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NFL Week 1 recaps

NFL Analysis: Closing Out Week 1

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The biggest game of Week 1 was Green Bay-San Francisco, and that one was recapped here. Let’s close out our NFL analysis on the season’s opening week with a run through the 15 remaining games…

NFC SUB-PLOTS


New Orleans 23 Atlanta 17: Both defenses played surprisingly well, given the quarterbacks they were facing. The Saints had to be pleased with the pass rush they got for new defensive coordinator Rob Ryan, generating three sacks and six QB hits, in the first game without injured pass-rusher Will Smith.

Dallas 36 NY Giants 31: The bar was set low in this game. The Giants didn’t run the ball, committed six turnovers and still had a chance to win on the road.

Philadelphia 33 Washington 27: Chip Kelly’s hurry-up offense gets a lot of attention for the 53 first-half plays. RG3’s return, where he looked rusty in the first half and sharper in the second, also gets the media ink. Overlooked is the fact the Redskin ground game was pathetic, while LeSean McCoy ran wild for the Eagles, piling up 184 yards.

Seattle 12 Carolina 7: The Panthers can feel as good as it’s possible to feel about a home loss. They shut down Marshawn Lynch on the ground and were driving at the end for the chance to beat the third NFC heavyweight, before a turnover did them in. Seattle has to like the fact Russell Wilson was productive in the air without any ground support.

St. Louis 27 Arizona 24: This was a big moment for St. Louis quarterback Sam Bradford. He rallied his team from 24-13 down in the fourth quarter to win it. We knew Jeff Fisher’s Rams would run the ball and play some defense, but to see Bradford rally against a good defense tells you something good about where St. Louis might be going this year. No shame for Arizona either, as this loss comes on the road.

Detroit 34 Minnesota 24: Christian Ponder threw three interceptions. The Vikings need a quarterback who can integrate smoothly into a run-first offensive concept. Last I heard, Tim Tebow is available.

TWO SHOCKERS COME UP SHORT


New England 23 Buffalo 21: If the Bills don’t commit ten penalties, they win this game. They kept Tom Brady underneath, got after him with some pressure, recovered a couple fumbles and their own rookie quarterback E.J. Manuel played mistake-free.

The problem is this—what separates teams like the Patriots from teams like the Bills, and the latter always has a reason they should have won. The other actually wins. Still, no point blaming new coach Doug Marrone for the sins of the past. Good start, now clean up the penalties.

Indianapolis 21 Oakland 17: Andrew Luck didn’t get the ball down the field very well, but he stayed away from the big mistake and got a chance to finish off a comeback, jaunting 19 yards for the winning score. This game still underscores, though, that the Colts are not as good as last year’s 11-5 record made them look.

In the end, Brady and Luck’s late drives saved a lot of loser pools, my own included, as their teams were the two biggest favorites on the board.

AFC NORTH WIPEOUT

 

Denver 49 Baltimore 27: Last year’s Super Bowl champs got off to a rocky start. Peyton Manning threw seven touchdown passes, Joe Flacco threw two picks, and just as problematic is that Flacco threw 62 passes against 21 rush attempts. Granted, some of that was in the come-from-behind effort, but this was still a game Baltimore led at halftime. Rough start for the post-Ray Lewis era.

Chicago 24 Cincinnati 21: Great job the long-maligned Chicago offensive line. Cincinnati’s defensive front is excellent, but they never got to Jay Cutler.

Tennessee 16 Pittsburgh 9: Of all the losses in the AFC North’s 0-4 showing in Week 1, this was the most alarming. The Steelers were at home, but they didn’t run the ball, they didn’t force turnovers and their only offensive points came on a touchdown with less than two minutes to play. Pittsburgh also lost center Maurkice Pouncey. Big problems for Coach Tomlin.

Miami 23 Cleveland 10: Is it at all shocking that this was a penalty-ridden affair (19 combined for both teams) with the ultimate deciding factor being that Brandon Weeden threw three interceptions for the Browns? No, I didn’t think it was.

THREE LOUSY GAMES

NY Jets 18 Tampa Bay 17: When I did my preseason predictions, I thought Tampa Bay would have a decent season, while the Jets would be a disaster. But for my Week 1 picks, I took a flyer and said this would be one of those games that just kind of upset the applecart and New York would first raise its fans hopes with a win, before dashing them. Whether Tampa Bay will actually be any good is a debatable point, but the Jets did nothing to suggest emerging excellence.

Kansas City 28 Jacksonville 2: Big day for the Kansas City defense, as Jamaal Houston’s three sacks led up a team that sacked Jacksonville quarterbacks (Blaine Gabbert and Chad Henne) six times. If you’re Jacksonville, the safety you got to start the game almost makes it look worse now. Sitting with a “2” on the board as your final total gets the attention of fans, whereas we’d have glossed over a shutout.

