Week 7 NFL Power Rankings: Titans, Steelers & Seahawks stand alone

Week 7 NFL Power Rankings

There are only three unbeaten teams in the NFL and they are rightfully at or near the top of these power rankings.

The question now is, where do teams like the Tennessee Titans, Pittsburgh Steelers, and Seattle Seahawks stack up against the Kansas City Chiefs and Baltimore Ravens among others?

We will get there, but let’s start in a familiar place: New York.

32. New York Jets (+0)

The fire sale has begun and it is time for New York Jets fans to completely move on from the players on this roster until next year.

At 0-6 and after a shutout against the Miami Dolphins, the Jets sit at the bottom of these power rankings as the only winless teams left in the NFL. With trades already starting, it is just going to be easier for fans to detach from all of the current players and then find another team to watch until the start of the offseason.

31. Jacksonville Jaguars (-1)

So close, yet so far away. Not this week, but for most of this season, the Jaguars have been pretty competitive unlike some of the other teams at the bottom of these power rankings.

The Jags have a lot of pieces to build around, but this feels like a team that is going to end up in a crucial spot in the 2021 NFL Draft and I can’t help but think that they are going to make a decision to bet on a low-value position and miss out on a franchise quarterback in the process.

Regardless of the outcome, this season has to be dedicated to getting the young players better and finding out exactly what you have in Gardner Minshew and whether or not you are ready to bet your job on him if you are the GM.

30. Washington (-2)

Washington’s only crime was being too aggressive and that isn’t something they deserved to be knocked down for in these rankings. Well…it wasn’t their only crime, but in general, they did a decent job stunting the Giants offense and moving the ball themselves.

The problem is that nearly everyone should be better than the Giants and they just don’t have the weapons to dominate a team yet, even a team as bad as the Giants. I still like Washington’s defense, but they should realize that this isn’t their year and that it is time to sell parts to the highest bidder.

29. New York Giants (+2)

Two decent games in a row from the Giants is nothing to sneeze at! It sounds like I am being sarcastic, but honestly, I am impressed with the improvement shown by this team and this coaching staff.

I think this is a bottom -3 roster in the NFL devoid of talent at most positions, but they won this week and they lose their last two by one score. This staff is figuring out what works and what doesn’t and I think they know that they need a new QB, but I am starting to kind of trust that they can make it work once they get a new QB in town.

28. Cincinnati Bengals (-2)

Oh, Bengals. What are you doing?

With nearly 20 minutes left in the game, the Bengals were up 27-21 and they got the ball three times before the game was over and they missed a field goal, punted, and threw an interception. That was after they blew a 21-0 lead.

This has to be pretty demoralizing for the Bengals who should have won this game but instead watched their franchise QB throw an interception with the game on the line. I believe in Joe Burrow, but they are doing him no favors right now.

27. Atlanta Falcons (+2)

The first win of the season coming after a coaching switch seems like an interim coach’s right of passage at this point.

More than the win, it was great to see Julio Jones getting back to his dominant self and this team looked like they were on a mission to prove that the next coach should build the team around them as centerpieces. Inevitably there will be some moves, but for now, it is exciting watching this competition bring out the best in this team.

Right now they are auditioning for their jobs, but beyond that, they are trying tying to show that the franchise should be respected and viewed as the top job available in what is starting to look like a field full of job openings in the NFL.

26. Dallas Cowboys (+1)

The Dallas Cowboys haven’t played this week due to a bye, so their change will be reflected in the next power rankings.

Dallas did move up a spot in the rankings, but that was a function of so many losses pushing the Cowboys up because even though they will be without Dak Prescott this season, they still have the talent to be a tough out for any team in the NFL on offense.

25. Houston Texans (+0)

Man, just think about what happened to the Texans today. They won the turnover battle 2-0, and with 1:30 left on the clock, they led by 7 points. Despite that, the offense never got to touch the ball again as the Tennessee Titans scored two touchdowns in the final seconds and in overtime.

J.J. Watt said that loss hurt more than most, and Deshaun Watson clearly had no confidence in his defense to get a stop in overtime (judging by his reaction to the coin flip) and the Texans fall to 1-5.

Still, they looked incredibly dangerous all day, and losing to an undefeated Titans team on the road, in overtime isn’t going to get you moved down the power rankings.

24. Carolina Panthers (-8)

This is a bad fall for the Panthers, but it is only one spot lower than I had them in the Week 5 NFL Power Rankings and there is a reason for that.

See, I took a (small) leap of faith that the Panthers were going to be able to handle themselves against teams like the Chicago Bears because they were handling teams that had much better offenses than Chicago.

