NFL Week 7 Notes
October 26th, 2009 at 6:04 am by Displaced Cleveland FanThese are stories from around the league that I thought were worth noting. You can read my recap of the Browns week 7 game here.
Could the Houston Texans be headed for a wild card berth?
The Texans jumped out to a 21-0 halftime lead Sunday against the 49ers. San Francisco pulled back into the game in the second half. But in the end, Houston prevailed with a 24-21 win. They are now 4-3 and in 2nd place in the AFC South.
Looking at their first seven games, two of their wins came against pathetic teams (Oakland & Tennessee) and two came against good teams (San Fran & surprisingly Cincinnati). Of their three losses, two of those games were only lost by one score. Only one had a lopsided final score (24-7 against the Jets in week 1). Not great. But not bad either.
Over their last nine games, they have three tough games (New England and Indianapolis twice) and three that look like they should be easy games (Buffalo, Tennessee, St. Louis). If they lose the tough games and win the easy games, that will make their record 7-6. Their other three games are against Jacksonville, Seattle, and Miami, which have a combined record of 7-11. Could Houston win 2 or 3 of those games. Perhaps. It will be interesting to see if they can continue or if they fizzle out at the end.
The big surprise to me, and many I believe, has been the play of quarterback Matt Schaub. This week against the 49ers he threw for 264 yards on 20 for 30 passing (66.7%) with 2 touchdowns and no interceptions. Through seven games he’s passing for 65.5% for almost 300 yards per game with 16 touchdowns and only 5 interceptions.
Maybe there’s another explanation for the Texans success.
Former Presidents George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush attended the game in Houston yesterday. Perhaps their presence was what pushed the Texans over the top.
OK. Maybe not. But it’s good to see these two former leaders of this great country out enjoying the game of football, just the same as us average Americans.
The Buccaneers “hosted” the Patriots in London yesterday. The winless Bucs were not impressive, but Tom Brady and the Patriots at least entertained the Brits in front of a crowd of 84,000+.
While obviously not going to post quite the same numbers as he did in last week’s 59-0 blow out of Tennessee, Brady still had a solid game - 23 for 32 (71.9%) for 308 yards and 3 touchdowns. He did throw 2 interceptions, but it didn’t matter. New England still won 35-7.
This is the third year the NFL has scheduled a regular season game in London. Commissioner Roger Goodell has said there may be more in the future, possibly multiple games a year. It will certainly be interesting to see just how far this expansion into England goes.
In the Division:
The Pittsburgh Steelers hosted the undefeated Vikings. Thanks to two defensive touchdowns, the Steelers handed the Vikings their first loss and improved to 5-2.
The Cincinnati Bengals were at home against the Chicago Bears this week. I’ll admit, I had the Bears picked to win this game. I just have a hard time believing that the Bengals would be this good this year. But they completely destroyed the Bears, thanks to former Bear Cedric Benson’s career-high 189 rushing yards with a TD and Carson Palmer’s 5 TD’s. Cincinnati won 45-10 and is tied for first place with Pittsburgh.
The Baltimore Ravens had a bye week. They remain in third place with a 3-3 record.
Quick hits:
- Three undefeated teams remain: New Orleans, Indianapolis, and Denver.
- Likewise, there are still three teams looking for their first win: Tampa Bay, St. Louis, and Tennessee. Of those three teams, the one with the best chance of winning next week is St. Louis against the 1-5 Lions.
- After a pathetic loss to the Browns in week 5, the Buffalo Bills have managed to win their last two games to improve to 3-4. Meanwhile, the Browns are 1-6.
- The New York Giants came up short last night against Arizona when the Cardinals intercepted a pass from Eli Manning with just over a minute remaining. The Giants have now lost two straight and their next six games are against teams with a combined record of 20-9. It will be interesting to see how they fare in these games.
-dcf
Tags: Carson Palmer, Cedric Benson, Eli Manning, George H.W. Bush, George W. Bush, Matt Schaub, Tom Brady
