Welcome back to the MikesPickz NFL Power Rankings. Sorry that they are later than usual, it’s been a busy week. I’ll get right to the rankings:
*As you probably know by now, teams are ranked into tiers, teams within a tier are teams I expect to finish with similar records and thus may be interchangeable in my opinion.
Tier 1
– 1. Giants– The running game is returning, watch out NFL– but Eli’s injury may be a major set back for the team (but they play Oakland this week, so they don’t need him to rush).
2. Colts– One slip by the Giants and the Colts are the number 1 team in the league. They are firing on all cylinders and they are playing solid defense.
3. Saints– How scary are the Saints? They win week 1 and 2 with classic Saint football- air it out with the inhuman Brees. They Saints can’t win without him, right?… wrong. In week 3 and 4 Brees has 0 TDs and under 400 yards passing. The Saints are winning with the run and solid defense (just ask the Jets).
4. Vikings– Solid win against the Packers. Favre is playing some solid football right now, but then again the Jets started off amazing last season as well. Can he finish the season is the question, the good thing is he has AP who can carry the team.5. Patriots– Nice win (with some help from Mark Clayton), the Patriots are getting things on track and I don’t think they will lose another game until the week 11 match-up with the Jets, and I think they will win that match-up as well.
6. Ravens– The Patriots showed that people may be jumping the gun on just how good the Ravens are. They were putting up impressive numbers but it was basically against very bad teams (Chiefs, Chargers [a top half of the league team, but not a powerhouse], and the Browns). I still think the Ravens are solid, don’t get me wrong- but they aren’t a top 3 team.
—7. Jets– Mark Sanchez cannot carry the team as the Saints showed. He is still learning the NFL game. He will be a solid game manager, but not a game changer.
8. Eagles– McNabb returns this week and they get as easy a match-up as you could want (Bucs). I expect huge offensive numbers this week (including Vick).9. Falcons– The first game after the BYE is no cake walk. The 49ers defense will surely get in Matt Ryan’s head, and I can see the Falcons falling further in the rankings next week.10. Packers– Despite the loss, they didn’t play completely terrible. They have the BYE week to regroup.
11. Steelers– The running game does exist! Not completely sold on them yet, they need to play better in the 4th quarter. The Chargers simply exposed them in the final quarter.
12. Chargers– If the 4th quarter was a sign of things to come, then the NFL better watch out because the Chargers can score and score quickly.
Tier 4
–13. Bears– They pounded the Lions and quickly got them off the high of winning a game. Last week was a great way to head into the BYE week.
–14. 49ers– The 49ers defense is legit. Patrick Willis is the best linebacker in the NFL, no question in my mind (2.5 sacks, 1 INT, 1 TD against the Rams). Now they have another contender to play this week (Falcons), hopefully the offense can score enough to win (especially with no Gore).
15. Broncos– Solid win against a somewhat good team. The defense is amazing 26 points allowed in 4 weeks.
–16. Bengals– No movement in the rankings despite a poorly played game against the Browns. I am giving them a pass in that game because of the intense rivalry the Browns and Bengals have.
17. Cowboys– Tony Romo is not cutting it at QB for them anymore. Romo looked anything but good against the Broncos. With the injuries to the running game, the season isn’t looking bright for them. Luckily they have the Chiefs this week, it should be any easy one for them- but with the Cowboys you never know.
Tier 5
18. Jaguars– All of a sudden the Jaguars are playing some top notch football. I can’t believe they benched MJD because they were winning, c’mon now Fantasy Football people?20. Dolphins– Chad Pennington Henne got the offense working this week as they played solid football against the Bills (who aren’t exactly a good team, but impressive no the less). Let’s see if they can win against the Jets on Monday night.21. Cardinals- They only moved down, because of teams playing solid last week. Let’s see how they play this week, is the SuperBowl team going to show up?22. Titans– The season is starting to get out of hand. Haynesworth was a bigger loss than many expected. They already have more losses this season than they did all of last year.
23. Seahawks– Things aren’t looking good for the Seahawks.
–24. Redskins– At least they won against the Bucs. I would have thought the week after losing to the Lions and playing at home, the team would come out firing and putting up big numbers, nope, they barely beat the lowly Bucs who started a QB that is ranked lower than 40 in Madden ’10.
–25. Panthers– Luckily they get the Redskins this week, so they should actually have a decent game, but then again with Delhomme you never know what is going to happen.
26. Bills– The Bills really are a bad team, I thought they would be better than they are playing especially how closely they played the Patriots in Week 1.
–27. Raiders– Still the worst passing game in the NFL… by a lot. They basically don’t have an offense unit and how can you win with only 2/3 of a team, especially if the 2/3 that you do have is not amazing.
–29. Chiefs– Cassell is looking like a one-hit wonder and a big time bust for the Chiefs.
30. Browns– Solid effort against the Bengals last week. Buffalo this week is winnable if they play like they did last week.
31. Bucs– Tampa Bay fans, don’t tune in this week, because it won’t be pretty in Philly.
–32. Rams– The 49ers showed how terrible the Rams are. I think we might have back to back seasons with winless teams in the NFL for the first time in NFL history.
That will do it for this week’s power rankings, be sure to check back next week for another ranking. Any questions or comments? Post them in the comment section below or send me a tweet @MikesPickz.
I agree with most of your rankings. I think the top 5 teams are all playing very good football and it’s hard to tell who should be where. Favre to the Vikings is working out beautifully. Even if Favre is having an off game they can just hand it off to the best running back in the game in Peterson. I think the 4-0 Broncos deserve more credit, although they have beaten relatively easy teams. The Chargers played tough against the Cowboys, but started their rally too late into the game.
Great set of power rankings here! Out of all of the teams you listed, I think that Buffalo has the best chance to make the greatest improvement as the season goes on. I think they’ll be able to get some momentum after they finish off Cleveland on Sunday.
Forrest,
Thanks. I agree that Buffalo has the best chance for improvement in terms of talent, but I think they have to go away from the hurry-up based offense. I think the experiment is failing and if they want to get better they have to re-evaluate the offensive game plan. If they can beat the Browns, which I am not 100% sure that they will, they will have a tough one @Jets next week, then they get Panthers and Texans before the BYE week. It won’t be easy, but there is potential.
-MikesPickz