The NFL Blog: Week 3 Review

Just when you thought you had things pretty much figured out…the NFL happened again.

The NFL just never stops being unpredictable. Each week something occurs that makes you scratch your head and wonder “how in the hell did that happen?” In week 3, there were several head scratchers and one stupefyer. Along the way there were a number of excellent, super competitive games once again. In the end, some teams moved on to 3-0, while other teams felt defeat for the first time. Some teams reached that unfriendly 0-3 that almost always spells doom, while other teams won for the first time to avoid facing all of that history.

Regardless of what took place in the late games on Sunday, or on Sunday night, or even on Monday night, there was no question what the story of the weekend was going to be. That’s because one of the more stunning developments in recent history had already taken place by the time the 4:00 PM games got underway. The Miami Dolphins went into Gillette Stadium on Sunday and put a whooping on the Patriots that no NFL fan will soon forget, blasting them 38-13, behind a gimmicky, high school football like offense that the New England defense simply couldn’t stop.



The New England Patriots obviously became a very different team the moment they lost Tom Brady for the season early in week 1. They went from Super Bowl favorites to a team that people weren’t sure could even make the playoffs. But after looking so steady and confident in their convincing win over the Jets on the road in week 2, most people assumed that the Patriots were still going to be a tough team to beat. Certainly at home against weak competition no one expected the Patriots to struggle much. And the Dolphins appeared to be extremely weak competition. After winning only 1 game in 2007, the Dolphins began this season by losing at home to the Jets (the team the Patriots smacked 19-10 on the road in week 2) and then getting smoked 31-10 by the Cardinals in Arizona. They entered this game with LB Joey Porter spouting his mouth off about how it shouldn’t be too hard to beat the Patriots, considering they had a backup QB starting for them, and he even said it would be nice to get the first win. To a man, the entire population of America thought that Porter was being a clown, and that his words would only bring a worse beating down upon himself and his teammates.

But nothing about Sunday went according to plan. Unless you’re talking about the Dolphins plan, in which case everything went accordingly. The Dolphins came in as 12.5 point underdogs, and they left having covered by 37.5. The Dolphins hadn’t scored more than 14 points in their first two games, but they scored 38 on Sunday. They had allowed at least 20 points in each of their first two games, but they held the Patriots to just 13 on Sunday. New England had scored 19 points or less in each of their first two games, but they had also held their opponents to just 10 points in each of their first two games. On Sunday, they scored just 13 points while allowing 38. The loss snapped New England’s 21 game regular season win streak that stretched back to December of 2006. Their last regular season loss prior to this: week 14 of 2006, at Miami, 21-0. During the time between that loss and the loss on Sunday, the Patriots went 21-0, while the Dolphins went 1-20. The 38 points allowed by New England was the most they had allowed in a regular season game since the Colts scored 40 against them in week 9 of 2005. The 13 points scored by the Pats was their lowest offensive total in a regular season game since they were shutout by the Fins in that game in Miami back in 2006.

Adding to the surprising outcome and the shocking score was the bizarre way in which the Dolphins carried out their beating of the mighty Pats. Using a formation in which RB Ronnie Brown lined up in the shotgun, the Dolphins snapped the ball directly to Brown 6 times, and 4 of those plays resulted in Miami touchdowns. Brown ran for 4 TD’s and threw for another. The Dolphins outgained New England 461-216, rushing for 216 yards, and holding the Pats to 137 yards passing. Patriots QB Matt Cassel was just 19 of 31 for 131 yards, 1 TD, and 1 INT. He was also sacked 3 times and lost a fumble. The Dolphins got out to a 14-3 lead, led 21-6 at halftime, and outscored the Pats 10-0 in the 4th quarter, scoring the final 17 points of the game. New England fans booed on several occasions.

While it’s unlikely that the Dolphins will play as well as they did on Sunday during the remainder of the season, especially now that teams will be looking for that “Wildcat” formation, they have at least gained a huge bit of momentum heading into their bye week. On the other hand, the Patriots go into the bye week in need of doing some serious soul searching. At this point, I really have no idea whether the Pats will end up 10-6 or 6-10.




There were two other final scores that were quite surprising last week, but in both games the favored team ended up getting a W. Oakland was a 10 point underdog on the road at 2-0 Buffalo, and nearly sprung an upset before falling by a point. Cincinnati was a 13.5 point underdog on the road against the 2-0 Giants, but they took the G-Men into OT before losing on a FG.

The Bills outgained the Raiders by 131 yards (378-247) and had 15 more first downs than Oakland (25-10), but they turned the ball over 3 times and needed a furious 4th quarter comeback to avoid defeat. The Raiders led 16-7 at halftime and had a 23-14 lead with 6:23 remaining in the game, but the Bills scored 10 points in the final 4 minutes, and got a 38 yard FG by Rian Lindell at the buzzer to win, 24-23. With the win, the Bills moved to 3-0, while the Raiders fell to 1-2.




The game between New York and Cincinnati was a very well played contest that was back and forth throughout. Neither team committed a turnover, the Giants had an edge in total yards of just 59, and both teams got 24 first downs. Cinci led 13-10 at the half but the Giants tied it with a FG in the 3rd and then took the lead on another FG early in the 4th quarter. The Bengals came back to take the lead on a TD pass from Palmer to TJ Houshmandzadeh with 4:39 to play. Eli then lead the Giants on a march down the field that resulted in a 4 yard TD pass to Kevin Boss that gave New York a 23-20 advantage with 1:50 left. Cinci answered with a last ditch drive of their own, and Shayne Graham knocked a 21 yard field goal through the uprights to tie the game as time expired to send it into OT. Both teams got the ball in overtime, but the Giants eventually won on their second possession, with John Carney booting a 22 yard field goal through to give New York a 26-23 win. With the victory, the Giants moved to 3-0, while the Bengals fell to 0-3.




