NFL Week 5: 1 Quick Thought About Each Game

Well, we're mostly through the beginning of the second quarter of the season, so it seems like a good time to take a look at what we learned in Week 5. Certain teams proved themselves to be legitimate contenders while others showed themselves to be complete frauds of what many people thought they were going into the season.

Let's take a look at one lesson learned from every game this past Sunday

Eagles vs. Bills

There were a couple things to take away from this one. First and most importantly is the Eagles' pure incompetency when it comes to stopping the run. Their defense is like a really cheap knockoff diarrhea drug—completely unable to stop the runs. 

It may just be a side effect from the biggest lesson, but Fred Jackson looked like a monster today. His receiving yards were overblown thanks to a couple screen passes that had completely blown coverages from the Eagles linebackers/secondary, but his rush yards where right on par with the numbers he's been steadily putting up thus far this year.

Chiefs at Colts

Yeah, the Colts really are this bad. To lose a game in this fashion to someone like the Chiefs has to be completely devastating to anyone, let alone a team that is looking for its first win of the season. On the bright side for the boys in blue, it at least seemed as if Curtis Painter did breathe some life into this team that's been on life support ever since Peyton Manning was officially ruled out for the majority of the season.

It's really difficult to not feel bad for the Colts as they've come oh-so close to pulling off at least one win this year but have fallen painfully short against the Steelers, Bucs and now the Chiefs. We'll get to what the Bucs showed us today and why that really would not have been a very impressive victory, but still. Any victory for this team would be a good one at this point.

Cardinals vs. Vikings

Both of these teams are just awful, there's no getting around that. It is about time the Vikings realized that Adrian Peterson is kind of a decent running back in this league however. It's really painful to watch the best running back in the league be completely squandered by an all-around terrible team that he's been surrounded with.

Yes, the Vikings came away with a win in this instance, but a home victory against the Cardinals counts just as much as winning the coin toss at the start of the game. Yes, you get a nice fuzzy feeling over it, but when something real comes into play you realize the win you just had doesn't mean anything and your team is still awful.

Seahawks at Giants

The NFC East is so much worse than anyone ever expected. I mean, the best team is really the Washington Redskins? Yes, they have a strong enough defense, but they also have Rex Grossman, which, if my math is correct, should still make them awful.

The Giants looked like the team from the division that could make a run now that it's a widely known fact the Eagles were the biggest fraud in sports in the Miami Heat. However, now they look just like the Celtics, the team that seemed like the big boys who would stop the up-and-coming youngsters, turned into a group of old guys that just get embarrassed when the lights are on.

Titans at Steelers

The Steelers are for real, the Titans are far from it.

Tennessee has pulled off one marquee victory so far this year, beating the Ravens after Baltimore came off a very emotionally draining victory against this same Steelers team in Week 1. It was today that the Titans showed themselves as what they truly are: a team with the biggest diva running back in recent memory and a quarterback who's over the hill.

The Titans are not that good of a team, deal with it.

Saints at Panthers

Yeah, Cam Newton is legit.

If you came into this game thinking the Panthers stood a decent chance to even hang in this game, let alone have a shot to win. you're insane. The way this Carolina team has played so far this year has been absolutely amazing to me, with the obvious standout being Newton. This guy is a winner (well, not so far in the NFL, but he's certainly a gamer). He will keep his team in the game doing whatever he needs to do in order to have a shot to pull out the big upset.

Bengals at Jaguars

Neither of these teams are very good, obviously, but what was proved is that Cincinnati rookie Andy Dalton is a better quarterback than Jacksonville rookie Blaine Gabbert, as unimpressive as that really is.

To be completely fair to both guys, though, Dalton does have the slightly better team around him and that's what this game came down to. Two unproven quarterbacks, trying their best to leave it up to their more talented playmakers and seeing what happens. Boring.

Raiders at Texans

Above anything else, this game proved the AFC really is up for grabs this year. Going into this week I had Houston as the favorites to be the league representative in Indianapolis come February, but the Texans showed today that they aren't ready for that. Obviously losing Andre Johnson is a huge blow to the team, but a real Super Bowl contender would find a way to overcome that injury and beat a less-talented Raiders team.

Also, this game showed that when Matt Schaub is under pressure, he kinda sucks. 

Buccaneers at 49ers

With another solid outing from No. 21 in the red and gold, can we assume that he's back into form? As much as I would like to say yes, I have to admit he did have two good games against two very bad rush defenses.

As learned in the first slide, the Eagles rush defense is the biggest joke in the NFL today, and if Frank Gore couldn't put on a decent show against those high schoolers, his time in the league would've been numbered.

The Niners seem to be for real this time, but with Alex Smith under center there's really no telling how good this team truly is. Also, it was re-affirmed that the Bucs are far from the team they were last year.

Chargers at Broncos

Denver really needs to give up on this season and start playing Tim Tebow. Obviously his TD pass was on a screen that he didn't really do anything special to set up, but at this point if you're Denver, why would you not start Tebow?

In addition to the aforementioned screen pass, he had a decently impressive TD run and returned some fire to the completely impotent Denver offense. Why not give this guy a shot, and at the very least you'll still have some trade bait in the little Christian fella.

Jets at Patriots

What we should all fully understand after today's game is that Mark Sanchez is the furthest thing from a franchise QB any team could ever want. He's been 100 percent riding his defense and running game for the past two years, and now that those facets are showing some weaknesses and the team is relying on him a bit more, they look completely vulnerable.

While they could have looked worse today, they never looked like they had a legitimate shot at winning that game throughout. The Patriots are the better team and will be if they play again in the postseason.

Packers at Falcons

The Packers are the best team in the NFL. This is a game that, even as the most hardcore Packer fan you could ever hope to meet, had me worried. I thought Green Bay's secondary was going to get torched in this game as it has been in the past few contests. Combine that feeling with the one I had after the first two Atlanta drives led to a 14-0 hole and I thought for sure the Packers were showing the holes that would cost them a game in the playoffs.

However, the defense bounced back and played the best I've seen all year, and obviously Aaron Rodgers was lights out and led GB to yet another victory.

Conclusion

All in all, an entertaining Week 5, most notably the noon (Central time) games that had a fair amount of exciting finishes. We learned a decent amount from this week and I hope after reading this you guys did, too. Let me know in the comments what you disagree with (I anticipate to be a lot of it, but that's alright) or what you agree with. Thanks for reading!