Power
Rankings After Week 15
1. San Francisco 10-3-1
(4th)
2. New England 10-4 (1st)
3. Green Bay 10-4 (2nd)
4. Atlanta 12-2 (6th)
5. Houston 12-2 (5th)
6. Denver 11-3 (7th)
7. Seattle 9-5 (8th)
8. New York Giants 8-6
(3rd)
9. Washington 8-6 (9th)
10. Baltimore 9-5 (10th)
11. Indianapolis 9-5 (11th)
12. Chicago 8-6 (12th)
13. Pittsburgh 7-7 (14th)
14. Cincinnati 8-6 (15th)
15. Minnesota 8-6 (16th)
16. Dallas 8-6 (17th)
17. New Orleans 6-8 (18th)
18. Miami 6-8 (21st)
19. Tampa Bay 6-8 (13th)
20. St. Louis 6-7-1 (19th)
21. Cleveland 5-9 (23rd)
22. Carolina 5-9 (25th)
23. Buffalo 5-9 (24th)
24. Tennessee 5-9 (27th)
25. New York Jets 6-8
(20th)
26. Detroit 4-10 (22nd)
27. San Diego 5-9 (26th)
28. Jacksonville 2-12
(28th)
29. Philadelphia 4-10
(29th)
30. Oakland 4-10 (30th)
31. Arizona 5-9 (32nd)
32. Kansas City 2-12 (31st)
Comments:
It
was yet another week of serious change within my power rankings. 24 of 32 spots
experienced change this week; down from 26 the week before, but still a good
deal of change. 15 teams moved up at least 1 spot in the rankings, with 6 of
those teams climbing more than 1 spot. 9 teams fell at least 1 spot in the rankings,
with 4 of those teams dropping more than 1 spot.
Amazingly, I have a new
#1 team yet again this week. The 49ers held on to beat the Patriots on the road
Sunday night, and they moved up 3 spots from #4 to take over the top spot in my
rankings. San Fran is the fifth different team to hold the top spot in my
rankings over the last 5 weeks and the sixth different team to hold the top
spot over the last 7 weeks. The Niners are ranked #1 in my power rankings for
the first time since week 5. The Patriots dropped out of the top spot after just
1 week, falling 1 spot from #1 to #2.
The 49ers were 1 of 4
teams to move 3 spots up this week. No team made a truly huge move up the rankings
this week, but 4 teams did climb 3 spots. Along with the Niners, the Dolphins
moved up 3 spots from #21 to #18; the Panthers moved up 3 spots from #25 to
#22; and the Titans rose 3 spots from #27 to #24.
For the second week in
a row, the Tampa Bay Bucs took the biggest dive in my rankings, this time
falling 6 spots from #13 to #19 following a complete and total meltdown against
the Saints.
Once again there is a
new team at the bottom of my rankings as well this week. The Cardinals snapped
their 9-game losing skid on Sunday, soundly beating the Detroit Lions to
finally earn their fifth win. The Cards moved out of the bottom spot in my
rankings after just 1 week, climbing 1 spot from #32 to #31.
The Kansas City Chiefs
return to the bottom of my rankings for the first time since week 11. KC was
shutout by Oakland on Sunday and they dropped 1 spot in my rankings this week
from #31 to #32.
Now that I’ve been
doing power rankings every week for a few years I’ve come to understand how
hard a task it is in terms of getting everything to make sense. It’s simply
impossible to make each team’s movement or non-movement up or down the rankings
appear completely logical each week.
If you look at the comment section on any
of ESPN’s power rankings (and one probably shouldn’t make a habit of looking at
any comment section on any website) you’ll see complaints from fans of all
teams pointing out different inconsistencies or things that don’t seem “fair”
about the rankings of specific teams.
What people don’t
always seem to realize is that unless you basically can’t make every team’s
movement up or down the rankings reflect whether they won or lost every single
week (nor should you). It seems like a waste of time to even point out why
these message board complainers don’t get it, but I’ll continue anyway.
I bring all this up
because this week might be the best example of that “you can’t please everybody”
aspect of my power rankings. For example, 3 teams moved up in my rankings this
week following losses. Of those 3 teams, surely the Steelers would get the most
attention for moving up a spot following a second straight defeat.
But the issue is that I
just don’t think that the teams directly behind Pittsburgh in my rankings
(Cincinnati, Minnesota, and Dallas) are any better than Pittsburgh. The
Steelers just played the Cowboys in Dallas and they lost in overtime in a game
that they tried really hard to give away. What I would normally do is keep
Pittsburgh right where they were, however, Tampa Bay has collapsed and they
simply had to move behind the Steelers, so I had to move Pittsburgh up a spot
despite a second straight defeat.
In isolation you would say that moving the
Steelers up doesn’t make any sense, but I think my reasoning is valid. The
problem is that if you just briefly look at somebody’s power rankings you don’t
see the reasoning; all you see is this week’s rank and last week’s rank.
Anyway, there are still
only 2 teams with less than 3 losses in the NFL (Atlanta at #4 and Houston at
#5) and there are now just 4 teams left with less than 4 losses. A total of 6
teams have fewer than 5 losses and those 6 teams are the top 6 teams in my
power rankings. 9 of 32 teams have either 5 or 6 losses.
Pittsburgh is the only
team at .500 in the entire NFL (7-7) and they are my #13 team, ahead of 3 teams
with winning records. The Cowboys are my lowest ranked winning team at #16. The
Saints are my highest ranked losing team at #17. Those two teams go
head-to-head this week.
The Seahawks are my
highest ranked 5-loss team at #7, while the Colts are my lowest ranked 5-loss
team at #11. The Giants are now my highest ranked 6-loss team at #8, dropping 5
spots this week from #3 following the glorious 34-0 beat down at the hands of
my Falcons.
5 teams have double
digit losses and 2 teams still have just 2 wins on the year (Jags at #28 and
Chiefs at #32).
No comments:
Post a Comment