The only legitimate power rankings

1. Green Bay Packers: Reigning Champs atop the rankings until someone knocks them off.
2. Pittsburgh Steelers: Won the AFC North without Ben to start the year. Defense keeps them elite.
3. New York Jets: I’m a big believer in Sanchez, say what you will about him, but for a 2nd year player he’s played well in pressure situations. Love the Rex Ryan attitude.
4. Indianapolis Colts: Any team with Peyton Manning at the helm is top 5 period. Fully expect the Colts to be back amongst the best next year.
5. New Orleans Saints: Dangerous if they can put it all together at the right time.
6. New England Patriots: Need a dominant defense before they get near another SB imo. I don’t think Brady can carry a team to a SB.
7. Baltimore Ravens: How much further and longer can Ray Lewis, Ed Reed etc. carry this team. You’d think Joe Flacco was the one pressing charges against Big Ben based on what happens when they meet.
8. Philadelphia Eagles: If they can add Nmandi Asomugha to the mix, and if they can protect Mike Vick, this team could go places on a schedule that features the NFC West.
9. San Diego Chargers: You might have noticed the Chargers stocking up on ST contributors on the draft. Because a lack of those players largely stopped the Chargers rolling over the AFC West last year.
10. Atlanta Falcons: This is a team that was greater than the sum of its parts in 2010, and it showed in the divisional round game vs the Packers.
11. Chicago Bears: I don’t think this team was very good last year, and getting a home playoff game against the 7-9 Seahawks pretty much summed up their season.
12. New York Giants: Schedule sets up nicely for yet another great start and poor finish. The Giants must cut down the turnovers in general or Coughlin could be done.
13. Kansas City Chiefs: Tbh I think this is a team that largely beat on an easy schedule and got exposed somewhat badly vs the Ravens.
14. Tampa Bay Buccaneers: Got great production from young players last year. Don’t see it repeating or the Bucs on a tougher schedule. Need to see more wins against good teams before I’m convinced.
15. Dallas Cowboys: Hard for the defense to be much worse than last year. Tony Romo back at the helm and the NFC West on the schedule should help the Cowboys rebound.
16. Jacksonville Jaguars: The definition of mediocre. May as well blood Gabbert since Garrard isn’t taking this team anywhere.
17. Houston Texans: Offense should keep them competitive. Defense can hardly be worse.
18. Oakland Raiders: I’m not buying into this so called ‘revolution’ in Oakland. Jason Campbell isn’t good enough and the best defensive player just rode out of town.
19. Arizona Cardinals: If they trade for Kolb, should win the NFC West by virtue of best QB.
20. Miami Dolphins: A team short of answers on offense. Sparano virtually a lame duck coach. It doesn’t look good.
21. Detroit Lions: Until further notice, they’re still the Lions. No defense past the LoS and a QB with a glass shoulder doesn’t bode well.
22. St Louis Rams: I’ll believe in Bradford when he moves on from Baby’s first playbook. I do believe in Spagnuolo’s philosophy however.
23. San Francisco 49ers: Every year the 49ers seem to be a bubble playoff team, but something goes wrong. So I’ll just sit and wait for it rather than ranking them highly this time.
24. Buffalo Bills: Gailey gets the best out of a decent offensive roster. Have a few pieces on defense to build around, but still too soon for the Bills.
25. Seattle Seahawks: Can’t afford for last year’s playoff run to mask a rebuilding job that must continue.
26. Minnesota Vikings: Should look hard at McNabb as a potential placeholder until Ponder is ready.
27. Denver Broncos: With Dumervil, Ayers and now Miller in the mix at DE the Broncos can get after the QB. Unfortunately that might be the only thing they can do.
28. Cleveland Browns: When your only offensive weapons are a 3rd round pick and an overused RB, and you convert from a 3-4 to a 4-3, this is the result.
29. Carolina Panthers: Still have some good pieces on the team. Not as bad as last year’s record indicated.
30. Washington Redskins: It really doesn’t matter whether John Beck or Rex Grossman starts. Because both are horrible.
31. Cincinnati Bengals: At least Dalton fits the uniform. Roster devoid of talent and a lame duck coach.
32. Tennessee Titans: Things are bad when Kerry Collins doesn’t want your starting job. Struggling to see a bright spot here.

Why Bills so high? Maybe that should read not so low. On offence, Fitzpatrick is ok, Steve Johnson is better than average.

On defence they have good saftey pair, and Dareus, but he wont be anything like Suh as he is not as talented and will play in a 3-4. Posluszny is good player. Over all a team lacking talent, and should not be so high.

