What I found most important about the weekend in football

Things I drew from the weekend of action:

Packers Win, Bears Lose, Vikings Lose (Finally)

There's not much that can be drawn from the Packers win today. The fact that the Packers blew out the Browns 31-3, Rodgers had a good game, Ryan Grant got 148 yards but they were playing the Browns so that was to be expected. The Packers now sit at 4-2 but playing the Lions and Browns aren't the best barometers for whether this team is a contender or pretender. We'll get a better answer when the Packers have their highly anticipated rematch against the Vikings.

Coming into Sunday's Bears-Bengals game there was the sub-plot of Cedric Benson alleging that he was blackballed by the Bears and that this caused it to take longer for him to get his second chance. Regardless of whether or not these allegations are true, Benson made the Bears pay by racking up 189 yards and helping the Bengals blow out the Bears 45-10

Well....it was a matter of when...the Vikings finally lost to the Steelers. Brett Favre started to show signs of being in last-season form by throwing a 4th quarter-pick six to close out the game.

49ers QB Controversy Brewing:

Going into today, it was a given that Shaun Hill had a grip on the 49ers QB job and Alex Smith was penciled in as one of the biggest draft busts in the past few years. Well, thats not how things looked today. After a terrible first half, Hill was benched and Alex Smith was given a chance to see what he could do. While he didn't bring the Niners all the way back...he threw 3 second half TDs turned a sure-fire blowout into a game that was interesting up until the final minute.......

Withe the 49ers struggling, it should be interesting to see how this affects the rest of their season. Does Shaun Hill get another chance to make something out of the football season or does Alex Smith get a shot of redemption?

Saints keep on keeping on:

For a while, it looked like the Dolphins were going to pull off a major upset against the undefeated Saints. However, the Saints demonstrated an ability to play through adversity and from behind to keep their record unblemished.

College Football Thoughts:

TCU won yesterdays only game between two top-20 teams by destroying BYU yesterday. They were (somewhat) awarded by the BCS rankings by bypassing Boise State to get to 6th in the BCS rankings.......also their victory over Clemson looks better after Clemson upset the Hurricanes

Still the BCS rankings weren't good to the TCUs/Boise's of the world. TCU is ranked behind an Iowa team (that squeaked by a perennially average Michigan State team) and a 1-loss USC team that lost to an improving but still mediocre Washington Squad......Boise took care of business and they were "awarded" by being dropped to 7th...............much of this talk is probably counter-productive as the championship game is likely to be Texas vs. Alabama/Florida

Well......Game 6 of the ALCS is about to start..........here's to a good game and the Angels forcing a 7th game

Week 2 NFL Preview --- It's Always Sunny at Cheddar's Sports Blog

I'm chillin at home right now watching Grandma's Boy on FX, and sitting in anticipation for the season premier of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia (as of this writing about 90 minutes away.

But that's then and this is now. Now is the time to preview some of the week 2 action in the NFL.

Packers 1-0 vs. Bengals 0-1

Two teams who had opposite endings to Sunday's game. The Packers rallied late to take the lead and pull off a massively epic victory over the Bears in front of a national TV audience. Their defense looked better, played better (with the help of Jay Cutler) and Aaron Rodgers took another step towards becoming an elite QB and quickly making his predecessor be nothing more than a distant memory.

The Bengals did the one thing they've done well in the last 20 years, find new ways to lose a games. Losing on an 87-yard tipped pass in the final seconds.......brutal times 10.

Patriots 1-0 vs. Jets 1-0

An early battle for AFC East Supremacy. The Patriots pulled a victory straight out of nowhere coming back in the final minutes against the TO-infested Bills.

The Jets had a strong week 1 in Mark Sanchez' NFL Debut. Whether Sanchez can keep playing well throughout his rookie season still remains to be seen but if nothing else he gives the Jets hope for the future (if not '09) and unlike his predecessor has never appeared in a Sears commercial.

Colts 1-0 vs. Dolphins 0-1

The Colts squeezed out a close win against a pretty bad Jaguars squad in Week 1.

The Dolphins did not start their follow-up to their break out season as strong as they hoped. I'm still holding out hope that they'll go outside the box and bust out a triple-option offense.

Seahawks 1-0 vs. 49ers 1-0

An early battle for supremacy in a weak NFC West. The Seahawks started out the Jim L. Mora era strong with a win over some CFL team in St. Louis called the Rams. According to cool-standing they have a 51.3 % chance to make the playoffs. You know what this means, a 48.7% chance of a sequel following up his father's Playoffs?!!!! rant.

The 49ers, coming off a strong finish after the hiring of Mike Singletary and the benching of ex-Aggie J.T. O'Sullivan. Pulled out a good road win against the defending Super Bowl runner-up Cardinals. While Hill hasn't gotten too much respect/publicity/legitimacy as an NFL Quarterback all he's done is quietly put up a 90+ passer rating and throw 2 TDs for every INT. Hill is a breakout year ready to happen.

Falcons 1-0 vs. Panthers 0-1

The Falcons didn't play out of their minds last week but they did more than enough to win. I have a gut feeling that regardless of how good or bad they are on Sunday they'll be 2-0 when the weekend is over.

The Panthers have Jack Delhomme who looks to be getting progressively worse with every start he makes. After single-handedly throwing the Panthers out of the playoffs last year, he started this season by pulling a Jay Cutler and throwing 4 picks, leading the Panthers to get blown out by the Eagles.

Broncos 1-0 vs. Browns 0-1

The Kyle Orton led Broncos offense was downright terrible for 59 minutes on Sunday but since they were playing the Bengals and got incredibly lucky on one play, they did well in the one place that counts, the standings. The Broncos get another cupcake in the Browns on Sunday. Even without Jay Cutler and the yet to be determined genius/idiocy of Josh McDaniels, the Broncos may have be 2-o before having to play a halfway decent team.

The Browns, well they are the Browns. What's with these teams from Ohio and being totally terrible at the NFL. It was pretty sad how they got owned by Adrian Peterson, well at least in this game they'll only get moderately embarrassed.

Redskins 0-1 vs. Rams 0-1

The Redskins look destined to not make the playoffs again....they had an uninspiring game against the Giants but at least they get an even worse team in the Rams to play on Sunday. Best case for the Redskins is that they gain more confidence by playing inept competition and can gain enough confidence to play over their heads for at least part of the season.

The Rams........brutal team....if they're not careful they may join the 08 Lions as the second 0-16 team in history.