However, that was not the case and it goes back to one reason why I thought they would make this leap. In the Week 6 NFL Power Rankings I said:

"In fact, Teddy Bridgewater has completely sold me on the fact that you can win with him long-term, especially when you consider what this team is doing without their best offensive weapon. This past week was the straw that broke the camel’s back for me in that it was the push to get me off the fence and to a place where I firmly believe that they are in a position similar to where the Arizona Cardinals were last year, only they have more talent."

Instead of being a team that was able to attack the weak points of an offense and make losing Christain McCaffrey look like no big deal, this was a team that looked like they desperately needed someone to help them change field goal attempts into touchdowns.

23. Philadelphia Eagles (-2)

It has to be so hard to be an Eagles fan right now because in the last four games you are 1-2-1 with a -6 point differential with back to back losses against the Pittsburgh Steelers and Baltimore Ravens that seemed within your grasp in the 4th quarter.

The defense seems to be really solid right now and Carson Wentz might, sorta, kinda be alright again? Not a great help, but maybe not someone who is going to actively hurt your team?

At the very least you can tell that this team has fight left and that is nice to see when you look around a league where some teams look about ready to pack it in.

22. Indianapolis Colts (+1)

Have you ever seen someone fall down an escalator that is going up? They roll in place and continuously stumble, but if the escalator is going fas enough, they will still manage to fall back but get pushed upwards towards their destination.

That is the Indianapolis Colts.

Despite messy, ugly football where they can’t seem to take two steps forward without taking one step back, the Colts continue to find ways to win games and stay in the mix for a post-season playoff berth.

Philip Rivers had a nice comeback day today, and even with an interception, it was a nice way to bounce back from everyone presuming that you are dead in the water.

21. Miami Dolphins (+3)

I don’t usually move teams up when they beat the New York Jets because I don’t think what you do against a preseason team matters (mostly kidding). However, the Dolphins looked dominant in their shut out against the Jets this week and this Miami team is 3-3.

Now to be fair, they have beaten bad and broken teams, but they are 3-1 in their last four games and there is only so long that you can keep a team down for things out of their control like schedule.

I still don’t think they are great, but they deserve to be out of the bottom-10 in these power rankings because Ryan Fitzpatrick is fun and the defense looks incredibly well-coached.

20. L.A. Chargers (+0)

The L.A. Chargers are on bye and don’t play this week, but their position in the power rankings will be reflected in the next rankings.

19. Detroit Lions (+3)

The biggest thing to happen in this game is that the Lions got a lead and kept a lead despite all odds. History has told me that was next to impossible, but somehow they did it!

Seriously though, it was great to see D’Andre Swift have a big game and he and Adrian Peterson looked like a great tandem of running backs. In fact, this game was the perfect example of what the Lions have been trying to build, which is a team that has a variety of weapons on offense and a few playmakers on defense.

Now, you may think that this is awfully high for a team that has only beaten the Jacksonville Jaguars and Arizona Cardinals, but they had a tough slate coming into this game. Taking a step back, the Lions won two games they should have won, and then they had one-score games with two of the better teams in the NFL in the Chicago Bears and the New Orleans Saints.

Maybe this team isn’t as bad as we have been making them out to be, and if they can just spend the next four weeks beating teams that they should beat then they could be 5-4 and eying a playoff spot.

18. Arizona Cardinals (+0)

The Arizona Cardinals don’t play until Monday night, but their position in the power rankings will be reflected in the next rankings.

17. New England Patriots (-5)

No one should bet against Bill Belichick and we saw just how competitive that he can make any game when he took a pair of backup quarterbacks and kept it very close with the defending Super Bowl Champs just a few weeks ago.

However, after all their problems with COVID and after getting their QB back for this game, the offense still couldn’t figure out a way to have Cam Newton outduel Drew Lock for the win. That has to be upsetting to the greatest coach of all time.

Despite losing this game, the Patriots came up with two interceptions on defense and they looked very good on that side of the ball all game. No matter what, Cam Newton and a good defense will keep you in nearly every game so you have to think that this will even out as time goes on.

One thing to note is that the Miami Dolphins and the Buffalo Bills are quietly becoming the top two teams in the AFC East and this has to be an uncomfortable feeling creeping into Foxborough.

16. Minnesota Vikings (-5)

This is so frustrating for me, but obviously even more frustrating for Vikings fans. They can’t hold a solid spot in these power rankings because they can’t consistently show that they are a solid team and not just a collection of stars.

I believe that Justin Jefferson is a true star in the making and I compared him to the Tennessee Titans A.J. Brown before the 2020 NFL Draft, but without Dalvin Cook this offense can’t do enough to make life easy on Kirk Cousins.

