2013 Offseason Update, Week 9

Nnamdi Asomugha struggled in Philadelphia after establishing himself
as an elite corner in Oakland. He hopes to return to his old form
across the Bay. Photo credit to CBS.

The later part of Week 9 did not bring much newsworthy updates, but the first three days brought plenty.

Secondary Moves

The Washington Redskins released DeAngelo Hall a few weeks ago, but last Monday they brought him back on a one-year contract.

The Oakland Raiders landed Tracy Porter, the former Super Bowl hero from the Saints who spent last season in Denver. Porter dealt with some health problems stemming from a seizure he experienced during the preseason, then suffered a concussion late in the season, so he wasn’t able to settle into Denver’s defensive scheme. The Raiders defense is looking pretty bad right now so this is a really nice addition for them.

Former Raider and Eagle, Nnamdi Asomugha, was signed by the 49ers on Tuesday. The secondary was probably the weakest part of San Francisco’s team, other than their kicker, in 2012. Though Asomugha never lived up to his expectations in Philly, less will be expected of him in San Francisco and hopefully he can have a little more success there.

Quarterbacks

The Redskins decided to get some depth at quarterback by resigning Rex Grossman and picking up former Dolphin Pat White, both on one-year contracts. They now have three healthy quarterbacks to work with while RGIII continues to recover.

The 49ers picked up former Longhorn Colt McCoy in a trade with the Browns. I’m a big fan of McCoy and San Francisco is a good place for him. They have a couple of really good halfbacks so if Kaepernick were to go down forcing McCoy into the starter role, he’ll have help. He never had that in Cleveland.

The Cardinals made a really nice move by grabbing Carson Palmer. Arizona will still be hard-pressed to contend with San Francisco and Seattle, but this move instantly made them a better team.

Kickers

Tampa Bay picked up Nate Kaeding on Tuesday. He is the second most accurate kicker in NFL history but hasn’t gotten to kick much since a season-ending injury on the opening kickoff of the 2011 season.

Detroit Loins kicker Jason Hanson retired last week and the team made a quick move to secure David Akers, who had a rough 2012 season. Akers owns the NFL single-season record for converted field goals, with 44 in 2011.

If I’m missing anything important, or if you just want to hear my thoughts on any other offseason news from the past week, feel free to contact me via my Twitter account, @cpuffnfl.

Sunday Night Football Afterword: Redskins vs Cowboys

Rookie RB Alfred Morris holds the Redskins' record for
rushing yards in a season and carried the team to the
NFC East title against Dallas. Photo credit to Redskins.com

So with 11 playoff spots already determined, only one was left to award, the NFC East champion. The winner of the Dallas Cowboys/Washington Redskins matchup on Sunday Night would win the division and host the Seahawks in the wild-card round of the playoffs. The loser would go home empty-handed.

It was a fantastic game. As a Redskins fans, I couldn’t breath for about half of it. But it was everything the NFL fan in me could hope for – a close game where every play mattered, where mistakes and successes were amplified.

The Redskins offense took a while to get into a rhythm, but their defense came up with interceptions on two very poor passes by Tony Romo to keep Dallas from scoring, despite moving the ball well early on. The second interception was by fellow DeMatha grad and Terps alum Josh Wilson.

The Cowboys did strike first with a touchdown pass to Jason Witten on a controversial play – it looked like Tony Romo got the snap off about a full second after the play clock expired, but no flag was thrown.

Washington struck right back with a long drive of their own, culminating in a 17-yard touchdown run by Alfred Morris, his first of three scores on the day.

Kai Forbath missed his first field goal of the season on a windy night in Landover, but the Redskins defense came to play in the second half and all but completely shut down the Cowboys, who have been significantly better in the final quarter all season. Dallas did score 10 points in the fourth quarter, but the Redskins scored more and came away with the NFC East Championship.

Alfred Morris had a terrific game with 200 yards to go with his three touchdowns. The sixth round draft pick broke Clinton Portis’ team record for rushing yards in a single season.

Morris was my MVP of the game, but my runner-up was absolutely DeAngelo Hall. I give him a hard time, and I will absolutely not say that I have been wrong to do so. He’s had good games in the past, but more recent performances make those games look like flukes. Who knows, last night may have been a fluke, too. But right now it doesn’t matter, because after a rocky start early in the first quarter, Hall played shut-down defense all night, taking away Dez Bryant and allowing Washington’s blitz packages to work properly. He may make a fool of himself against Seattle, but he was a hero last night.

And it’s hard not to feel bad for Tony Romo. He is a quality quarterback, but he is now 1-6 as a starter in elimination games in Week 17 or the playoffs.

It was a fantastic season and it ended in a way I never would have expected, with a fantastic division championship game between two bitter rivals. Not focus turns to the postseason.

I am not yet sure what I will publish tomorrow. I may write a 10 Things post or I may come up with something else. Ideas are certainly welcome. Wednesday I will publish my predictions after The All-Sports Crew show. Thursday I will publish previews for Saturday’s wild-card games and Friday I will do the same for Sunday’s.

Thanks for reading, have a safe New Year’s Eve, and a special shout out to my mom, whose birthday is today. Happy birthday, Mom! Thank you for all of your constant support and I love you so much!

10 Things You Need to Know: NFL Regular Season Week 9

The AFC is a little more even through
eight weeks than the NFC is.

Happy Halloween to all my readers! Be safe but have fun!

