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- Big names needing big wins in week 3 and more

Ian Hetherington September 23, 2007
Ian Hetherington
NFL Columnist

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NFL Week 3


A bit of a barebones article this week, but fear not beloved reader! My incredible “insight” into the week’s upcoming matches and the prestigious Pro Football Critics Mini Fantasy Football Competition (PFCMFFC for short, catchy eh?) will be updated and our fantasy tips for the coming week are still present and correct.

Game predictions
Arizona Cardinals vs. Baltimore Ravens
Steve McNair is back in the starting line-up meaning the offense could struggle again, and the Cardinals have been doing a decent job of protecting Matt Leinart. The Ravens have the defense to take it to Leinart and James and, though it’s a little beat up, I think it’ll be the catalyst for the home team to take a win.

Buffalo Bills vs. New England Patriots
Is there anyone who’d bet for the Bills on this? Marshawn Lynch has shown promise but the rest of the team simply shouldn’t have what they’d need to go to Foxboro and nullify that offense, even if they managed to get something going against the defense.

Detroit Lions vs. Philadelphia Eagles
This could go either way, and there was a part of me thinking I should go for the Eagles on the basis that surely they’re going to explode over some poor defensive unit or another. I couldn’t quite bring myself to say it’d be this week though, and the Lions will hurt them through the air as well as Kevin Jones maybe being back as another weapon. If McNabb starts making the big plays he’s capable of, then I’ll be wrong.

Indianapolis Colts vs. Houston Texans
Scraping past the Titans convinces me further of the Colts’ Super Bowl quality. They’d been guilty in seasons gone by of blowing out walkovers and struggling once a team stood up to them. Now? They’re working hard to get the big wins and their defense is much better. Houston are looking good, but without Andre Johnson they might struggle to trouble the Indy defense.

Miami Dolphins vs. New York Jets
This is just another of a list of tough-to-call games in week 3. The Jets have the edge for me, and with Miami both not performing as you’d expect on defense and missing Thomas at line-backer, Thomas Jones could be the horse the Jets ride to victory on.

Minnesota Vikings vs. Kansas City Chiefs
After almost picking the Vikes I’ve (for reasons I can’t quite put into words) had a complete U-turn and am now leaning for the Chiefs. Larry Johnson will do a good job against the Vikings vaunted running defense to leave the Vikings needing the big offensive plays I don’t know if they’re able to create.

***Game of the Week***
San Diego Chargers vs. Green Bay Packers
The Chargers have been a huge disappointment but in their defense, that’s been against two incredibly tough defensive teams. The Packers are no mugs, but LaDainian Tomlinson is itching to take this team to another win so the Chargers and who am I to argue? It’ll be yet another tough game for San Diego and a tough performance will see them right.

San Francisco 49ers vs. Pittsburgh Steelers
Pittsburgh have been playing well so far, a lot of which can be attributed to Tomlin having a happy Ben Roethlisberger leading the offense. He’s looked solid, the defense has been as hard as ever and I can’t imagine the 49ers will suddenly produce a sufficiently potent offense to worry Pittsburgh.

St. Louis Rams vs. Tampa Bay Buccaneers
After about four changes in my decision for this game, this is probably just the one that I happen to have made at the time of writing. Come the game, another reconsideration might come into play. I don’t believe a team becomes bad overnight, and I don’t believe good players suddenly become incapable of putting great performances out. The Bucs have flattered to deceive and they could be made to suffer for the Rams’ sluggish performance in the opening couple of weeks. They’ll still put together a decent performance on offense, and I can see Jeff Garcia and Joey Galloway causing them big problems.

Cincinnati Bengals vs. Seattle Seahawks
Cincinnati racked up big points against a poor Browns defense, and allowed huge numbers against a- let’s not beat around the bush- Browns offense that isn’t likely to set the league alight. Do you see where this is headed? Cincy should have a tougher time on both sides of the ball. Seattle won’t fear them and could quietly get a big win here.

Cleveland Browns vs. Oakland Raiders
After putting up 51 against Cincinnati and coming to meet an Oakland team that hasn’t been stopping teams like they’d have hoped, Cleveland will take the game to them and see how the Raiders hold up. The Browns defense isn’t exactly Chicago’s either so it’ll be down to the Raiders to exploit that and get the points to put them ahead and try to let the defense do the rest.

Jacksonville Jaguars vs. Denver Broncos
The key for this game for Denver is to try and get points on the board earlier in the game. They haven’t been setting the world alight, but it’s notable they’ve not been letting their opposition do it either. Jacksonville meanwhile, have struggled to put up points even with their exciting running back tandem and Denver doesn’t look like the place to break out a high-scoring performance.

Carolina Panthers vs Atlanta Falcons
The Falcons have players of ability, but they let people get to Joey Harrington far too often right to put together a convincing performance. And can they stop Steve Smith? This one’s got Panthers written all over it.

New York Giants vs Washington Redskins
Joe Gibbs’ team is pulling together once again and while during their last playoff season they often thrived on big plays to pull them through, they’re currently managing to get the short yardage required to win games as well. With Philadelphia and New York not looking great, divisional games against the two at home are vital if they’re to challenge Dallas. The problem with the Giants is they don’t seem able to pull together the talent in the depth chart but if this season is going to amount to anything they need to start doing so and fast.

