Hey folks! My name’s Kenneth…you might have seen my name in some comments at this site. Well, TT asked for some help on the site, and was nice enough to let me help out with writing the commentary on the rankings. We’ll see how that works out for him. 
Anyway, let’s see how it goes!
| Rank | Team | Notes | Last Week | BeatPower |
1 |
 |
(Beat DET) Surprised? I know I was. Basically, Tennessee and Carolina’s wins had nothing to do with this–rather, underlying graph dynamics hurt the Titans but not the Panthers, so you have a new #1 this week. Perhaps TT can explain better? |
2 |
98.0(24/25 – 0/25) |
2 |
 |
(Beat JAC) Here’s what I do know: through no fault of their own, the Titans lost beatwins over SD and NO this week. That had some effect on their ranking, as the Panthers kept beatwins over both. |
1 |
100.0(19/19 – 0/19) |
3 |
 |
(Beat NE) This team seems too unstable to really be ranked this high. I mean, losing to the Chargers is bad enough (this year), but losing to the Raiders is just inexplicable. Maybe they have trouble traveling to the west coast; I guess upcoming games @SF and @SEA would test that. More important for them is going to be the trip to Tennessee this week, in what is surely the game of the week–but I guess that will come in the picks… |
3 |
97.8(22/23 – 0/23) |
4 |
 |
(Beat SEA) Arizona beats Seattle, as expected. The Cardinals seem to have finally capitalized on all that promise people have seen for so long. My question is still if Warner can continue to avoid the disastrous mistakes that have hampered him in recent years. |
4 |
89.6(21/24 – 2/24) |
5 |
 |
(Beat WAS) Beating Washington gave them the season split and thus took away a beatloss, which let the Cowboys rise. |
7 |
82.7(20/26 – 3/26) |
6 |
 |
(Beat MIN) Buccaneers rise a bit due to Washington and Pittsburgh’s slides (more on each later). |
8 |
80.0(19/25 – 4/25) |
7 |
 |
(Beat SD) Subtle changes in the underlying graph hurt the Steelers, as far as I can reckon. The graph under them flattened a bit overall. |
5 |
90.0(16/20 – 0/20) |
8 |
 |
(Lost to DEN) As mentioned in the previews, the loss to Denver got beatlooped away immediately. |
9 |
89.1(19/23 – 1/23) |
9 |
 |
(Beat CHI) Beating the Bears gives them a beatpath and provides enough of a boost to leapfrog the Giants. |
11 |
72.0(18/25 – 7/25) |
10 |
 |
(Beat BAL) A lot of people might sensibly ask, “What does this team have to do get respect from BeatPaths?” It turns out that the answer is “don’t get blown out by the Browns on Monday Night Football”. Seriously: there are a lot of beatwins that the Giants are missing out on due to that loss. The good news is that they should have the oppurtunity to get over it in the coming weeks. |
10 |
77.3(6/11 – 0/11) |
11 |
 |
(Lost to GB) Luckily for my boys, there’s no penalty in BeatPaths or the NFL for total embarassment. |
12 |
67.3(17/26 – 8/26) |
12 |
 |
(Beat HOU) There’s been a lot of talk recently about how the Colts have “found themselves” and are “back”, but have they really looked that much better? It seems to me they’re still skating by teams (albeit a higher class of teams), and don’t look like a strong team to me yet. |
13 |
63.5(16/26 – 9/26) |
13 |
 |
(Lost to NYG) That game could have been part of a Chappelle’s Show “When Keepin’ It Real Goes Wrong” skit. |
14 |
55.8(14/26 – 11/26) |
14 |
 |
(Lost to DAL) If you were wondering why so many teams bumped up one or two spots higher in the rankings, this would be it. Without the beatwin over Dallas, the Redskins look much less impressive, and tumble a great deal. |
6 |
75.0(6/12 – 0/12) |
15 |
 |
(Beat KC) On the other hand, the Saints look much better than they did last week, which helps the Redskins out. The Saints managed this by being one of the many teams lining up at KC’s “Beatloop Away Your Loss To Denver” window. |
24 |
66.7(5/12 – 1/12) |
16 |
 |
(Lost to TB) Minnesota already was under a beatpath from Tampa Bay, so nothing really changes. They have a beatpath to Jacksonville, so a win there wouldn’t change anything either. For a team with so much talent, they really seem like a blah team to me. |
15 |
52.3(11/22 – 10/22) |
17 |
 |
(Lost to IND) No change in ranking for losing to IND. What happened to that great D Line they were supposed to have? |
16 |
43.8(10/24 – 13/24) |
18 |
 |
(Beat OAK) No big reward for beating Oakland, as you would expect. Despite this ranking, Miami has certainly been impressive this year. |
17 |
40.0(9/25 – 14/25) |
19 |
 |