Three other teams improved to 3-0 on Sunday. Tennessee whipped up on Houston at home, winning 31-12 to stay undefeated. They have outscored opponents by a total of 46 points this year. The Broncos escaped with another close victory, this time over the Saints at Mile High. The two teams combined for 871 yards and 66 points, but the Broncos eked out a 34-32 win. Denver survived to get to 3-0, stopping the Saints on a two point conversion try that would have tied the game with 10 minutes to play, and benefiting from a 43 yard field goal attempt missed by Martin Gramatica with 2 minutes to go. Dallas won convincingly over the Packers at Lambeau Field on Sunday to get to 3-0. The Boys won 27-16, again confirming that they are the best team in the League at this moment.




Along with the Bengals, 4 other teams fell to 0-3 on Sunday. Kansas City was horrible again, getting blown out 38-14 by the Falcons in Atlanta. The Lions were equally as bad, getting smoked 31-13 by the Niners in San Francisco. This week GM Matt Millen was finally relieved of his duties. The Rams weren’t any better than Detroit or KC, getting hammered by the Seahawks, 37-13, in Seattle. It was the first win of the season for the Hawks, who have been crippled by injuries. The Rams will now go with Trent Green at quarterback instead of Marc Bulger. I’ll be shocked if that move has a positive impact on the Rams’ season. Finally, the Browns got pummeled by the Ravens, 28-10, in Baltimore. There is now talk of Brady Quinn taking over at QB for Derek Anderson some time soon. Anderson isn’t a great QB, but there’s much more going wrong for Cleveland this year than just bad quarterback play.




Aside from the Patriots, 4 other teams lost for the first time on Sunday. The Cardinals began the season 2-0 for the first time in ages, but they were unable to survive a road trip to Washington last week, losing 24-17 to fall to 2-1. The Panthers had come out of tight games with wins in each of the first two weeks of the season, but they ran into a wall in Minnesota on Sunday and lost 20-10. For Minnesota it was the first win of the year after a pair of tough losses, and they are now 1-0 with Gus Frerotte at QB. The Steelers lost running back Willie Parker for some time and lost their first game of the season, falling in a hard hitting matchup against the Eagles in Philly, 15-6. And the Packers suffered their first defeat with Aaron Rodgers at QB, losing by 11 at home to the Cowboys.




The Vikings, Dolphins, and Seahawks were 3 of 5 teams that won for the first time this past weekend. Jacksonville avoided an 0-3 start by beating the Colts in one of the best games of the weekend. The Jaguars were picked by many to get back to the playoffs and were thought by some to be legitimate Super Bowl contenders. But after losing games they were favored to win in each of the first two weeks of the season, the Jags were in serious jeopardy of seeing their season go down the drains, 0-2 and facing the Colts in Indianapolis. Jacksonville dominated the game in many ways, outgaining the Colts by 78 yards (403-325), achieving 6 more first downs than the Colts (25-19), intercepting Peyton Manning twice, and holding an outrageous edge in time of possession, 41:35 to 18:25! Yet the Jags needed some late game heroics to pull out the win. The Jags trailed 7-0 after the first quarter and 14-10 at the half, but they took a 17-14 lead late in the 3rd quarter and led 20-14 with just over 2 and half minutes to go in the game. The Jags appeared to be in good shape but they had left enough time on the clock for Manning to lead another one of his late game drives. After the 2 minute warning, the Colts had a 4th and 2 at their own 31 when Manning hit his old partner Marvin Harrison for 27 yards and a first down at the Jax 42. 7 plays and 44 seconds later, the Colts tied the game on a 2 yard TD run by Joseph Addai, and then took a 1 point lead on the extra point by Adam Vinatieri. The Colts kicked the ball deep for a touchback and the Jags had just 67 seconds to try and kick a field goal and avoid falling to 0-3. One thing on their side was that they had all 3 timeouts. The other thing on their side was that tremendous advantage in time of possession, which had kept the Indy defense on the field for over 70 plays. Things didn’t start well on the drive for the Jags. They had already used 38 seconds and a timeout while gaining just 9 yards when they came to the line for a 4th and 1 at their own 29 with 29 seconds to play. David Garrard threw a pass to his right incomplete and it looked as if the Colts had won. Tony Dungy even took off his headset on the Colts sideline but that was before he saw a late flag appear. The refs called the Colts for pass interference, giving Jacksonville new life and a first down at their own 40 with 25 seconds remaining. In the next 11 seconds, Garrard got off 3 plays, throwing for 10 yards, running for 9, and throwing again for 8 yards to move the ball to the Indy 33 with 8 seconds left. The Colts tried to freeze Jacksonville kicker Josh Scobee with a couple of timeouts, but eventually he drilled a 51 yard field goal to give the Jags a 23-21 win, their first victory of the season.



The Chargers also got their first win of the season last week, but their victory over the Jets on Monday Night Football came in a far less competitive game. San Diego forced 4 turnovers, returned 1 for a TD, went 9 for 13 on 3rd down conversions while holding the Jets to just 1 for 8 on 3rd down, and outscored New York 38-14 through the first 3 quarters in route to a 45-29 shellacking that was much worse than the final score indicated. Things didn’t start out that well for SD, as Philip Rivers threw a pick 6 in the first quarter that put the Chargers in an early 7-0 hole, but they scored the next 17 points in the game, and 38 of the next 45 to put the game away. Rivers’ excellent play continued and LT scored his first 2 TD’s of the season. The Chargers join the Jags, Colts, Vikings, Seahawks, and Saints as teams favored to reach the postseason that are 1-2 after 3 weeks. But for San Diego, 1-2 feels oh so much better than it does for Favre and the Jets.