NFL Week 2 Snap Judgments

Week 2 has already come and gone, and here are my thoughts...

1. Stop me if you heard this before, but an entire division stunk except for a single wide receiver.  Last week it was the AFC North; this week was the NFC East's turn.  If not for a crazy day from Dez Bryant, the entire division laid an egg.  Oh sure, the Eagles put 30 points up on the board thanks to big days from LeSean McCoy and DeSean Jackson, but the defense gave up 419 yards passing to Philip Rivers.  Not many football teams will win a game while giving up that kind of yardage.  The Giants continued turning over the ball which led to their demise, and the Redskins couldn't save a turkey from becoming Thanksgiving dinner.  In fact, speaking of the Redskins...

2. What do the Redskins do with RGIII?  From a fantasy football perspective, I wanted nothing to do with drafting RGIII as my quarterback on any of my teams.  He hadn't played a down in any football game since January, and spent the entire off-season rehabbing his knee.  He didn't play at all during the preseason either, so there were bound to be cobwebs and rusty play for at least the first week or so.  Still, yesterday he looked very uncomfortable throwing the football and avoiding any hits.  Tony Dungy even said on Sunday Night Football that the Redskins should consider benching him after next week if he continues to play poorly.  Personally, I think that's extremely premature, but the Redskins also can't afford to continue digging a deeper hole for them while waiting for RGIII to get back into playing shape.

3. The Patriots are in serious trouble.  When was the last time those words found themselves in the same sentence?  I expected the Patriots to take a step backwards this season given their extremely weak group of receivers, but even I was surprised at how bad they looked last Thursday night against the Jets.  I'm a firm believer in the Bill Parcells philosophy of "You are what your record says you are," but barely squeaking by the Bills and Jets is a huge concern for a team who was in the Super Bowl two years ago, and was in the AFC Championship Game last year.  Miami is looking really good after their first two games, which puts the Patriots in the position of someone actually breathing down their necks.  That's a very foreign situation for them.

4. The rest of the NFC could face a daunting task if the Seahawks wind up with the #1 seed in the playoffs.  The Seahawks' home field advantage has always been somewhat skewed due to how sound travels in their stadium.  I don't know much about the mechanics or engineering of it, except that the stadium's design and location near water makes sound much louder than most other NFL stadiums.  It showed Sunday night thanks to Seahawks fans aiming for setting new noise records during a game.  That would disrupt any opposing team's communication from the sidelines to the field.  Even though we're a long way off from January, the Seahawks have shown over the last few years they are extremely tough to beat in their own house.

5. The Goat of the Week Award goes to the CBS affiliate station WKMG in Orlando.  This is a really outside the box pick, but check this out.  How pathetic is that if a station in the Jaguars' home market has to apologize for the "inconvenience" of showing the Jaguars game instead of the Broncos/Giants game?  Maybe the more appropriate goat is the Jaguars for being as awful a team as they are, but I think it's pretty telling if a local network knows how bad the team is and feels ashamed for being contractually obligated to televise them.

6. The Cardiac Kodiaks have been pretty remarkable so far.  Seeing how the Bears have made two fairly big comebacks in the first two weeks of the season, I'm reminded of a two-week stretch for the Bears way back in 2001:

Incidentally, how much better was NFL Prime Time with only Chris Berman and Tom Jackson?  Man, those were the good ol' days.  Sigh....

7. Ron Rivera can't last much longer in Carolina.  This season marks the third year for the Panthers with Ron Rivera as head coach, and it's the third straight year they've started slow.  They find new and bizarre ways to blow leads late in games, putting themselves in a deep hole by mid-season.  The last couple years, they find some kind of stride fairly late in the season and wind up winning 5 or 6 of their final few games.  If they lose next weekend and start 0-3 - which is a real possibility since they are playing against the desperate Giants - ownership may have to consider making a coaching change at some point this season.

8. I wouldn't be surprised if the Chiefs wound up winning double-digit games at this point.  I know, talk about jumping to potentially irrational conclusions.  But considering the Chiefs have already equaled last season's win total - albeit one of those games was against Jacksonville - they're clearly one of the most improved teams in the NFL right now.  Plus, they have yet to turn the ball over even once.  Don't get me wrong, though; I don't necessarily think they are good enough to win the AFC West yet, but they could very well compete for a Wild Card come December.

9. The Todd Haley Experiment in Pittsburgh is imploding.  I'm not sure if there's any one thing that's caused the Steelers to struggle so much in the first two games of the season.  The offensive line is clearly a weakness, so I can't imagine that the line coach will have a job there much longer.  But when the offense (and the team as a whole) only scores two touchdowns through the first two games of a season, that's about the worst kind of omen.  Even as a Ravens fan, I wouldn't have expected this kind of showing from the Steelers for a prolonged period of time.  The Steelers usually have one down year in every 5-year span or so, but last year's struggles have slopped over into this season, and there's no sign of things changing any time soon.  The Steelers are back at home next week against Chicago, so there's a real chance they could find themselves at 0-3.