The return!!
After a long offseason, I (and football) am back!! I'm doing the Power Rankings again and this time I am going to have rules and I am going to do this my way. I'm not going to follow the traditional model of analyzing every game and breaking everything down; I'm just going to say what I think.
Before we get going though, I am going to lay some ground work - mainly some rules.
1. If a team wins, you don't go down in the rankings. That's you're reward for winning a game. You're welcome.
2. I give a team the benefit of the doubt if that team has won before and they have a talented roster. That's right, I'm giving good teams a break. If the Patriots started 0-2 they are not going to be the worst team in the league.
3. Same goes for the opposite. If the Dolphins win one game this season then they aren't moving up much.
4. Injuries are only slightly considered. Depth is a bigger deal to me. If you lose a tackle and I think your team can cover that injury with a good backup then you don't get punished too much.
5. There are other rules and when I think of them I'll apply them, until then I forgot what they are.
6. Also! This isn't necessarily a rule but it's very important. If you're team isn't very good then I probably won't watch them play every week. So the Bengals, Dolphins and a couple other teams may not get too much analysis or viewing time from me. Sorry for your favorite team being bad.
Finally, because all rankings have some sort of bias in them, I'm going to get some things out there. I am a San Diego Chargers fan and I like being a tortured fan so I have decided to follow them to Los Angeles. Secondly, I am openly rooting for my Super Bowl picks.
These are those picks and the final score:
Patriots: 40
Cowboys: 34
I picked the Patriots because at this point I'd rather be one year too late on them rather than try and fail to be one year to early. Secondly, I picked the Cowboys for the story and the iconic matchup. America's team versus the team everyone hates. It would get tons of media attention and be wildly entertaining. After Jason Garrett gets fired halfway through the season for starting 2-4, Kellen Moore takes over coaching duties and puts together the best offensive play calling stretch ever to lead the Boys to the Super Bowl.
So those will be the three teams I am rooting for above everyone else.
Now some more groundwork. In order to have Power Rankings where teams move up and down, we need to have initial pre-season rankings. Here they are. I don't think they need too much explaining.
1. Patriots
2. Saints
3. Chiefs
4. Rams
5. Eagles
6. Cowboys
7. Chargers
8. Ravens
9. Bears
10. Packers
11. Texans
12. Vikings
13. Steelers
14. Browns
15. Seahawks
16. Titans
17. Colts
18. Jaguars
19. Broncos
20. Jets
21. Panthers
22. Lions
23. Falcons
24. Redskins
25. 49ers
26. Bengals
27. Cardinals
28. Raiders
29. Giants
30. Buccaneers
31. Bills
32. Dolphins
One last thing. Listen here. I have a busy schedule. If you're team isn't great I can't be expected to commit to watching them every week.
Finally, I am no football expert. I played in high school but that hardly makes me qualified to talk football. I just need an outlet and a way for me to feel like I'm being productive after watching football all day every Sunday.
Now onto the Week 1 Power Rankings!
This week I'll group teams by games and reveal all of the rankings at the end of the article. Next week I'll list teams by their position in the ranks.
General Week 1 takeaways: The defenses were good, the offenses looked out of sync (I blame no preseason) and there were some real chemistry and mental errors (looking at you Browns). Speaking of the Browns - do they stink? In fact, is the whole AFC North bad and the Ravens are the only good team? In terms of holdout news: Zeke was justified in his holdout and Melvin Gordon may want to show up to practice soon. The Chargers did not miss him much.
Also nothing on Sunday mattered because Saturday had the big news! Antonio Brown is a Patriot! In perhaps the greatest orchestration (?) ever, Antonio Brown forced his way out of the Steelers and Raiders then landed himself on the Super Bowl champ's roster. In case you don't know how it all happened, here's how it went down.
My top plays of the week: RB snap to McCaffrey. Davis making a Madden, controller breaking play to score, Phil Rivers' scramble pass to Keenan Allen in the end zone, all of Deshaun Watson on Monday night and this game winning field goal.
Thursday Night:
Packers at Bears.
It was really cool that the NFL kicked off their 100 year anniversary by playing a game that looked like it was from 1919. Thank you for letting tell that joke.
Early games:
Rams at Panthers.
Yes the Rams are better and yes The Panthers May not be good this season at all, but it’s always bad to lose at home.
Takeaways:
Is McCaffrey is even better than he was last year? He looks stronger and defenders were bouncing off him on Sunday. Also his patience and footwork looked even sharper than last year. Cam looked alright but he didn’t do anything on Sunday to stop worriers from saying he’s shaken. Even some of his open throws aren’t as pinpoint accurate as they should be.
On the Rams’ side of the ball, their defense looks pretty good again. Playing without Aaron Donald didn’t really change them much because the Panthers are so one dimensional. Anytime you win on the road you need to be proud of your team. Norv Turner ran a beautiful direct snap to Mcaffrey who faked handoff to Newton. Beautiful misdirection and it was one of my favorite plays of the day (Clip)
Bills at Jets.
I don't want to touch on this game too much. It hurt to watch. Sam Darnold scored the weirdest TD ever. Bills had 4 TDs in the first half. Looks like another great year for the AFC East teams not named the Pats. What a truly impressive loss by the jets and even bigger win by the bills. Those are all of my thoughts. As should be yours. I think Leveon Bell is good still. He looked good for a guy who hadn't played football in 15 months.
Chiefs at Jaguars
Injuries injuries injuries. Mahones limped a bit, Nick Foles is out for the game - injured clavicle, Myles Jack was kicked out, another linebacker for the Jags got injured. If the Jags weren’t going to drop for the loss it’s because of all the injuries they suffered. Not to let the Chiefs off the hook, Tyreek Hill may have broken shoulder. Good thing Mahomes is still good. Everything looks easy again for him. I think he even sailed a pass trying to no look.