Now, that isn’t the offense’s fault. In fact, it is pretty clearly on Cousins the majority of the time, but he is what he is and the team knew that going into his megadeal. Still, I think this team is very difficult to defend and Jefferson is on pace for a record-setting year so it is hard not to be a little optimistic despite the terrible record.

15. Denver Broncos (+2)

Winning against the Patriots is always a beautiful thing, but that was probably one of the ugliest versions of it that I have ever seen.

Drew Lock ended up with a whopping 42% completion percentage and the team as a whole had 37 rushes for less than 4 yards per carry. That sort of offense isn’t going to win many games in the NFL.

Luckily the defense and special teams had a huge day and they kept putting the Patriots in uncomfortable situations. Maybe on a normal workweek, there would have been no problem, but with the distractions they had, the Broncos had just enough in the tank for a huge win and a small jump in the power rankings.

14. Las Vegas Raiders (+0)

The Las Vegas Raiders are on a bye week, but their position in the power rankings will be reflected in the next rankings.

13. Chicago Bears (+2)

The Bears took advantage of a long week to come out and beat the Carolina Panthers in a pretty solid outing where they looked like the better team. However, I still can’t figure out if I can trust Chicago at all which is why they are in the upper-middle part of these power rankings.

Nick Foles has ranged from painful to boring on the watchability scale, the running game is bad, Anthony Miller seems criminally underutilized, but Khalil Mack finally seems to be hitting his stride and the defense as a whole looks good.

Can the Bears be a defensively led football team that really has nothing going for it on the offensive side of the ball? I don’t think so, but then every week they end up winning and I have to slide them up another spot or two.

Chicago has a tough three-game stretch ahead with the Rams, Saints, and Titans all of which are ranked ahead of them in these power rankings. Maybe after that stretch, we will know more about what the Bears are, but maybe they are just a team that does enough to win.

12. Cleveland Browns (-3)

The build-up, the hype, the expectations, all of it came crumbling down when Baker Mayfield threw his first interception and never recovered.

I just don’t know which Browns team I am getting from week to week. Are they going to be the offensive powerhouses that they were against the Dallas Cowboys, Washington, and the Cincinnati Bengals?

Are they going to be the team that is opportunistic on defense and attacks your weaknesses like they did against the Colts?

Or are they the team that has gotten stomped by the Steelers and Ravens by a combined score of 76-15 this season?

I don’t know and without Nick Chubb, I worry about this team’s chances as playoff contenders as the road gets tougher.

11. L.A. Rams (-1)

Speaking of teams that are hard to understand, after Sunday night the Rams have scored 20 or fewer points in three of their six games this season. That is a problem for a team that is run by an offensive genius and a 1st overall pick at quarterback.

I’m not saying that they can’t win games by holding other teams to less than 20 points, but we need to shift our perception of the Rams from a team that is going to force other teams into shootouts, to a team that is reliant on the defense to suffocate the opponent.

The good news is that when you have Aaron Donald then you can make that work, but when a team like the 49ers dedicates half of their offensive line to block him and they are still able to put up points, it is always nice to be able to trust your team to be able to outscore them. I don’t get that impression from this roster right now and everything that works for them seems like it has to be schemed perfectly.

This team could use another real playmaker on offense.

10. San Francisco 49ers (+9)

That is more like it San Francisco. In a game that the 49ers really had to have, Jimmy G and the offense put up 3 touchdowns in the 1st half and they never needed another point.

Without Nick Bosa, I don’t know that this team is going to have the fierce pass rush that they had when they went to the Super Bowl, but maybe they don’t have to be. Sunday Night the 49ers won with a heavy rotation of running backs, George Kittle, and consistent play on the back end of the defense including Emmanuel Moseley and Jason Verrett.

They felt in complete control all night and with great coaching on both sides of the ball, they don’t need to be extraordinary right now, they just need to start stacking wins.

9. Tampa Bay Buccaneers (+4)

Tom Brady was fine, but don’t mistake what we just saw from the Bucs. Tampa won that game with great defense (easily the best that Green Bay has seen all season) and a very nice running game that dominated the Packers.

To show how weird the passing game was today and how little they really had to do, Gronk outgained Mike Evans and Chris Godwin combined by 20 yards and a touchdown…in the year 2020.

Add that mean, run heavy offense to a team that ended up with 5 sacks and 13 QB hits, and you can see why it got so bad that the Packers waved the white flag and benched starters at the end of the matchup. Great job by the Bucs.

