NFL 2019 Week Ten – And Then There Was None
It s taken 10 weeks but finally every NFL team has at least one loss thanks to an exciting OT win for Seattle in Monday Nights game. Talk about seconds counting – well the 49ers tied the game up in regular time with a last-second score, only to lose to a Jason Myers field goal in overtime as time expired. Suddenly the NFC West is a race again, however, as we mused last week it looks like the Rams are the latest Super Bowl loser to have a next season hangover. Their loss at Pittsburgh leaves them three games back on both the Seahawks & 49ers with seven games to play. They are not completely dead yet but games are running out for them. Overall it was a week of surprises, with the Dolphins, Jets & Falcons all getting only their second win of the campaign – OK the Jets win was not too much of a surprise but the other two results…
NFC Looking Strong
Overall the NFC is beginning to separate with five teams with 7 or more wins. Green bay currently heads the North thanks to a hard-fought win over a pretty good Carolina team thanks to a last-second goal-line stand. Aaron Rodgers is still struggling to get to grips with the Matt LaFleur offense, but their defense looks good enough to carry them into the playoffs. With New Orleans surprisingly losing at home the panthers remain just about in touch in the NFC South, which might be their only hope of the postseason given they are two games out of the wild card places. The NFC East continues to struggle with Dallas losing at home to the Vikings. They still lead the division with a 5-4 record but overall the division has only managed 13 wins total this year.
Battle Still On For Home Field Advantage In The AFC
In the AFC Baltimore continued to impress moving to 7-2 with a comfortable win over the hapless Bengals (more on them below). Lamar Jackson continued to impress recording a 158.3 (perfect) passer rating and accounting for four of the teams TD’s. Cincinnati started Ryan Finley at QB but he looked worse than Andy Dalton, not helped by the Ravens defense which again looked good.
Indianapolis missed the chance to join Houston at the top of the AFC South, losing at home to Miami, while Kansas City also missed the chance to keep pace with Baltimore & New England after somehow managing to lose at Tennessee, despite putting up nearly 150 yards more in offense and controlling the ball for nearly 38 minutes. Football can be a funny old game at times.
Overall the playoff picture from the thee seed down is wide open in the AFC going into week eleven.
The race for 0-16 Continues.
Cincinnati remains winless and with the Jets & Dolphins both starting to play a bit better the spectre of 0-16 is looming fast. They slid to 0-9 against the Ravens and they have to travel to Oakland this week before facing the Steelers. 0-11 look a distinct possibility. AJ Green can’t return soon enough for them.
Is Minkah Fitzpatrick the bargain of the season?
When The Steelers gave Miami a first-round pick (and some change) for their last blue-chip asset a few eyebrows were raised, especially given they were 1-3 and without their talisman QB Ben Roethlisberger, whose future remains somewhat unclear. That first-round pick could have come in useful should he decided to retire. However, since Fitzpatrick arrived the Steelers have gone 4-1 and it has been their defense (with him playing no small part) that has carried them. Suddenly they are in the No 6 seed and on Sunday he repaid another huge chunk of the consideration by returning a fumble for a TD and also snaring an interception. It’s rare for a safety to come in an have such an impact straight away, however, if as looks distinctly possible the Steelers make the postseason this could go down as one of the most inspired trades of the 2000s.
Offense is not enough!
We all love to see great offensive plays, but as the passing stats for this week shows gaining yards doesn’t always equate to wins. Four of the top five QB performers this week ended up on the losing side and the only winner played one of the losers!
Patrick Mahomes (KAN) 36/50 446 yds, 3TD Lost
Dak Prescott (DAL) 28/46 397 yds, 3TD Lost
Jameis Winston (TAM) 30/48 358 yds, 1TD Beat Arizona
Kyler Murray (ARI) 27/44 324 yds, 3TD Lost to Tampa
Daniel Jones (NYG) 26/40 308 yds, 4TD Lost
It’s no surprise that the best teams in the NFL right now – New England, Baltimore, Green Bay, New Orleans & San Fransisco all have Top Defenses.
So how did we do predictions wise?
Rather badly 6-7 straight up but 7-5-1 against the spread. Not often we too better ATS.
Week Nine Results
Thursday Night
LA Chargers 24 @ Oakland 26
Sunday Night
Detroit 13 @ Chicago 20
Baltimore 49 @ Cincinnati 13
Buffalo 16 @ Cleveland 19
Kansas City 32 @ Tennessee 35
Atlanta 26 @ New Orleans 9
New York Giants 27 @ New York Jets 34
Arizona 27 @ Tampa Bay 30
Miami 16 @ Indianapolis 12
Carolina 16 @ Green Bay 24
LA Rams 12 @ Pittsburgh 17
Minnesota 28 @ Dallas 24
Monday Night
Seattle @ San Francisco -6.5
Bye Week
Denver, New England, Philadelphia, Washington, Jacksonville, Houston