Houston 31 San Diego 28: They might have a new coach in Mike McCoy, but San Diego is still the same old Bolts. Up 28-7 in the third quarter at home and they lose in regulation. Philip Rivers throws a pick-six in his own red-zone. Some things never change.

Prognostication Tally: I picked all games against the moneyline, as will be the case here at TheSportsNotebook each week. I ended up (+82) on the week, thanks primarily to the Jets coming through as a (+167) underdog.

 

NFL Week 1 Recap

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Week 1 of the NFL is in the books, so let’s go division-by-division with some observations…

NFC EAST: The big stories of Week 1 are all right here and there’s plenty of chances to overreact. Does Robert Griffin III’s fantastic debut—called the best ever by a rookie quarterback in the NFL yesterday by the normally reserved Michael Wilbon on ESPN—mean the Redskins are a division contender? Do Michael Vick’s four interceptions mean more than the fact he ultimately led a game-winning drive to push Philadelphia past Cleveland? Are the Giants headed for another pedestrian regular season or are the Cowboys now real Super Bowl material? For now, let’s just focus on the last point—we already know Dallas is capable of looking very good. What we don’t know is if they’ll string together consistent wins or if a clunker home loss is waiting in the wings. How about we see if they can at least go like 4-1 or 6-2 before we book passage to New Orleans for the Super Bowl?

NFC NORTH: I’m going to hold back on Green Bay’s poor defensive showing against San Francisco and Chicago’s win over Indy, since the Packers-Bears play Thursday night and we’ll talk about both teams more in depth in just two days. For now, let’s look at Detroit. Does their narrow home win over St. Louis mean a warning sign for the Lions, or instead an indicator the Rams will be improved? I’m concerned about Matthew Stafford’s three picks, but given the presence of Jeff Fischer on the St. Louis sideline and the talent the Rams have on the defensive front I’m going to give the benefit of the doubt to St. Louis and say this was just a case of a team going from awful to at least semi-competent and semi-competent in the NFL means you can at least compete week-in and week-out.

NFC SOUTH: Just like Detroit gets the benefit of the doubt, so does Carolina. I think Tampa’s 16-10 home win over the Panthers is more a sign that the Bucs are going to be respectable this year than it is a sign of Carolina being overrated. At the start of the year I picked Carolina to go 9-7 and Tampa to shoot up to 8-8, so a home win for the Bucs fits that landscape.

NFC WEST: We’ll look at San Francisco in more depth tomorrow after their win in Green Bay has moved them to the forefront of Super Bowl discussion (to the extent the Niners weren’t there already). But I want to throw a second-guess at Seattle head coach Pete Carroll, or at least whomever handles the play-calling. The Seahawks trail Arizona by six points, and have three shots at the end zone. Russell Wilson is a quarterback who’s short, with some accuracy issues, but very mobile and good on the run. So does Seattle roll him out and let him create something? No, they run three straight pure dropback passes and fail to get in the end zone. I like to give coaches the benefit of the doubt, because I think they probably often have legitimate reasons for their decisions, even if they don’t work out. I’ll give the same to Carroll and his staff regarding this play-calling. I just wish I knew what the rationale was, because it escaped me.

AFC EAST: I know the media will want to talk about the Jets, but I can’t get past just how bad Buffalo was. I wasn’t a part of the modestly crowded Bills’ bandwagon to start the season, but I wouldn’t have expected the team to be this bad. How much longer do they stay with Ryan Fitzpatrick, after he throws three interceptions? And the most alarming stat anywhere in the NFL? Buffalo, after signing Mario Williams in the offseason not only ends up with zero sacks—against a questionable offensive line—but zero QB hits.

AFC NORTH: Even those of us who think Baltimore is in decline (I say “those of us” as though there were more people than just me thinking that) have to do a double-take after last night’s 44-13 thrashing of Cincinnati. Joe Flacco played the part of the quarterback having a breakout year and the defense produced four sacks. The concern? Cincinnati established the run, with 129 yards on the ground.

AFC SOUTH: Very disappointing effort from Tennessee. The Titans might not have been expected to win against New England, even at home, but the rushing game was non-existent and if that’s going to be a pattern than it will be a long year in Nashville. And though Jacksonville didn’t play badly in an overtime loss at Minnesota, if they can’t beat the Vikings, where are the wins going to come from?

AFC WEST: I’m sure everyone has heard plenty of pundit-talk about Peyton Manning’s play on Sunday night and this is a case where the mainstream commentary is pretty well right on. San Diego got a nice win on the road over Oakland, but that has the look of a game that was more about Raider incompetence offensively. And though Phillip Rivers’ completed 24/33 passes, the fact those completions only got 231 yards against a lousy secondary has to be a least a yellow flag. Last night might have been a 7-9 team beating a 5-11 team.