8. Buffalo Bills (-3)

The Buffalo Bills don’t play until Monday night, but they did play since the last time we talked about them. That game would be the Tuesday night game against the Tennessee Titans in case some Bills fans out there decided that it would be better to repress those memories entirely.

Make no mistake, this is a good Bills team that has speed and skill all across the board, but Tuesday night against the Tennessee Titans showed that they still have a way to go to get Josh Allen to those MVP levels that they were chanting before.

Once they are healthy on defense and once they have their speed back on offense, this isn’t going to be a team that loses by 20+ points often. In fact, this team is much more likely of inflicting that kind of damage on another roster.

Don’t forget over a month of great work in one bad game, but they have been dropped a few spots in the power rankings because I am not going to leave them high in the power rankings only to yoyo up and down with wins vs the Chiefs and the Jets. Instead, I will place them here and we will see how they look and not just what their record is.

7. New Orleans Saints (+0)

The New Orleans Saints don’t play until Monday night, but their position in the power rankings will be reflected in the next rankings.

6. Green Bay Packers (-4)

Wow, I did not see that coming.

Sure, you could have told me that the Packers were going to lose to the Bucs, but after going up 10-0 I thought the game was going to be controlled by Green Bay and that we were going to see a shootout.

Instead, we found out that Aaron Rodgers is still human when he threw a pick-six, and then two plays later he threw an interception that was nearly returned for a touchdown.

After that, the Packers didn’t make a sound the entire game as the Bucs dominated every facet of their primetime matchup.

Aaron Rodgers has been the master of self-motivation before and he seems to have a pretty quick memory, but that was tough to watch and I have to wonder whether or not the rest of the team has a memory as short as their leader. If not then we could be a few weeks away from talking about the NFC North-leading…Chicago Bears.

5. Baltimore Ravens (-1)

The Ravens falling down the power rankings a little bit has less to do with what they did today, and more to do with what I think they are.

Right now the Ravens look like a team reliant on Lamar Jackson’s legs more than his arm and they also look like a team that is capable of beating bad teams, but who isn’t always as dominant as people think when they can’t stay on top of an opposing team.

The defensive line showed out today which is great, but I don’t know if I think this team is any better than I did two weeks ago and I am not sure what they can do to convince me until they win against a good team without holding the lead the entire game.

4. Kansas City Chiefs (-1)

The Kansas City Chiefs haven’t played yet, but their game will be reflected in the next NFL power rankings.

3. Tennessee Titans (+5)

Since the last time I moved the Tennessee Titans up in the power rankings they:

-Lost nearly half of their starters due to COVID

-Got some of them back

-Received permission from the NFL to practice, and ultimately only practiced three times in two weeks.

-Throttled the Buffalo Bills

-Got a few more back

-Practiced on another short week.

-Won a thrilling game in overtime against a Houston Texans team with plenty of momentum after a coaching change.

That is a pretty busy timeline for the Tennessee Titans who had every reason to feel justified in losing one of these games, after all, they went through.

While there is a LOT of improvement that is needed on the defensive side of the ball, you could argue that they have one of the best offenses in the NFL and that we still haven’t seen them at full strength. They deserve to be recognized as one of the best teams in the NFL and they have earned a top-3 spot in these power rankings.

2. Seattle Seahawks (-1)

The Seattle Seahawks don’t play this week, but their position in the power rankings will be reflected in the next rankings.

1. Pittsburgh Steelers (+5)

Right now, I don’t know how anyone can be ranked of the Steelers for a few reasons. The first reason should be clear, the Steelers once again have one of the best defenses in the NFL.

T.J. Watt, Bud Dupree, Minkah Fitzpatrick, Stephon Tuitt, and Cam Heyward are the faces of one of the best units in the NFL and they continue to notch great performance after great performance. This week they took down the Cleveland Browns in a game where I thought they would get hurt from being over-aggressive.

Instead, they picked apart the Browns who were on a winning steak and it got so bad that they had to bench a banged-up Baker Mayfield.

Secondly, Chase Claypool is a problem but not in the way that you think. Sure, he has been good and teams have struggled to cover him, but what is even more dangerous is that he seems to be making this offense more creative as they try to find ways to feature him.

If there is something that opposing fans don’t want to see, it is a Pittsburgh OC who is completely locked in trying to find a way to get his favorite toy on Sportscenter that night.

Finally, James Conner has quietly bounced back from a less than stellar start to the season and he has touchdowns in four straight games as well as 100 yards in three of the last four. While some of those yards are the product of explosive plays in boom or bust situations, it is becoming less volatile and more consistent.

Knowing that you are combining consistency in the backfield with creativity on the outside and a defense that can cover for them if they get too dependant on either. That is scary and that deserves the top spot in the power rankings.