I'm pleased to say that Week 2 of the NFL season went quite a bit better than Week 1 in regards to Purple Nightmare predictions. I went 8-6 in my first batch of picks, but I went 14-2 over this past weekend. This is a good sign as it took me over a month to really get a grasp on the true strength of each NFL team last year. That, however, may have been due to unpredictable and uneven officiating from the replacement refs. Thankfully, the 2013 season features zero replacement officials.
Solid officiating and accurate predictions are certainly not the only things that made this a pleasant week in the NFL. Any week in which the Ravens win and the Steelers lose is a good week. The Ravens' first win of the season may not have been pretty or resounding, but wins over the Browns seldom are. The Ravens, as usual, found themselves up against a pesky Browns team that played stout defense which effectively stuffed the Ravens rushing attack. The Ravens, however, could have taken the lead early, but dropped passes once again plagued the team's patchwork receiving corps. Marlon Brown dropped what would have been a spectacular touchdown grab in the first quarter. Fortunately, Brown later made up for it with a successful touchdown reception in which he caught the ball and lunged for the endzone with his arm stretched out.
One simply can't worry about the Ravens only beating the Browns 14-6. The Ravens won the Super Bowl last year and barely beat the Browns each time they played them in the regular season--that's just how divisional games go. I could go into great depth analyzing finer points of the Ravens-Browns game, but I've learned not to panic if the Ravens barely beat the Browns as it seems to have zero bearing on how they play against other NFL teams. Let's move on to the rest of the league, shall we? The Manning Bowl wasn't even close as the Broncos showed the world that they truly are a dominant team once again. Who knows if this early regular season dominance will continue for the rest of the regular season or into the playoffs, but we must assume that the Broncos will win 12-14 games given their current state and Peyton Manning's track record of regular season success. Ironically, that could spell doom for the Broncos as homefield advantage in the playoffs means weather well below freezing against teams that are quite well suited to handle such conditions including the Ravens and Patriots.
The outcome of the Broncos-Giants matchup likely surprised few people nationwide, but a game that proved far more interesting and maybe a little surprising for some was the Seahawks-49ers. I predicted a Seahawks win, but I didn't anticipate another blowout reminiscent of that of last year in Seattle. The Seahawks shut the 49ers down on offense and made Colin Kaepernick look like the relatively young, inexperienced QB he actually is. It's not that Kaepernick is ineffective or inconsistent, but the Seattle defense is on an entirely different level when playing at home in front of that virtual wall of crowd noise. This doesn't mean that the 49ers are a bad team as I'm sure they'll win plenty of games this season, but I did find one thing extremely alarming (though not surprising) if you're a 49ers fan. Anquan Boldin had exactly one catch against the Seahawks. He couldn't beat Richard Sherman off the line due to a comparative lack of speed and the extreme physicality that Sherman possesses to match that of Boldin. In Baltimore, fans were all too aware of Boldin's tendency to simply disappear in some games while playing absolutely dominantly in others. Few other teams possess cornerbacks as talented and physical as Sherman, but teams will use video of this game as a blueprint to shutting down an aging receiver that can potentially take over a game if he's not planned for correctly.
Most of the rest of the NFL games of Week 2 went exactly as I expected, and the Bengals-Steelers game was no exception. The Steelers lack of talent and depth at offensive line is nothing new, but this year the boys in black and yellow are particularly thin up front. Beyond that, the Steelers allowed Mike Wallace to leave in free agency for the Miami Dolphins, and now their receiving corps looks to be one playmaker short of effective. Even if Big Ben finds a way to extend plays with his sense of awareness and impressive footwork, he finds few open receivers and simply throws the ball away or gets buried by defenders. The Steelers' lack of a running game has proven extremely apparent as this is essentially the worst statistical rushing attack since the 1930s for the franchise through the first two weeks of any season.
