Last week it looked like it was an AFC-heavy league at the top, so we broke down how each NFC team had fared and weighed their legitimacy for the rest of the year. Then the Falcons and Cowboys went out and thoroughly beat the Broncos and Bengals, so the NFC all of a sudden is looking more competitive.
There’s no doubting who the king of the AFC is, though. In fact, we pick them over the NFC-topping Vikings thanks to the impressive return of a certain quarterback.
Let’s look at each of the AFC clubs with the Week 6 Power Rankings.
1 New England Patriots (4-1, Last week: No 2)
• All due respect to Minnesota, the league’s last standing unbeaten team. But what a returning Tom Brady did to the Browns on Sunday just reaffirmed who the top dog is. If fully a healthy Patriots met the current-form Vikings ten times, it’s tough to see Minnesota winning more than three of them. It’ll be easier to believe the Patriots aren’t the team to beat when they show they aren’t, and that hasn’t happened in a long time.
2 Minnesota Vikings (5-0, LW 3)
3 Green Bay Packers (4-1, LW 4)
4 Pittsburgh Steelers (4-1, LW 6)
• Apart from the Week 3 hiccup against the Eagles, the Steelers have won their games by 12, eight, 29 and 18 points. Ben Roethlisberger is having an MVP-calibre season, with teammate Antonio Brown likely to take some votes away from him. They’re as scary a matchup for the Patriots as any team. The two play each other in two weeks.
5 Seattle Seahawks (3-1, LW 7)
6 Atlanta Falcons (4-1, LW 9)
7 Oakland Raiders (4-1, LW 10)
• If Brady decides to retire before he’s 50, the league will find itself without this generation’s most recognisable faces, since Peyton Manning is gone. Their replacement could be Derek Carr, who is not only having an All-Pro season but is one of the most exciting and charismatic players to watch. The league feels as devoid of big names as it has in a long time, but Carr will be a household name very soon. This is a really good and really fun team.
8 Denver Broncos (4-1, LW 1)
• It’s perhaps a harsh drop from first to eighth in one week, but Paxton Lynch’s struggles underlined just how vulnerable Denver can be due to one position. Trevor Siemian has been pretty good and should return from injury this week, but it’s not hard to see him having similar days to what Lynch just had at some point. The defence will still keep them in the thick of things until the end.
9 Dallas Cowboys (4-1, LW 11)
• More: Tony Romo and the upcoming QB dilemma
10 Philadelphia Eagles (3-1, LW 5)
11 Kansas City Chiefs (2-2, LW 13)
• The AFC West is going to be extremely tough to win with the Raiders and Broncos there. The division could send three teams to the play-offs if the Chiefs remain their consistent, professional selves.
12 Arizona Cardinals (2-3, LW 18)
13 Buffalo Bills (3-2, LW 21)
• Three straight wins has Buffalo in good position to push for a Wild Card spot. They won’t be so lucky to catch a quarterback-less Patriots team next time they meet, but there’s reason for optimism when there wasn’t three weeks ago. The NFL is weird.
14 Baltimore Ravens (3-2, LW 14)
• Two straight losses and a dearth of offensive fire power were enough to shake things up. The Ravens fired offensive coordinator Mark Trestman on Monday. The last time they fired their OC midseason, they won the Super Bowl.
15 Washington (3-2, LW 19)
16 Cincinnati Bengals (2-3, LW 12)
• The loss Sunday to the Cowboys could really come back to bite the Bengals. They're at New England this week, so a 2-4 start looks probable. Cincinnati have been a postseason mainstay, getting there six of the past seven seasons (0-6 in that time), but only 9 per cent of teams to start 2-4 have ever made the play-offs. Every game is must-win from here.
17 New York Giants (2-3, LW 16)
18 Los Angeles Rams (3-2, LW 15)
19 Detroit Lions (2-3, LW 29)
20 Houston Texans (3-2, LW 8)
• Welcome to the AFC South portion of the rankings, where all four teams are admittedly grouped together to drive home the point how similarly mediocre-to-bad they are.
For the first-place Texans, prized free agent QB Brock Osweiler has been a disaster. Thought to be the final piece to the puzzle and the long-sought quarterback for an otherwise loaded roster, the ex-Bronco has been one of the league's worst players. There's no JJ Watt coming back this year, either. Their one-game perch isn't safe, but they're still the tentative favourites even though literally no one wants to watch them in the play-offs again.
21 Tennessee Titans (2-3, LW 26)
• Mea culpa: We had Tennessee as the dirt-worst team in the first of these rankings. A 2-3 record isn't exactly a case for full reconsideration, but they're competitive, with a fantastic run game, a dynamic young quarterback and a legit star on defence in Jurrell Casey. Both lines are pretty good and don't receive much recognition. Their coach is historically awful and the Titans won't scare anyone, but they're feisty, and in this dreadful division that might be enough to grab a surprise play-off spot.
22 Jacksonville Jaguars (1-3, LW 20)
• One win – over the Colts Week 4 in London – was enough to rejuvenate hopes and likely keep coach Gus Bradley from being fired during the bye week. Jacksonville have the ability to score and a nice young defence that’s getting better. It’s not too hard to see them winning the division, even if it only takes seven or eight wins.
23 Indianapolis Colts (2-3, LW 31)
• Andrew Luck is the only thing keeping the Colts viable. It’s insane how bad the rest of the roster is. With Luck, though, they have a puncher’s chance to get punched out in the play-offs.
24 Tampa Bay Buccaneers (2-3, LW 23)
25 New Orleans Saints (1-3, LW 24)
26 Carolina Panthers (1-4, LW 19)
27 Chicago Bears (1-4, LW 28)
28 San Diego Chargers (1-4, LW 20)
• Mike McCoy could be fired any day and Phillip Rivers continues to waste his career on a going-nowhere team. If they are moving to Los Angeles next year, San Diego fans won’t miss them at this rate.
29 Miami Dolphins (1-4, LW 27)
• It’s time to consider the Ryan Tannehill experiment dead.
30 New York Jets (1-4, LW 22)
• Even though their schedule has been devastating, the Jets haven’t even looked competitive. Choosing not to lock up interception machine Ryan Fitzpatrick long-term was fortuitous, but there’s only faint hope that the quarterback position will be solved soon. Until that position is finally solved, the Jets aren’t going anywhere.
31 San Francisco 49ers (1-4, LW 30)
32 Cleveland Browns (0-5, LW 32)
• The Browns have actually been competitive in more games than the Niners or Jets can claim. Charlie Whitehurst was already their fifth quarterback to take a snap in five games. It’s safer to be a Spinal Tap drummer than a Cleveland quarterback. At least they have the Cavs and Indians.
kjeffers@thenational.ae
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