Ravens at Dolphins.
Is Lamar Jackson too much of a pocket QB. Should he use his legs more? Im not gonna overreact to this Ravens win because they did the same thing last year to the Bills in Week 1. The big difference though is that they did it with Lamar this week and not Joe Flacco. Jackson’s pocket presence and ability to throw and not run instinctually was truly impressive. The Dolphins are already at bottom so I have nothing to say about them.
Titans at Browns. - I’ll just say it now. I am not going to overreact to the Browns’ bad loss because I was so impressed with Tennessee. That being said; it was a bad loss. We forget they have a ton of new personnel who didn’t play in preseason together. They also have new HC. Browns looked very out of sync and a little like a disaster. I feel like we all should have seen this coming. That's what happened when you’re the most hyped offseason team. Sometimes you let people down. They’ll figure it out though. Bet the Browns next week on a bounce-back game.
In regards to the Titans, their defensive line was really good. The Browns offensive line isn’t anything special so is their great play today more indicative of that? Here’s the first player of the week that I didn’t know was on a new team: Cam Wake on the Titans. He was a great addition to an already good defense though.
Falcons at Vikings.
Vikings defense looks good again. I’ll say it, I’m not afraid to: the Falcons look bad. Their offensive line looked bad. They also had another big defensive injury. Is this just going to be like last year? Also Kirk Cousins I have a question. Who throws for 98 yards in an NFL game? Is Kirk Cousins the new Mitch Trubisky?
Redskins at Eagles.
The Eagles ruined everyone’s parlays today, but they don’t care because they won. Wentz looked like a guy who hadn’t been healthy since week 15 of last year. He was flat out bad in the first half, but turned it around in the second. Second player who I didn’t know changed teams: Deshaun Jackson. He’s back in Philly and the NFL is better for it. The Eagles put together Super Bowl quality drive to start second half and that changed the complexity of the entire game. That's how good teams adjust at half time when they’re punched in the mouth. That still didn’t change the fact they didn’t cover.
Late Games:
Colts at Chargers.
Takeaways: Chargers run game is not an issue and Brissett looked as average as I figured he’d be, but I was impressed with the demeanor of the Colts all game long. Their biggest flaw is that they lost that game the way the Chargers usually lose - with a kicker and two bad penalties. Chargers' RBs Ekeler and Jackson ran for 115 yards and 7 receptions for 64 yards. I’m sure at some point I’ll will eat this words, but I’ll say it now anyway: the Chargers don’t need Melvin Gordon (cue Week 2 loss to the Lions where the Chargers only rush for 25 yards).
Other notes from this game. Rivers looked pretty mobile in the pocket. In a year where some were projecting his may be the year he’d start to fall off, he moved well Week 1. He looked especially good on this touchdown pass to Keenan Allen in the second quarter. Also that one-handed interception by the Hooker was dope.
Bengals at Seahawks
- didn’t watch (it's already bad that I'm missing games Week 1). The Seahawks won though so I’m just gonna assume they were down going into the 4th and then came back to win the game - like usual.
Lions at Cards.
There’s only one thing I really care about from this game. Actually two but I’ll save the second for later. The first thing I care about is the final drive of regulation by Kyle Murray and the Cardinal’s offense. It was what Cliff Kingsbury envisioned for this team. They got great push from their offensive. They ran an option, then a quick out route, and to cap it all off Kyler threw a dime to Larry Legend. Kyler Murray showed great composure in the second half after a very shaky start. This is nothing new to see for college football fans, but I’m glad people who thought he was good were validated. Incredible heart and comeback to win the game! Oh wait they didn’t...that leads me to my second thing. You gotta make that interception in overtime. It was handed to you on a platter. On the Lions’ side of the ball, their line was dominating on both sides of the ball in the first half.
Giants at Cowboys.
Is Kellen Moore the greatest play caller of all time? Yes most definitely. Is Eli Manning going to lose his job even sooner than everyone expected. Also yes, most definitely.
Niners at Bucs.
The Niners defense looked good because of Jameis. We'll see if it's actually good.
Big takeaway:
Neither of these QBs are that great. Jimmy G. had some really inaccurate throws. His best throw of the game was taken back because of a penalty. Also this may be the end of the road for Jameis. Everyone came into today ready to declare Mariota over. Seems like it’s Pick #1 from that same draft who could be on the way out.
(OOOOHh) Sunday Night:
Steelers at Patriots
The Patriots were clowning on the Steelers for most of the evening and even Al Michael was laughing at one point. How do people always forget Edelman can throw the ball? That play was so clever. James White sold that fake and deserves every acting award for that performance.
Pats created hell for the Steelers’ Linebackers by forcing them to match up with their running backs and receivers over and over again. These mismatches with skill position players on line backs is what Pittsburgh has struggled against for multiple years now. How are they letting this happen again???? Pittsburgh also made too many mistakes to beat Patriots tonight. The Steelers aren’t a bad team and I think they can make the Playoffs, they just won’t be going to the Superbowl.
Monday Night:
Texans at Saints.
This was the game of the week. Drew Brees started slow, but he looked like one of the best QBs in the league in the second half. Deshaun Watson was amazing all game long and if not for the Texans' offensive line reverting to their previous protection struggles from last season, perhaps the Texans could have sustained a few more drives. That was a big time game by two big time teams though. That's why we watch football!
Raiders at Broncos.
The fearsome Broncos' defense had no answers for Derek Carr and the unstoppable Josh Jacobs run game. You gotta ask now. Did Antonio Brown make a mistake leaving the Raiders? Carr did have a better completion percentage than Brady in Week 1 (don't fact check that).
And those are all the games from this week. Here are my initial rankings based on these outcomes:
**photos found via NBCSports and ESPN