Week Five gives us a chance to start separating contenders from pretenders. 5-0 and then 6-0 become much tougher to reach than 4-0 except when an extremely soft schedule is encountered on occasion like Kansas City experienced. New England, Cincinnati, Denver, Green Bay Atlanta and Carolina all remain unbeaten. Carolina is on their Bye Week after which they go to Seattle which should take care of that one. This weekend the Seahawks face an AFC Regular Season Warrior in the Cincinnati Bengals who reportedly have it back together on defence. We get to find out if they do as the Seahawk offence is so anemic without Lynch whereas the Bengals sent Tom Brady home soaking wet and no longer unbeaten in Week Five of 2013 the last time they actually did.
In Green Bay, with all kinds of consecutive this’s and that’s going on the talented St. Louis Rams come to visit, the team that drafted so many very good players to let Washington suffer with Booby G3 that they could spend this year’s top pick on the Wild Card that is Gurley and also has Aaron Donald who should be able to harass Aaron Rogers all day long, for the most part at least. The Packers have not yet felt the loss of Jordy Nelson but a team cannot lose the very best WR1 in the game and not suffer. On the other side of the ball, if Gurley is for real, and it sounds like he is, Nick Foles is absolutely the best Quarterback for the Rams offence as he knows well how to take what is there and let his running game do the heavy lifting from his 27 TD/2 INT season in Philadelphia. Clay Matthews may be a very good player but the Packers do not have the run defence to stop a very special running back. With the Rams holding still at slightly better than 3/1 Gurley could be a good bet.
Denver visits Oakland in a game a lot more contestable than most would have thought before the season. Manning isn’t right but the Bronco defence is playing like Mr. May Dave Winfield that is out of this world at the beginning of the season. Demarcus Ware is 33 and has already been hurt really bad once after the big 3 0 that he is one wrong pileup away from retirement much like Peyton himself. The Raiders on the other hand are as young as Denver is old with their offensive leader (Carr) and defensive leader (Mack) are only in their second season. The Raiders have dropped well below 2/1 (at 7/4 Saturday Night) but still offer decent value at home. It may surprise you to learn that the Raiders are in the Top 10 defending the run (under 4 yards per attempt) and Denver is not for all this talk about the Bronco defence. It is of course the exact opposite in the secondary where the Raiders are using old men although Charles Woodson got an interception last week and the week before at age 39. Such is the NFL.
The 4-0 Atlanta Falcons entertain the 2-2 Washington Redskins, Captain Kirk Cousin’s version. Cousins has thrown 1 TD in each game while the Redskins have rediscovered running the football and presently lead the league. Atlanta has beaten each of Washington’s East Division opponents outlasting the Eagles by 2 points and then taking advantage of the second Momentary Lapse of Reason by the NY Giants followed by beating the Brandon Weeden version of the Cowboys and then a Houston Texan’s squad where Ryan Mallett had a meltdown at QB and Hoyer had to come in to mop up. Captain Kirk looks like he may be an NFL caliber QB after all as he continues to improve. Although he has been around as long as Griffin, Cousins only has 13 starts under his belt. In Peyton Manning’s 13th start (against the Falcons BTW) he threw two picks in a loss with a passer rating of 79.1 and in Tom Brady’s 13th start he too threw 2 Interceptions and had a passer rating of 61.3 but the Patriots did still beat a 7-9 Cleveland team. The Redskins are at 5/2 in a game we believe to be a 50-50 chance for either team.
So we expect the Bengal Defence to rule the day against the Seahawks to go 5-0, Gurley to give the Packers all they want and then some, the Raiders to assert themselves (although beating Denver is very questionable) while Washington, in the top ten against the run and against the pass, sends the Falcons to 4-1 and Carolina gets ready to go to Seattle and meet a well rest Marshawn and his boys. That leaves New England visiting the Big “D”. The Patriots (Brady) has beaten Callas the week before their Bye Week, the week after their Bye Week and when they have played with no Bye Week to consider at all. Brady has owned Dallas so far in his career beating Romo twice and Quincy Carter? Did you know that Dallas ever had a black quarterback that won 16 games and took them to the Playoffs when he went 10-6 in 2003? That Patriot defence where everyone did their job and everyone had learned what to do was number one in least Points Allowed (the only defensive stat that matters) helped New England win 12-0 as if to emphasise being number one in scoring defence.
The Patriots should demoralize Dallas as they will again aim to score on every drive like they did in their previous game at the short price of 1/4 as Belichick will have learned how to shut down what Weeden likes to do and forcing him to do what he doesn’t. We should find out why Belichick brought the behemoth Akiem Hicks to Boston. It is hoped that putting the 335 lb Lineman out there with rookie Malcom Brown to help the Patriot run defence that added another quality linebacker in 24 year old Jonathan Bostic.
We will learn:
1) Is New England just at another level above everyone else? Will Brady rack up another 50 points?
2) Is the Bengals defence for real and can they shut out Russell Wilson sans Lynch?
3) Can the Packers run defence stop someone special like Gurley? What about the Ram pass rush?
4) How will the battle down in Oakland will go and can Mack get to Manning?
5) Can Kirk Cousins, 2-2 this year, play well enough to take down 4-0 Atlanta?
6) Has John Fox helped the Bears defence to shut down Alex Smith
7) Will talented Jacksonville jump back up after their very disappointing loss in Indy?
8) Can Drew Brees carry the Saints over an Eagles team in disarray?
9) What will Baltimore do on offence with zero playmakers after Smith went down?
10) How will Jeff Fisher try to deal with Aaron Rodgers?
11) Can Car Part lead the Bills to victory in a “get right” game in Nashville?
12) Will the Lions bounce back and do enough to beat Carson Palmer without Ngata?
13) Who will win the Brandon Weeden/Bill Belichick chess match?
14) How will Amari Cooper fare against his shadow Aqib Talib in Oakland
15) Are the 49ers on a different level? Like the opposite of New England?
16) Can the Steelers win with Mike Vick?
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