Dallas Cowboys vs Chicago Bears
If the Cowboys had been keeping teams out then that combined with a dangerous offense might have been enough to tip them for a win in Chicago. However, this Bears team has a way of stopping supposedly great point-scorers and getting just enough to notch another victory up for themselves.

Tennessee Titans vs. New Orleans Saints
How long can the supposedly Super Bowl-bound Saints go without a win? You can’t keep a good team down forever and this is their first home game of the year so it’s a good place to start. I like the Titans and they’ve looked better than I anticipated so they’ll give New Orleans a good game.

PFC Staff Fantasy Picks


As you hopefully saw in the article last week, we’ve introduced a little fantasy football game between a few of the PFC staff for a bit of fun and, if we know anything (which is debatable at times) give anybody who wants it some potential fantasy tips. Whether that’ll work out or not remains to be seen, but we’re gonna do it anyway and hope we get enough right to show we might have some idea of what we’re talking about. First up, here are last weeks picks, scores and the standings going into week two.

Kevin Figg selected Carson Palmer (an inspired choice, as it would turn out), Cedric Benson Steve Smith and Todd Heap. Huge games for Smith and Palmer means he leaps up the standings by getting himself an impressive 79 points.

Chris Pokorny selected Brett Favre, Joseph Addie, Roy Williams and in Kellen Winslow a pick I thought was wholly optimistic but turned out to be a great selection. Those players raked in a highly respectable 60 points.

I picked Drew Brees to lead what I thought would be a Saints revival (oops!), Rudi Johnson, Steve Smith and Jason Witten. Smith was probably my best choice as I got a comparatively low 46 points, to give us the standings below.

Kevin really made the big calls this week, especially Carson Palmer and that means he’s ended up well in the lead as we approach week 3.

Kevin - 90
Ian - 76 ½
Chris - 62 ½

So as week 3 approaches Kevin has jumped out into the lead leaving me and Chris playing catch-up, but we’re all doing a reasonable job of it thus far, here’s hoping for more of the same (and that Kevin doesn’t get another 90-pointer!)

Kevin Figg:
QB: Donovan McNabb (Eagles) vs. Lions - McNabb should have a field day against a below average Detroit secondary.

HB: Adrian Peterson (Vikings) vs. Chiefs - With a back-up QB at the helm, and facing a bad defense, it will be the Adrian Peterson show.

WR: Santana Moss (Redskins) vs. Giants - He has yet to have a breakout game this season, this will be the week.

TE: Heath Miller (Steelers) vs. 49ers - With San Francisco's new aggressive/blitzing style defense, expect Big Ben to look to Miller on third downs over the middle.

Chris Pokorny
QB: Matt Hasselbeck (Seahawks) vs. Bengals - It's probably a curse to bank on the Bengals being so bad again, but forget about "curses". Hasselbeck should create matchup problems for the Bengals secondary, even if it's only good for two or three touchdown passes.

RB: Jamal Lewis (Browns) vs. Raiders - Jamal Lewis got his wheels going last week, and he should put on another show against the Raiders defense. It won't be as explosive as last week, but considering the Raiders have weapons in the secondary, Cleveland will focus more on running it near the red zone.

WR: Chad Johnson (Bengals) vs. Seahawks - It could definitely be possible that Johnson has 20 touchdowns as a receiver this season. Johnson and Palmer's chemistry has reached a new high, and there's no such thing as shutting him down anymore.

TE: Todd Heap (Ravens) vs. Cardinals - McNair will be in desperate need of weapons in his return game, and Heap will be his safety outlet.

Ian Hetherington
QB: Ben Roethlisberger (Steelers) vs. 49ers –Big Ben is showing signs of his ’05 form, seeming to be perfectly happy under Tomlin’s system. I think with the 49ers having to keep tabs on Willie Parker Roethlisberger could end up with a few scores, not least because he’ll be dumping it off a lot under 49ers pass rush. He’s doing things carefully and the 49ers could pay for sending too many guys at him.

RB: Travis Henry (Broncos) vs. Jaguars –The Jags have a good rush defense in theory, but it hasn’t lived up to it’s reputation or 2006 form so far, so throwing Travis Henry between the tackles would be a good way to judge whether they’ve sorted out their problems. He’s shown flexible technique thus far in Denver though, so I think he’ll have a good game here anyway even if the Jags cut down his productivity a little, he’ll grind out another good performance on home turf.

WR: Joey Galloway (Buccaneers) vs. Rams – The Rams defense has been far too generous to opposition thus far, and the Bucs have flattered to deceive so further Garcia/Galloway hook-ups could be a way for the Bucs to try and steal a march on the Rams.

TE: Dallas Clark (Colts) vs. Texans – A deceptively good Houston D will be looking to smother deep passes after they saw what Manning did to the Saints and they’re going to want to pressure him where possible, so short throws to Dallas Clark could be the order of the day as the Colts create those long drives.

SCORING SYSTEM:
Quarterbacks: Touchdown = 6 points; 50 yards passing = 1 point; interception or fumble (recovered by defense) = -½ point

Running back: Touchdown = 6 points; 50 rushing/receiving yards = 2 points; fumble (recovered by defense) = -½ point

Wide receiver: Touchdown = 6 points; 50 receiving yards = 2 points; fumble (recovered by defense) = -½ point

Tight end: Touchdown = 6 points; 50 receiving yards = 2 points; fumble (recovered by defense) = -½ point


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