Titans last also bit weird. Struggling to look for positives? CJ? Kenny Britt looks like he could be the real deal. They have a great secondary. Babin had a late, but still break out year in his first in the system. They will have a rookie QB or Collins, but with CJ and a decent defence, I find it hard to agree they are worst team in the NFL.

Would you also move the Vikings up if they get McNabb?

Possibly. Retaining Sidney Rice would help.

Bills have Kyle Williams and Dareus up front, which should help.

Britt needs QB and/or Ellis Hobbs against him. Babin is a FA and might follow Washburn back to Philly. CJ put up 2000 yards and the Titans still sucked.

Titans are nowhere near the worst team in the nfl, our defense is solid and creates turnovers (Griffin is possibly one of the most underrated safeties in the league), plus our red zone defense before the wheels came off last season was close to being the best in the nfl.

I agree Collins isn't coming back, but that's only because he doesn't want to caretake for half the season and then let Locker come in, apparently he wants one more full season (which I don't understand as there's no way he'll make it through a whole season). I imagine we'll try for a vet QB when FA finally hits, McNabb or Hasselbeck would be well suited. I'm also a big Locker fan, analysts kept going on about his accuracy issues but I'm not buying that. In Washington he had practically no o-line (ours is in pretty good shape atm) and a pretty horrible WR core. Also given that if he does start teams are 100% putting 8 in the box vs CJ means he'll have his shots downfield to one of the best young receivers about in Britt (would like us to pick up a FA WR vet as there's lots about on the market, don't rate Washington and Williams is still a bit too young though progressing).

No need to speak about CJ, he'll put out 1500+yards without breaking sweat.

All in all, unless we have Rusty Smith playing the whole year (in which case we shall be the worst), there's no way I can see the Titans as the worst team in the NFL next year, not saying we'll be challenging for playoffs (hoping of course ) but there's a good 7/8 worse than us on paper atm.

Even if Locker pans out, its highly unlikely to be in year 1. On paper the Titans dont look great.

So if we were to assume that the titans were to get a vet QB would you keep us in the same spot?

Probably

Graeme Swann's Cat wrote:Possibly. Retaining Sidney Rice would help.

Bills have Kyle Williams and Dareus up front, which should help.

Britt needs QB and/or Ellis Hobbs against him. Babin is a FA and might follow Washburn back to Philly. CJ put up 2000 yards and the Titans still sucked.

Kyle Williams is a beast, he should probably have appeared in the most under-rated thread.

Graeme Swann's Cat wrote:4. Indianapolis Colts: Any team with Peyton Manning at the helm is top 5 period.

They weren't top 5 last season.

I dont think that you can have 7 spots between the eagles and the cowboys. yes the boys were rubbish last year but there a super talented teams (likes the eagles) and have a similar chance of grabbing asomugha. They also travel to the west whcih talent wise the giants, eagles and cowboys should sweep (even though i doubt that will happen)

i think its preety much an even race for the title this year and one of those good teams will almost definetly miss out on the playoffs

twelve283 wrote:

Graeme Swann's Cat wrote:4. Indianapolis Colts: Any team with Peyton Manning at the helm is top 5 period.

They weren't top 5 last season.

Crippled by injuries, still win the AFC South, should have beaten the Jets were it not for Caldwell deciding to call a timeout.

arizona_tom wrote:I dont think that you can have 7 spots between the eagles and the cowboys. yes the boys were rubbish last year but there a super talented teams (likes the eagles) and have a similar chance of grabbing asomugha. They also travel to the west whcih talent wise the giants, eagles and cowboys should sweep (even though i doubt that will happen)

i think its preety much an even race for the title this year and one of those good teams will almost definetly miss out on the playoffs

6-10, awful defense, only reason they get mentioned is because they're the Cowboys.

Titans should not drop that low, Imo washington should take the very last place, i don't think anything is going well for them. The titans have a lot of solid players as they have a star rb, future star at wr imo, shutdown cb and decent pass rush. San diego are too high for me as are miami, good list though m8, i'd struggle to even hazard a guess at what will happen, and even if i did im pretty sure they would wrong. I'm going to say the unlikely which is that indie will finsh .500 or slightly above if lucky

Graeme Swann's Cat wrote:

arizona_tom wrote:I dont think that you can have 7 spots between the eagles and the cowboys. yes the boys were rubbish last year but there a super talented teams (likes the eagles) and have a similar chance of grabbing asomugha. They also travel to the west whcih talent wise the giants, eagles and cowboys should sweep (even though i doubt that will happen)

i think its preety much an even race for the title this year and one of those good teams will almost definetly miss out on the playoffs

6-10, awful defense, only reason they get mentioned is because they're the Cowboys.

