10 Things You Need to Know: NFL Regular Season Week 14

Andrew Luck is having one of the best rookie seasons of
all time. He has brought a quick turnaround to a 'spoiled' city.
Photo credit to Bleacher Report.

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10.            Bear Problems

If the Bears weren’t already in trouble, they certainly are now. Brian Urlacher hopes to be back for the playoffs, but he will sit out the rest of the regular season with a hamstring injury.

As if that weren’t bad enough, a shoulder injury from the Seahawks game has Tim Jennings’ status uncertain, receiver Earl Bennett is expected to be out against the Vikings, and Devin Hester is trying to come back from a concussion while Alshon Jeffery is coming back from a knee issue.

9.            Playoff Hunt

Houston can clinch their division with a win and a loss or tie by the Colts. Baltimore can win the AFC North crown with a win and losses by both Pittsburgh and Cincinnati. New England and Denver have both clinched their divisions already.

In the NFC, Atlanta has clinched the NFC South. The other three divisions cannot be won this week, but San Francisco can clinch a playoff spot with a lot of help. They need a win, but they would also need Dallas, Minnesota, Tampa Bay and Washington to lose and St. Louis or Seattle to lose or tie.

The Bengals are the first team out in the AFC, with the Jets, Bills and Dolphins trailing them by two games. The Redskins are the first team out in the NFC with tiebreakers over Tampa Bay and Minnesota and the tiebreaker so far over Dallas, all of whom have the same 6-6 records as Washington.

8.            Fantasy Disappointments

There were plenty of fantasy disappointments this week, so I’ll just list a few that stood out to me.

• Tom Brady had his worst fantasy game of the season against Miami on Sunday, scoring just 12 points against a team he usually lights it up against.
• Drew Brees takes the cake, this week. Just 3 fantasy points in his five-interception, zero-touchdown performance against Atlanta. It was just his third sub-20 point game of the season, and his first with fewer than 16 points.

7.            Fantasy Surprises

• Donnie Avery hadn’t made much noise since the first two weeks of the season, but two touchdowns made for a nice 23.5 points in my fantasy league.
• Brady Quinn had not scored more than 4 points in a game this season. In fact, he only had 10 total fantasy points on the season. But the Chiefs played inspired on Sunday and Quinn was not immune has he threw his first two touchdowns of the season, topped 200 yards passing for the first time this season, and did not turn the ball over in a 19-point fantasy performance.
• Not really a surprise, but it is worth noting that Adrian Peterson had his second 30-point fantasy game of the season, his first game with 200 rushing yards this season, and his sixth consecutive game with 100 or more rushing yards.

6.            Games to Watch

Like last week, I’ll be more specific on why these are the biggest games to watch in my predictions post tomorrow.

• Baltimore Ravens at Washington Redskins (Sunday, 1:00 p.m.)
• Dallas Cowboys at Cincinnati Bengals (Sunday, 1:00 p.m.)
• New Orleans Saints at New York Giants (Sunday, 4:25 p.m.)
• Detroit Lions at Green Bay Packers (Sunday, 8:20 p.m.)
• Houston Texans at New England Patriots (Monday, 8:30 p.m.)

5.            Power Rankings

For the sake of space, I will list just the top 6 and the bottom 6 here. You can see the rest on NFL.com.

1. Houston Texans	27. Carolina Panthers
2. Atlanta Falcons	28. Tennessee Titans
3. New England Patriots	29. Philadelphia Eagles
4. Denver Broncos	30. Jacksonville Jaguars
5. San Francisco 49ers	31. Kansas City Chiefs
6. Baltimore Ravens	32. Oakland Raiders

The Jets and Rams jumped four and five spots respectively while the Giants and Saints both fell four. Other than that the biggest difference is that Around The League now considers Oakland to be the worst in the NFL.

The Power Poll is a better representation of where the teams stack up, in my opinion. Check that out here.

4.            Puff’s Rankings

I’ve taken the liberty of ranking every team in the NFL for myself. I ranked each team in a number of categories and then used a math formula to take each of them into consideration in my overall rankings of the teams. Here are my rankings heading into Week 14.

1. HOU (4.350)	9. SEA (7.735)	17. ARI (9.235)	25. IND (11.385)
2. SF (5.630)	10. CIN (8.330)	18. SD (9.580)	26. BUF (11.990)
3. DEN (6.200)	11. BAL (8.340)	19. CAR (9.735)	27. PHI (12.280)
4. NE (6.315)	12. WAS (8.445)	20. StL (9.985)	28. MIA (12.505)
5. CHI (6.370)	13. PIT (8.570)	21. CLE (10.450)	29. KC (12.705)
6. NYG (6.625)	14. DET (8.855)	22. NO (10.775)	30. OAK (12.900)
7. ATL (6.935)	15. DAL (9.000)	23. NYJ (10.795)	31. TEN (13.275)
8. GB (7.155)	16. TB (9.210)	24. MIN (10.980)	32. JAC (13.505)

Keep in mind this is essentially a ranking of where each team should be at this point in the season, based on various aspects of performance, with certain aspects weighted more heavily than others. Some teams have over- or under-achieved.

Feel free to ask about this, but please be clear that this is not necessarily how I would rank the teams, this is all math based.

3.            Atlanta Falcons

Well, the Falcons beat the Saints, so they have that going for them. They have already clinched the NFC South, but I don’t give that all that much merit. The defense is carrying the team, but the fact that they needed five takeaways to barely win against New Orleans tells me that this team is not one that is ready to perform in the playoffs against the best in the NFC.

2.            Houston Texans

The Texans are undoubtedly the best team in the NFL right now. They had a slip up against Green Bay that had everyone wondering if the Texans would collapse, especially with the loss of Brian Cushing. Wade Phillips has done a fantastic job with that defense and some of you may have even forgotten Cushing is out until I mentioned it just now. Their offense is no slouch, either. Unlike the Ravens, who also have an incredibly talented running back, the Texans use theirs. Also unlike the Ravens, the Texans actually have a quarterback that can drive them down the field consistently.

1.            MVP Race

I read an interesting piece by Adam Schein on NFL.com yesterday that really got me thinking. Schein has the honor of being one of the people who vote for who gets various AP Awards in the NFL, including MVP. His choice, right now, is Andrew Luck. It is easy to dismiss him right off the bat, for being a rookie if for no other reason, but he brings up a great point.

Of course, if we throw him into the mix we have to eliminate Peyton Manning – there is no guarantee that the Broncos couldn’t have a similar record since their three losses came against terrific competition and their wins haven’t really. You also have to eliminate Tom Brady – we’ve seen what a bad quarterback can do with that team with Belichick at the helm. And Adrian Peterson is also eliminated, for reasons other than the Vikings not likely being in the playoffs – Peterson hasn’t made a big impact on the Colts record, while Luck has.

Five game winning drives this season by the rookie, five of them. The Colts are almost certainly a top-10 draft pick team without Luck. With him, they are a very likely playoff team and only two games behind the Texans. If the rest of the voters can get over the fact that he’s a rookie, Andrew Luck is the obvious choice. Of course, maybe Robert Griffin III would then also have a case.