‘Like’ The All-Sports Crew on Facebook to keep up with updates! The All-Sports Crew will air on WMUC Sports, live, tonight from 7-8.

10.            Trade Deadline

Because of Hurricane Sandy, the trade deadline was pushed back from Tuesday (yesterday) to Thursday (tomorrow). The deadline had already been pushed back two weeks from where it was last year to encourage more deals.

So far, one trade of note has come in after the original deadline passed. Wide receiver Mike Thomas was traded from the Jaguars to the Lions in exchange for a mid-round draft pick. Nate Burleson broke his leg last week and Detroit hopes that between Thomas and Titus Young, who is coming off a big game, will help pull coverage off Calvin Johnson.

9.            DeAngelo Hall

Shanahan, it’s time. Hall was ejected after getting into it with an official during Sunday’s game in Pittsburgh. Tuesday he tried to deflect blame when he appeared on a radio show. As it is, his level of play is declining significantly each year and while he was a good play for the Redskins for a couple years, he isn’t there anymore. That, mixed with his attitude, should be enough to ship him out of Washington when the season ends.

8.            Michael Vick

Andy Reid decided Wednesday that Michael Vick will remain the starting quarterback for the Philadelphia Eagles. Most experts are agreeing with the move, and I am, too. The Eagles are still in the playoff hunt, and bringing in an inexperienced quarterback, good as it may be for the future of the franchise, is not the right move as long as the team still has a chance of extending their season.

7.            Fantasy Disappointments

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

• Victor Cruz scored all of three points in my fantasy league, one of which came off his two receptions because it’s a PPR league. Don’t worry too much, yet, because his eight targets still led the team, and it was somewhat reminiscent of the Week 1 matchup against the Cowboys, which he bounced off of nicely, but it was still a disappointing week.
• The Vikings defense was averaging 14.5 points per home game this season. But when Tampa Bay paid a visit, Minnesota’s unit scored -2 points. Yes, two points in the red. That’s a disappointing outing anyway, but especially at home where the Vikings defense has been rock solid in 2012.
• Jamaal Charles scored just 1.5 points in my league this week. He had three consecutive big weeks earlier this season, but that feels like a distant memory now. Romeo Crennel was at a loss for why Charles only carried the ball five times against Oakland, so figure that he’ll carry much more against a struggling San Diego defense.

6.            Fantasy Surprises

• Matthew Stafford scored more points than anyone else in the NFL this week with 36. It was more of a disappointment for me, though, because he was on my bench. After he had struggled early in the season, I benched my first round pick – I’m aSHAMEd of that (Dave Dameshek would be proud) – for Andy Dalton. Dalton was on bye this week. So what do I do? I pick up Ryan Tannehill and start him. He gets hurt, scores no points. Meanwhile, Stafford is having his first multi-touchdown game of the season, sitting on my bench. If I had started him, I would have won my matchup by 3 points. Okay, I’m good.
• Seattle shut down Calvin Johnson and Titus Young responded. 28.5 points was good for fifth most in my league for Week 8.

5.            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.

• Kansas City Chiefs at San Diego Chargers (Thursday, 8:20 p.m.)
• Denver Broncos at Cincinnati Bengals (Sunday, 1:00 p.m.)
• Carolina Panthers at Washington Redskins (Sunday, 1:00 p.m.)
• Miami Dolphins at Indianapolis Colts (Sunday, 1:00 p.m.)
• Pittsburgh Steelers at New York Giants (Sunday, 4:25 p.m.) 

4.            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. Atlanta Falcons	27. Buffalo Bills
2. Houston Texans	28. Cleveland Browns
3. Chicago Bears	29. Carolina Panthers
4. New York Giants	30. New Orleans Saints
5. San Francisco 49ers	31. Jacksonville Jaguars
6. Green Bay Packers	32. Kansas City Chiefs

You figure that at this point of the season, there won’t be much change. In fact, the top six is identical to last week’s. But there were a few big changes. In particular, the Lions and Buccaneers both jumped 10 spots to 14^th and 16^th respectively. The Cardinals and Eagles dropped six spots to 19^th and 20^th and the Jets fell from 18^th to 25^th.

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

3.            New York Giants

Despite nearly blowing a 23-0 lead in Dallas, the Giants maintained their standing as 4^th in the NFL.com Power Rankings. The Cowboys are reeling, and so some may think the Giants are doing the same. But this is a script many of us have seen before. The Giants struggle against the Cowboys. But after a tough loss in Week 1, I think all we needed to see was them win to keep our confidence in New York sky high.

2.            Atlanta Falcons

The Falcons were already #1, so they can’t go any higher, but in handing Andy Reid and his Eagles their first ever loss after a bye, the Falcons are flying higher than ever. The Falcons’ last three games have been near losses, but Atlanta is now 7-0 and faces a relatively easy schedule ahead. That spells trap, and I won’t hop on any undefeated bandwagons, but this is a team that could represent a stacked NFC in the Super Bowl, if they can put their postseason woes behind them.

1.            American Football Conference

Speaking of a stacked NFC, what about the AFC. The Houston Texans are the only team in the conference in the top 6 of the Power Rankings and of the Power Poll. But the first four out on both lists are the Ravens, Patriots, Broncos, and Steelers. A lot is being made of the NFC because there is usually a clearer line between those who will be in the playoffs and those who won’t be by this time in the season. The two conferences have seemingly switched places, with just about everyone within a few games of each other in the AFC.