NFL Week 16 Power Rankings

2010 NFL Football Power Ratings

Each week during the heart of the NFL season, and once or twice during the NFL Preseason, we’ll gather the troops around the roundtable and hash out the NFL Power rankings. We check out the stats, looks at the records, and, most importantly, we take a close, close look at the heart of each team.

We encourage you to come back each week and see how the NFL Power Rankings have changed.

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No deficit is too great, no obstacle too large when Michael Vick is your quarterback.

No one is more feared than Tom Brady, who is tearing teams apart with surgical precision even absent any kind of legitimate deep threat.

Yet before the season there were doubts about both.

Brady was coming off a so-so 2009 season in which his Patriots blew several fourth-period leads and were crushed at home in the playoffs. Rumors swirled through Foxboro that Brady wasn’t working as hard as he had in previous off-seasons.

Vick opened the season on the bench after the Eagles committed to Kevin Kolb, and got on the field only when Kolb was injured. With stunning results. Word is that Vick is now studying the game and wants to be the complete quarterback he declined to be in Atlanta.

Both deserve to win the MVP award. Can we dispense with the voting and just give them each possession of the trophy for 6 months a year?

To the rankings:

1. New England Patriots (1) – They almost always win the game because they almost always win the turnover war. Six straight games without one turnover.
2. Atlanta Falcons (2) – Best record in the NFL and only the 9^th-best odds to win the Super Bowl shows that the public is not yet sold on this team.
3. Philadelphia Eagles (5) – Hey, save some of that luck for the playoffs.
4. Baltimore Ravens (6) – These guys are still very, very good, but it looks like the business model (ball control and hellacious defense) is broken.
5. Pittsburgh Steelers (3) – Don’t panic. Wins over Carolina and Cleveland will still be enough to get the No. 2 seed. No. 1 left town when they lost at home to the Patriots.
6. New Orleans Saints (4) – Reggie Bush helped save the franchise after Katrina. But it looks like he may be relegated to third-down back now.
7. New York Jets (8) – It’s amazing what can be accomplished offensively when receivers don’t drop 3 or 4 passes a game.
8. San Diego Chargers (10) – Chargers need help to get to the post-season. Amazingly, Philip Rivers could throw for more than 4,500 yards and not be in the playoffs.
9. Chicago Bears (11) – Bears will be a tough playoff draw at home if they can get even 70-75 yards out of Matt Forte.
10. New York Giants (7) – Could be a lot worse for punter Matt Dodge. He could be working for a boss who isn’t the big teddy bear that Tom Coughlin is.
11. Green Bay Packers (12) – Packers need two wins at home to play beyond Week 17. They’re getting the Giants – who should be spitting bullets after practice this week — at a bad time.
12. Indianapolis Colts (14) – Colts were finally able to take advantage of teams stacking the secondary. Peyton Manning is hard enough to beat without a running game.
13. Kansas City Chiefs (15) – Tennessee and Oakland won’t roll over, but if the Chiefs can nail them both at home, they’re in. Tip of the cap to Matt Cassel – anyone who plays in an NFL game 10 days after getting his appendix removed is one tough guy.
14. Jacksonville Jaguars (9) – Loss to Indy was a blow to the stomach. David Garrard and Maurice Jones-Drew picked a bad time to forget how to execute simple handoffs.
15. Tampa Bay Buccaneers (13) – No shame in losing to Detroit, which is better than anyone realizes. But the loss was one of those woulda/coulda/shoulda games that will probably keep TB out of the playoffs.
16. Oakland Raiders (18) – Anyone else notice that only Week 17 victory over KC is standing between the Raiders and a 6-0 record in the division?
17. Miami Dolphins (16) – Things are so bad in Miami that Dan Carpenter is starting to miss field goals.



18. St. Louis Rams (17) – Someday the Rams will figure out how to finish drives, and they will be able to be a force again in the NFC West.
19. Houston Texans (19) – You have to hand it to the Texans’ secondary. Because if you don’t, they’ll drop it.
20. Tennessee Titans (20) – Jeff Fisher is usually a standup guy, but how did he even keep a straight face when he said after Sunday’s game that he didn’t know that Vince Young was on the Titans’ sidelines?
21. Buffalo Bills (23) – If you’re a Buffalo fan, you should be OK taking your chances with Gailey and Fitzpatrick at the controls next season. Beats starting over.
22. Dallas Cowboys (21) – They’re 4-2 with Kitna, 1-7 with Romo. Not suggesting anything. Just saying.
23. Cleveland Browns (22) – With a Baltimore/Pittsburgh finish, will 5-11 finish Eric Mangini?
24. Detroit Lions (26) – Key numbers for bettors: Lions are 10-4 ATS and 9-4-1 on the over this season.
25. Seattle Seahawks (24) – They’re 6-8 and tied for the NFC West lead. Question: Do their fans still wave those foam-rubber “We’re No. 1” fingers?
26. Cincinnati Bengals (30) – Only one home game left (Sunday vs. San Diego) to bid adieu to Owens, Ochocinco, Lewis, Palmer and probably Benson. A team reluctant to clean house is now forced to.
27. Minnesota Vikings (25) – Good riddance.
28. Washington Redskins (27) – Judging from news reports, the real problem this season was Donovan McNabb’s reluctance to buy into offensive schemes developed by offensive coordinator Kyle Shanahan.
29. San Francisco 49ers (28) – Seven games this season against teams with winning records. Seven losses.
30. Arizona Cardinals (29) – If the slate was wiped clean and the season started again this coming weekend, the Cardinals would be the leading contender for the No. 1 pick in the draft.
31. Denver Broncos (31) – Changing the quarterback furniture won’t help much unless the Broncos figure out a way to repair one of the league’s worst running games.
32. Carolina Panthers (32) – Panthers still have a solid grip on the No. 1 pick.

Comment on the Power Rankings below, or as always hit us with your pregame NFL picks and predictions…

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Lawrence Paul is a regular contributor to the Cappers Picks Blog, and is a free-lance gambling and travel writer from Massachusetts.