Oh, to be 3-0. Undefeated teams like the Saints and Colts receive beaming rays of sunshine from sports pages and talk radio all around the country. Their players start talking momentum, their fans start talking Super Bowl.
For formerly unbeaten teams that had their bubble burst, though, week 3 can be a sobering bummer. The Falcons and Patriots are suddenly pelted with questions about weaknesses they’d been praised for overcoming just a week ago.
As we look back on the last week of NFL action, two big stories stand out: the Bengals beating the Steelers and the Jaguars losing to the Colts. Each fits one of the descriptions above. The 3-0 Bengals are being hailed as potential champions, and the 2-1 Jaguars’ newfound credibility from their MNF win has been all but washed away.
Both storylines have it exactly wrong. Dig a little deeper, and you’ll see the Bengals win was a fluke, while the Jags’ loss revealed them to be as strong as previously advertised.
Cincinnati isn’t better than the Steelers.
They won the game. They may win the divison. But that game turned on bizarre gaffes, like the wind gust that sent a punt off the helmet of Steeler Ricardo Colclough that resulted in the Bengals’ possession in which they took the lead. Roethlisberger is also not back to full strength, or fully sharp yet. He threw 2 picks in the endzone he probably won’t throw in the second half of the year. His other pick came when he stepped on an OL’s foot. Had the lineman not stepped backward, an open Hines Ward might have scored a go-ahead TD.
The normally stout Bengals line couldn’t stop the Steeler rush. Palmer faced sack after sack in the second half, and had he not gotten the ball back in outstanding field position thanks to lady luck, he would’ve had an awfully hard time moving the ball down the field. Palmer also threw a few ugly intercepted floaters himself, and seemed genuinely rattled by Pittsburgh before their turnover flurry.
Willie Parker was able to gash Cincy for huge gains right up the middle and on the edges all day. Rudi Johnson had nowhere to run at any point. And Chad Johnson was completely cut off from the football.
The Bengals D was handed some freebies, but was otherwise manhandled. Their offense couldn’t run or stop the pass rush. If the Steelers had gotten a little less unlucky, or if Ben Roethlisberger played at even 80% of his capacity, the champs take the win. Cincy’s problems in the trenches will bite them badly in the postseason, so I won’t be looking for them to hoist up the Lombardi trophy anytime soon.
The Jaguars have what it takes to win the AFC
A week after throwing for 400 yards the week before, Peyton Manning couldn’t get anything going against the Jags in the first half. He couldn’t complete half his passes for the game. This is huge news, folks. Regular season Peyton Manning is usually unstoppable, especially when it comes to completion percentage. The Jaguars are the only team in the league that consistently gives him trouble, and every game they seem to get a little better at disrupting the Colts’ gameplan. Indy mustered only 14 points on offense, and 7 of those came on a Manning bootleg. That tells you how far out of their comfort zone the Colts were. I like the Jags’ D at every level, and if they get/stay healthy, they’ll be a threat to pitch a shutout every week.
The Jaguars’ offense absolutely gouged the Colts on the ground, too. Rookie Maurice Jones-Drew got whatever he wanted between the 20s, gaining 100+ yds on almost 8 yards per carry. Old man Freddy Taylor slowed down in the second half, but tore the Colts apart early in the game.
Byron Leftwich did struggle on Sunday. After completing over 66% of his passes in each of the first 2 games, he lost his rhythm and never got on track. But he and his WRs already performed well against 2 tough Ds in Dallas and Pittsburgh, and Leftwich has a history of making clutch plays in big moments. I don’t think you’ll have to worry about the passing game too much come January.
The Colts scored their first TD on a punt return that turned out to be the difference in the game. This one-time gaffe by an otherwise impressive Jacksonville special teams unit won’t be something other teams can count on against them. I like the Jaguar offense and love their defense. Their QB is a gamer, and the thunder and lightning running game lacks only a strong goal line presence.
Watch out for Jacksonville this year, folks. They scare me a lot more than Cincinnati.
Jacksonville is good, but you forgot about their special teams missing two field goals, and that they had two personal fouls in the first half that hurt them (one came right before the Colts runback TD, who knows without those 15 yards the colts don’t get 7 points early in the game and Jacksonville might have gone away with a win.)
Jacksonville came into the game pumped up, but sorta deflated as the game went on… but they did go on the road after a short week. I was impressed with the Colts, this is the second game they have been beaten at the line of scrimmage to hang in there and pull out the win, the other game was at NY with the Giants.
Of course I am a colts fan, so I may be biased here.
Scobee’s a problem, no doubt. But I heard a lot of people dismiss J-ville after the loss, and my only point is that this would be a foolish mistake based on the quality of their play.
I bet that punt return sucked a lot of the wind out of their sails. I mean, they were shutting out the Colts in the dome! Then BOOM, tie game, and at that point, Jax had been dominating both ways. I would be a tad deflated, too.
Special teams are nothin’ but heartbreak.