So, what did we learn from week three in the NFL?
– The Cincinnati Bengals and Indianapolis Colts are the cream of the crop in the AFC.
– Ben Roethlisberger is playing like a guy that has been in a horrific motorcycle accident and is coming off of appendectomy surgery. But he has to play to shake the cobwebs out.
– Despite losing Sunday to Chicago, Minnesota can compete in the NFC thanks to Brad Childress.
– I swear Jake Delhomme and Kurt Warner play with butter on their hands – three fumbles lost between the both of them Sunday; Warner now has eight on the year.
– Teams in the NFC better hope that Seattle doesn’t earn home field advantage throughout the playoffs, because the Seahawks are a completely different team at Quest Field.
– The Giants secondary is awful.
– Baltimore has a real good player in DT Kelly Greg.
– Miami and Tampa Bay were possibly the two most over hyped teams in the NFL this offseason, you hear that Sports Illustrated?
Lets recap the top match ups heading into Sunday and then look at some quick shots from the rest of the action in Week 3:
Cincinnati 28, Pittsburgh 20
Not to take anything away from Cincinnati, but the Bengals didn’t outplay the Steelers in this game. Pittsburgh out gained Cincinnati, converted more third down attempts, held the ball longer and almost doubled the Bengals first down output (27-15 in favor of the Steelers).
When your quarterback is playing scared and you turn the ball over five times, however, you’re not going to win. Give credit to the Bengals though, because Hines Field is a tough place to play in and they had to battle through a lot of emotion off of last year’s playoff loss. With the Steelers now at 1-2 and Cincinnati at 3-0, for a moment the Bengals can start concentrating on Baltimore and leave Pitt in the dust.
Most impressed with: Carson Palmer and Willie Parker. Palmer led four scoring drives for the Bengals and even though he was picked off twice, he threw for close to 200 yards and four touchdowns. Palmer won the game despite RB Rudi Johnson (19 carries for 47 yards) having a tough time running against the Steelers front seven.
Like I said in the introduction, if it weren’t for Parker the Steelers wouldn’t have scored today. Parker ran for 133 yards on 31 carries and when you get that type of production out of your starting back, you should win the game.
Least impressed with: Roethlisberger is hurt and isn’t getting much on his deep ball. He has happy feet in the pocket and just doesn’t look like himself.
Chicago 19, Minnesota 16
Sloppy game, but the Bears don’t care. They get a division victory on the road in a hostile environment and now have a two game lead (with the head to head victory) over the overachieving Vikings in the NFC North.
Rex Grossman threw for 278 yards and had a touchdown, but he did throw two costly interceptions (one was taken back for a touchdown by CB Antoine Winfield) and came back down to earth a bit. Muhsin Muhammad and Bernard Berrin proved to be solid targets all day long for Grossman and combined for 15 catches and 188 yards.
Most impressed with: Neither team played over its head, but Lovie Smith has this team believing they can compete when they’re behind in games now. Smith is getting no production out of his run game, but his confidence in Grossman to throw late in games is being rewarded with W’s in the win column.
Least impressed with: As noted up above, the Bears have no running game. Thomas Jones – 18 carries for 54 yards against a defense that was giving up an average of 100 yards per game just won’t cut it. At some point this season, Smith is going to have to get something out of his run game or teams are going to start dropping seven into pass coverage and smother Chicago’s receivers.
Indianapolis 21, Jacksonville 14
Outstanding win by the Colts today. I know that the Jaguars were coming off a short week, but Jacksonville has got to beat these guys if everybody is going to consider them as a Super Bowl contender.
Peyton Manning was able to find holes in Jacksonville’s defense for scores and even scored on a two-yard touchdown run himself. Indy’s defense wasn’t overly impressive – in fact it wasn’t impressive at all – but they did enough not to lose the game.
Most impressed with: Maurice Jones-Drew from Jacksonville. This kid was all over the place on offense for the Jaguars. He carried the ball 13 times for 103 yards and caught four passes for 32 yards and a touchdown. He was fun to watch and at times, the rookie was QB Byron Leftwich’s only weapon.
Least impressed with: The Colts running game is back to having question marks (65 total yards on the ground by Dominic Rhodes and Joseph Addai). However, Jacksonville is so tough to run on, so we’ll give Indy another reprieve.