(Tied CIN) There’s been a fair amount of discussion as to how to treat the tie in the graph. For the record, it’s the same as a season split–it beatloops itself away. On another note, people seem to be willing to forgive McNabb not knowing the tie, but to me it fits right in with the Reid/McNabb problems with closing out games and handling the clock in late situations. |
19 |
65.0(4/10 – 1/10) |
20 |
 |
(Lost to PIT) I can hear TT’s teeth grinding every time I mention the Bronco’s loss to the Chiefs. But again, that which allows the Saints to rise lets the Charger bump up too. That’s how they rise despite a loss; the fact that the Steelers had a beatpath to them already meant it didn’t hurt them. |
26 |
36.4(1/11 – 4/11) |
21 |
 |
(Beat BUF) Congratulations go to the Browns and Brady Quinn, who managed a beatwin for their heroics. Unfortunately, it was only over the Bills, which only lets them tread water as other teams move around them. |
21 |
35.7(6/21 – 12/21) |
22 |
 |
(Lost to NYJ) What a game that was, right? The Patriots still look strong on the field, but they’d be advised to win this week. |
18 |
25.0(4/22 – 15/22) |
23 |
 |
(Lost to CLE) I could write a long post disparaging this team, but I think I’d just be venting for the sake of expressing my anger over what Trent Edwards has done to my fantasy team. |
22 |
23.9(4/23 – 16/23) |
24 |
 |
(Tied PHI) In the standard NFL methods for calculating such things, a tie could really hamper the Bengal’s quest for a top pick. Whether that matters at all is left up to the reader. |
25 |
6.2(0/16 – 14/16) |
25 |
 |
(Beat ATL) Seriously, Denver is just getting KILLED by that loss to KC. They beat a quality team but get no benefit from it, and instead drop in the rankings because they lose all their beatwins. They’re much like the Giants in a way. The advantage that they have over New York is that they’ll get the chance to wipe that loss away completely; let’s hope for our proprieter’s sanity it happens. |
20 |
15.9(0/22 – 15/22) |
26 |
 |
(Lost to MIA) You have to wonder just how desperate Jim Fassel is if he would beg to take this job. |
29 |
10.5(0/19 – 15/19) |
27 |
 |
(Lost to NO) At least the Chiefs expected to be bad this year, and are planning to be better in the future. We’ll see how that goes. Personally, I’d advise against assuming Thigpen is going to be the QB of the future. |
23 |
10.0(0/20 – 16/20) |
28 |
 |
(Lost to TEN) What the heck happened to this team? I know they’ve had injuries, but even considering that they’ve really fallen. |
27 |
10.0(1/20 – 17/20) |
29 |
 |
(Lost to ARI) Well, eventually one of the other teams in the NFC West had to rise up and actually punish the Seahawks for just treading water at mediocrity. |
28 |
7.1(1/21 – 19/21) |
30 |
 |
(Beat STL) The reward for beating St. Louis is not falling behind St. Louis. That must have been quite a motivation. |
30 |
10.9(2/23 – 20/23) |
31 |
 |
(Lost to SF) At some point this team has to realize that they are rebuilding. |
31 |
0.0(0/24 – 24/24) |
32 |
 |
(Lost to CAR) I don’t know which is worse–that Detroit is using Oakland retreads, or that Culpepper actually looks better than he ever did in Oakland. Still, I’d bet that the Lions don’t win a game. It’s hard to believe there’s an organization more dysfunctional than the Raiders, but Oakland has actually been good this decade; I’m not sure I’ve seen a good Detroit team that didn’t have Barry Sanders on it in my lifetime. |
32 |
0.0(0/24 – 24/24) |
I think the Colts finding themselves has to do with three things, mainly:
1) Their offensive line is a little healthier than at the beginning of the year. That always helps.
2) They’ve adjusted to the fact that Marvin Harrison is no longer an elite receiver, and have started using him differently. His speed never came back after the mystery injury from last year, but now they’re not wasting downs looking deep to him when he has no separation.
3) Manning is healthy. They really snowed the league about the extent of his knee troubles. He couldn’t move for those first few weeks, which really destroyed the Colts’ running game. The stretch play works because the D doesn’t know it’s a handoff until the RB is almost at the line, but when Manning was just pitching it right away, the linebackers could run to the ball in stead of sitting back in their zones. Also, Manning didn’t practice for the early part of the year, which had to mess with his head, given how OCD he is about his preparation routine. He seemed a lot less accurate than usual.
The Colts’ defense is still wildly inconsistent as usual, but the offense seems to be getting back to what we’ve seen the last few years, albeit without Harrison at his old level.
Disclaimer, I am a Colts (and Redskins) fan.
Good commentary — I laughed out loud at the Chappelle Show “keeping it real” bit.