loss to the Carolina Panthers, the Chargers fell just one spot in the Week 2 rankings, to third overall. The fourth-ranked New Orleans Saints and the defending Super Bowl champion New York Giants round out the top five. Each team vaulted three spots in the voting.

The Chicago Bears made the biggest leap of the week, thanks to an unexpected romp over the host Colts. Powered by rookie running back Matt Forte, the Bears moved from 25th to 15th overall in the voting.


The Seahawks, who apparently never got the wakeup call on a visit to Buffalo, tumbled nine spots to 18th overall.

jrelway
09-09-2008, 09:11 PM
i laugh at espns power rankings. wtf is that?

DenBronx
09-09-2008, 09:15 PM
i laugh at espns power rankings. wtf is that?

agreed, that was pathetic. after tooling the raiders they still have the browns ahead of us. :coffee:

jrelway
09-09-2008, 09:54 PM
agreed, that was pathetic. after tooling the raiders they still have the browns ahead of us. :coffee:

not only that, seattle and buffalo ahead of us also? we'll climb to #5 when we jack up the chargers on sunday.

omac
09-09-2008, 10:01 PM
Wow, forget about wins or losses. They upgraded Carolina for beating up the Chargers, and the Bears for winning against the Colts, yet the Colts and Chargers are still up there, and despite their losses, way ahead of other teams who've won convincingly.

Why not just say, I'm a Charger homer, they can lose their 1st 5 games, and I'll still think they'll be the superbowl champs. :D Those guys are ridiculous.

Benetto
09-09-2008, 10:16 PM
Rankings shmankings.

xzn
09-10-2008, 01:56 AM
Are we doing Pro football like the BCS now?

If not, why should I care what our "ranking" is according to some uninformed east-coast biased tool?!?

Thanks goodness that in professional football all that matters is wins and losses.

Hawgdriver
09-10-2008, 06:03 AM
If I recall correctly, the 2007 week 1 power rankings didn't catch that Green Bay would be a Super Bowl contender, Arizona would finish in the cellar, Tampa would be knocking on the door, Carolina wouldn't make the playoffs, Minnesota would be decent, and Cleveland would turn it around. And the other ten or so misses. Hey, batting .500 is good in that other sport. As far as predictive power for the end of 2008, I wouldn't expect the week one 2008 rankings to be much better.

Mike
09-10-2008, 07:56 AM
I know rankings are a joke...but who the heck does ESPN have doing theirs? :confused:

Practically the whole thing is off base. :whoknows:

BroncoJoe
09-10-2008, 08:06 AM
This is the only ratings site I ever pay attention to. It's not based on someone's opinion.

http://www.usatoday.com/sports/sagarin/nfl08.htm

Hobe
09-10-2008, 08:32 AM
I thing your comment about "knee-jerk reactions" was accurate. Right now, Dallas as #1 is reasonable. They love San Diego, but had to put the Panthers a head of them. I don't think you can write the Pats off. They still have a basicly good team. However, I the Bills are now the favorite in the AFC east.

Kapaibro
09-10-2008, 09:36 AM
12. Denver Broncos 1-0 A win's a win, but how much can you really gauge from beating up on an opponent as pathetic as the Raiders were Monday night?


To be fair, this is a funny quote! No way in hell we should be below teams who have lost.