Quick Shots:
Who was luckier to get a win this weekend: Baltimore or Notre Dame? If the Browns had any offensive firepower in the second half of their 15-14 loss Sunday, they would have clinched their first win of the season. QB Charlie Frye’s interception in the end zone with just over three minutes to play in the game was such a crucial moment in the game. If Cleveland could have at least gotten a field goal to make the score 17-12, I just don’t see the Ravens marching all the way down the field for a touchdown (which they would have had to do to win) the way their offense had been playing. Instead, Matt Stover (clutch-o-matic) nails a 52-yard FG with 24 seconds left to keep Baltimore undefeated…The Dolphins might be the worst team in the AFC East – no joke. Nice job beating the hopeless Tennessee Titans 13-10 on your own field Miami, especially when you were 10.5-point favorites…Somebody woke up Washington’s offense on Sunday! 31 points? Oh, it was against Houston? Never mind – although Mark Brunell going 22 of 22 before his first incompletion is quite remarkable…Brett Favre destroys the Lions for about the 1,000th time in his career. Three touchdowns, 340 yards passing and Green Bay sends Detroit to 0-3 after a 31-24 shoot out at Ford Field…Don’t look now, but the NY Jets are 2-1 and are playing extremely tough under rookie head coach Eric Mangini. The Jets have no running game, but QB Chad Pennington is playing great and has a touchdown to interception ratio of 5:1. J.P. Losman threw for a shocking 328 yards in the Bills 28-20 loss, but I’ll have to check the tapes to see if the Jets were actually on the field when this feat took place…All is right again in Carolina after WR Steve Smith returns in a 26-24 victory over Tampa Bay. Smith caught seven passes for 112 yards, but the real story was WR Keyshawn Johnson lighting up his former team for seven catches for 97 yards and two touchdowns (one was on a reverse). Stick a fork in the Bucs and get one ready for the Panthers, because they still aren’t playing good football – their defense gave up 24 points to a team that came into the game without a touchdown? Yikes…Oh, no! Get out the way – Seattle romped the Giants 42-30. Forget the score, the Seahawks jumped out to a 42-3 lead before Eli Manning made the game somewhat respectable. Seattle at home is almost unbeatable…The Eagles bounced back nicely with a 38-24 win over the 49ers, but San Francisco exploited Philly’s defense a couple of times in the loss. Something just isn’t right about the Eagles defense, but the good news is that QB Donovan McNabb is playing like an M.V.P. candidate and is keeping his team in contention…St. Louis desperately held on to a 16-14 win in Arizona. The Rams were set to cough up the win when the Cardinals scored to cut the lead to 16-14 after St. Louis lead most of the contest 16-7. Marc Bulger fumbled on the Rams ensuing possession and Arizona took over on the Rams 34 yard line with two minutes left to play. Kurt Warner, however, graciously gave the ball back to St. Louis with a fumble of his own and Arizona missed a chance to go 2-1 on the young season. Despite the loss, the Cards duo of Anquan Boldin and Larry Fitzgerald at receiver is just sick to watch when Arizona’s offense is in unison…In other NFL news, the Raiders lost to the BYE 34-3, which still leaves Oakland without a touchdown this season.
Sunday night match up:
Boy, New England might be the least impressive 2-1 team in the NFL right now. The Patriots had to come from behind to beat the Bills in the opener, then they had to hang on for dear life last week against the Jets and then they look totally uninspiring Sunday night in a 17-7 loss to Denver.
QB Tom Brady was fine, but Denver just completely shut down the Patriots run game. It didn’t help losing Corey Dillon so early in the contest, but rookie Laurence Maroney didn’t look like the back with burst from New England’s first two games. I mean, 18 yards on 12 carries?
I’m sure the Broncos are feeling much better about themselves after QB Jake Plummer showed he had a pulse in throwing for two touchdowns and 256 yards. RB Tatum Bell and WR Javon Walker stole the show with their performances, however.
Bell ran for 123 yards on 27 carries and showed head coach Mike Shanahan what he could do with a full workload. Walker on the other hand, made two phenomenal touchdown catches and finished with 130 receiving yards on just three receptions.
So, after three weeks the New England Patriots and New York Jets are tied atop the AFC East at 2-1 (although the Patriots hold the edge in the head to head tiebreaker right now).
Didn’t see that one coming.
Still left on the Week 3 docket:
New Orleans reopens the Superdome against division rival Atlanta on Monday Night Football tomorrow.