With all of that said, I wasn't particularly impressed with the Bengals. Sure they won by a convincing 10 points, and divisional matchups are often close like that of the Browns and Ravens. This, however, is a SEVERELY wounded Steelers team with a relatively inept offense and an aging defense. How is it that the Bengals can't simply manage to blow them away at home? The answer lies in the Bengals' young quarterback. Andy Dalton came alive late in the game, but he appeared rather inaccurate for the first half especially on deep passes. People always insist that A.J. Green is one of the most talented wide receivers in football, and maybe he is, but the Bengals will never fully take advantage of Green's speed if Andy Dalton can't accurately throw the ball deep down field to him. The Ravens haven't yet hit their stride, and maybe they won't this season, but that may be the only thing working in favor of a Bengals team whose offensive leader appears to be its biggest question mark. Dalton will have to make major improvements if the Bengals hope to get past the first round of the playoffs and the likes of the Houston Texans this season.
The Houston Texans are not the same team that bullied its way to the top of power rankings through the first 9 games of last season. They appear, instead, to be a lot more like the team that barely beat the Jaguars and Lions and allowed 26 points per game in their final 7 games of last season. Don't look now, but the Texans have allowed an average of exactly 26 points per game through the first two weeks of the season as they barely squeaked by both the Chargers and Titans. Are the Chargers and Titans that good or are the Texans just barely better than each of those teams? This week should shed some light on that as the Texans go to Baltimore to face a franchise they've only beaten once in the history of their team. The Texans will likely be without Andre Johnson (concussion) and left tackle Duane Brown. That could leave the Texans with only DeAndre Hopkins and Owen Daniels as major receiving threats, but more importantly, Duane Brown's absence could leave the Texans extremely vulnerable to a revamped Ravens pass rush. Only time will tell how the 2-0 Texans will be able to overcome a pair of major injuries in a hostile environment.
One player who has clearly not totally overcome a major injury is Washington Redskins quarterback, Robert Griffin III. I doubt anyone expected the Redskins to go into Green Bay and beat the Packers, but Griffin simply doesn't appear confident on his surgically repaired knee. During Week 1 against the Eagles, Griffin seemed hesitant to step into throws and completed almost no passes in the first half of the game. Yes, the Redskins battled back and may have even had a chance to win if they had recovered a late onside kick, but the two-week trend of falling dangerously behind their opponent and simply putting up points in garbage time will not win the Redskins games. This week against the Lions will be a major test for RG3. The young phenom must win this game or his team will have almost no hope by my calculations. It's not that losing three games puts them too far behind to catch up in a 16 game season, but rest of the Redskins schedule is daunting to say the least. Based on their first two weeks of the 2013 season, I judge there to be 4-5 winnable games at MOST for the Skins. If they continue to play in this fashion, this could be a sorrowfully depressing year for a fanbase that had a lot to get excited about last season. Could this be the fault of a head coach that won't step in again when its clear that his young quarterback isn't aware of his own physical limitations?
Week 3 of the NFL may not have as many major matchups between playoff contenders as Week 2, but it may prove more revealing with regards to teams that have gotten off to good starts but haven't proven themselves against tough competition yet. We get to see how the highly touted Bengals handle a high-powered Packers offense at home in Cincinnati, and we also get to find out whether or not the Dolphins are as good as their record suggests as they host the Falcons on Sunday afternoon. Either the Ravens or Texans will prove they can overcome major injuries to beat a major AFC playoff contender, and the tomorrow night Andy Reid and his new team, the Chiefs, will travel to Philadelphia to face his old team, the Eagles, in a showdown that could reveal whether Andy Reid or Chip Kelly's new offense is more effective. This week could also feature both the Redskins and Steelers overcoming the effects of injuries and winning their first game, orrrrrr both teams could simply continue their losing trends against two reasonably competitive teams (the Lions and Bears). However Week 3 turns out, make sure to stay tuned, and DEFINITELY stay tuned as the Ravens take on the Texans at 1:00 on Sunday.
AS ALWAYS
GO RAVENS!!!
No comments:
Post a Comment