A few minutes into a call I had this week with another person whose livelihood depends on the NFL (albeit in a different kind of way), we both arrived at the same conclusion: Boy, there are just a lot of mediocre teams out there right now. This felt especially true after I sat down to compile this week’s power rankings, which, when I have the winless Las Vegas Raiders in the top 26, the okay Minnesota Vikings in the top 10 and the 1-2 San Francisco 49ers as an obvious playoff contender after losing 11-10 to the Colorado Rock … sorry … Denver Broncos on Sunday Night Football.
There’s myriad reasons for this of course. It’s a longer regular season and a shorter preseason. Everyone is either hurt, tired, too hot or playing in an offense run by former special teams and defensive coordinators. It’s tough sledding out there, which makes what the top-end teams have done all the more impressive.
This list will be completely different in a few weeks, because a few of these clubs will get in a groove and ascend. At least we hope so.
