Heading into the Week 7 of the 2011 NFL season, things are in full swing. A clear playoff picture is beginning to form and there is a large jumble of teams that can make a push for the post season as we near the half-way point of the regular season. Before we get too har ahead of ourselves though, let’s pick the five things that made Week 6 of the 2011 NFL season awesome.
Darrelle Revis, Rookie QBs And Five Things That Made NFL Week 6 Awesome
From the Bengals and Packers to Christian Ponder getting the starting nod, here’s five things that made the sixth week of the 2011 NFL season awesome.
Coming into the 2011 season the Bengals were ranked at No. 32 in every single power ranking poll that existed. After six weeks though, the Bengals are in the top-15 in NFL.com's and Pro Football Talk's power rankings. They're riding a three-game winning streak which was starting with a win over the Buffalo Bills, who were undefeated at the time and were coming off a win over the Patriots. Even their losses are somewhat impressive. In their two losses, which were by a combined seven points, were to the Denver Broncos on the road and to the 5-1 San Francisco 49ers.
They’re doing this with a top-three defense, a rookie quarterback, a rookie No. 1 receiver and the youngest roster in the AFC. Nobody’s saying that they’re going to make a playoff push but people are excited in Cincinnati.
They’re the only undefeated team left in the league and they look like they’re primed to win a second Super Bowl in a row. They have one of the top offenses in the league and looking through their schedule, they don’t seem to have many extremely tough games left to play outside of their two games against Detroit and a game in San Diego.
Are we looking at the beginning of a New Enland-like NFL dynasty?
| Darrelle Revis Scores as Much as the Dolphins Offense |
The Jets have been one of the more disappointing teams so far in the 2011 season. However, heading into the Monday Night Football game between the Jets and the Dolphins in New York, nobody expected the Jets to lose. What they also didn't expect was the Jets defense to score as much as the Dolphins offense, or more specifically, Darrelle Revis to score as much points as the Dolphins offense on this play:
The Jets may be a disappointing team so far this season but that didn’t stop the league’s best cornerback from delivering one of the most exciting plays from the sixth week of the 2011 season.
| Close Games |
Seven of the week's 13 games ended with the losing team down by a touchdown or less. The Washington Redskins were a touchdown away from the Philadelphia Eagles. The Buffalo Bills were a field goal away from the New York Giants at the end of the game. The Detroit Lions were only down by six points to the San Francisco 49ers at the end of the game. The Pittsburgh Steelers only managed to beat the Jacksonville Jaguars by four points. The Cleveland Browns were only a touchdown away from tying their game against the Oakland Raiders. The New England Patriots had to squeak out a fourth-quarter comeback win, beating the Dallas Cowboys by four points. And finally, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers defeated the New Orleans Saints by six points.
Close games make weeks exciting and the sixth week in the 2011 NFL season certainly was exciting.
| Four of the Top-Five Rookie Quarterbacks are Now Starters |
The first five quarterbacks to be selected in the 2011 NFL draft were Cam Newton, Jake Locker, Blaine Gabbert, Christian Ponder and Andy Dalton. Before this week, only Newton, Gabbert and Dalton were starting quarterbacks for their teams but after Donovan McNabb's benching during the Vikings' 39-10 loss to the Chicago Bears, Ponder is not the fourth rookie quarterback to take the keys to an NFL offense this season.
That leaves only Locker as the only top-five rookie quarterback that isn't the starting quarterback for his team, the Tennessee Titans, and as long as Matt Hasselbeck continues to keep the Titans on top of the AFC South, Locker will stay put.
Four out of five ain’t bad though.
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