Week Six Power Poll Rankings
After a few weeks with the same three teams at the top of the rankings, we have two new faces this week. After getting thoroughly demolished by Aaron Rodgers and the Packers, the Texans dropped three places to fourth. The Niners also suffered a brutal defeat at the hands of the new number two, the Giants, and consequently fell three spots to sixth. The new top five are the Atlanta Falcons, New York Giants, Chicago Bears, Houston Texans, and Baltimore Ravens.
The Seahawks moved up three places to seventh, right behind the Niners (6th) and most certainly swap positions, if nothing else, after their matchup in San Francisco this Thursday. The Cardinals fell four spots to 12th, after an overtime defeat to Buffalo. The Rams also slipped four spots to 20th after losing 14-17 in Miami. The Rams have a better team than many think, but struggle putting up enough points. The Cardinals also face questions at QB going forward with the injury of Kevin Kolb.
I saw many comments over the last few days that the Falcons are not the best team in the NFL right now. While you might be able to create hypothetical games that the Falcons may lose, they can only play the schedule they are given, and it would require evidence that currently doesn’t exist to drop them out of first place. A one loss team could potentially move into first, but because the Texans were beat so soundly (and are seriously missing Brian Cushing) it’d be very hard to keep them in first place. The Falcons also have the weakest strength of schedule (.353) for the rest of the season. Consequently, all six writers had the Falcons at number one this week.
There were six teams that generated a difference of opinion of at least nine spots.
Chiefs (13): 19th by Scott , 32nd by Keith.
Vikings (11): 4th by Keith, 15th by Scott.
Lions (11): 12th by Scott, 23rd by Jason.
Jets (10): 18th by Keith, 28th by Scott.
Ravens (9): 2nd by Keith and Nick, 11th by Scott.
Steelers (9): 11th by Nick, 20th by Keith.
The Bears were ranked third by two of us, and third by the other four.
Teams that fell were the Vikings (-1), Raiders (-2), Saints (-2), Cowboys (-2), Bengals (-2), Chiefs (-3), Chargers (-3), Steelers (-3), 49ers (-3), Texans (-3), Panthers (-4), Colts (-4), Rams (-4), Cardinals (-4), and Patriots (-5).
Teams that gained in the rankings were the Jets (+7), Giants (+5), Redskins (+5), Packers (+4), Bills (+4), Bears (+3), Seahawks (+3), Broncos (+3), Dolphins (+3), Lions (+3), Titans (+3), Falcons (+1), Buccaneers (+1).
The Ravens, Eagles, Browns, Jaguars all maintained their positions.
*If people would like to see charts of other divisions or any other sort of charting please let me know in the comments section.