6-10 with a tough schedule last year half the season without romo. AThey arguably have as an explosive offense as philly when fully fit. There D-line OK theyve got a preety good linebacker core but like Philly (but not to the same extent admittedly) have a preety dire secondary. patterson was slaughtered last year. The eagles were 21st in points given up and cowboys 27th. so is there really that much of a difference???

Graeme Swann's Cat wrote:

twelve283 wrote:

Graeme Swann's Cat wrote:4. Indianapolis Colts: Any team with Peyton Manning at the helm is top 5 period.

They weren't top 5 last season.

Crippled by injuries, still win the AFC South, should have beaten the Jets were it not for Caldwell deciding to call a timeout.

But they had Peyton Manning right? Truth is Peyton Manning =/= top 5 team.

Maybe if you go by record alone. Peyton still had his team within a timeout and a FG from the AFC Divisional round.

Good effort GSC, my thoughts:

Colts too high - think they're borderline top 10.
Ravens a tad high possibly
Chargers maybe a bit low
Raiders too low - 6-0 in div and they're getting better
Bills too high - think they're another #1 pick challenger
Browns too low - much better than 28th IMO, weak offence agreed but still top 20

The problem is the Browns are converting to a 4-3, so I doubt the defense will be that great either.

I question how the Raiders are getting better when the best player by a large margin just left.

Graeme Swann's Cat wrote:The problem is the Browns are converting to a 4-3, so I doubt the defense will be that great either.

We're also converting to a West coast style offense which will help McCoy, so our offense should improve. The problem is we're changing on both sides but they are missing out on time to train for these new systems, though McCoy does have a playbook and the offense have practiced together.

I don't put much stock in these practices, truth be told.

Still a lack of weapons on offense. Can't hand it off and throw to Hillis on every down and expect to be effective or for him to be healthy, all season. I think the switch to the 4-3 was unnecessary, and sets the Browns back tbh.

I think they can make the 4-3 work, plenty of teams change schemes and it wasn't that long ago the majority worked with 4-3 instead of 3-4.
Who stays/goes is anyone's guess, I know they think a lot of their draft picks, the WR and TE and very highly thought of....

Yeah, eventually it can work. I doubt its going to be this year, especially with personnel changes and no time to install the scheme.

That's the bigger issue GSC, trying to implement a scheme that's been months in the planning but you're not allowed to get your personnel together to practice it !
It must drive coaches insane.
That said, all 32 teams are in the same boat and whilst they may not all be looking to change defensive formations the reduced camp/practice time will hurt everyone.
Lesson for me this year, don't judge rookies too soon, they all have to be integrated and need time to learn plays/schemes, this lockout will hurt them more than anyone....

And hence why I think the Browns are a contender for #1 overall

All about opinions GSC, on what I know right now I'd be backing a few for the #1 pick before I considered backing Cleveland, Bungles being right at the top of the list....

In my completely non-biased view I would say we beat the Bengals this upcoming season, I can understand why you think we'll struggle but I see our offense improving despite a lack of practice our special teams will remain good and our defence is young and improving.

I'd agree it was improving if it was still a 3-4.

Steelers rated way too high, sure still a strong team but an ageing defence that was woefully exposed by the Packers.

I concur re the above you have the Cowboys rated as 15th below the Giants and below 3 NFC South teams Bucs, Saints, and Falcons Cowboys will be in top 2 in the NFC East.

Colts are good with Manning but no way are they above Pats(2) and Ravens(3) who I would make AFC 2nd and 3rd teams behind the Jets(1), I would have the Steelers 5th behind the Colts at 4th.

As for NFC I think they are no the stronger conference and as such is harder to select the top 5 but IMHO they would be Green Bay (1) Saints (2) Falcons (3) Eagles (4) Cowboys (5). Whilst I am a Cowboys fan Iam not being biased they have some good players on offence and defence, sure they were dire when and went 1-7 under Wade but look at the 2nd half under Garrett they lost narrowly to a Saints side and beat an Eagles team with a rookie 3rd string QB with no major running game and poor secondary. We have a Ryan running a 46 3-4 defence next season upgraded the OL and RB and Romo will be back under centre, I fancy Dallas to be a 10-6 9-7 team next season.

The NFC Championship game will be between Packers v Falcons and AFC will be Ravens v Pats we might even see an all Bird Final

Re Bills, one or 2 saying they are contenders, not too knock anyone guys but they are in the same conference as the Pats and Jets, no chance they will finish higher than those 2 teams.

You beat the Eagles 3rd stringers and Kolb. I wouldn't get too excited. We had an undrafted rookie playing LT.