NFL Power Rankings Week 8: New Orleans Saints and Sunday's Big Winners

Absolutely nothing of note happened on the seventh Sunday of NFL action. Nope, nothing at all.

This, of course, is a damn, dirty lie. On the contrary, many things of note happened on Sunday, and these things brought about drastic changes in the landscape of the NFL.

Some of these things were bad things. A couple of teams (i.e. the Oakland Raiders) took some steps back, and must now play catchup as a result. Luckily, some other teams had much more positive outings on Sunday and their seasons are now looking pretty good.

Let's go ahead and give these teams some props. 

Chicago Bears (No. 15 overall)

A couple of weeks ago, I was pretty down on da Bears after they lost to the Detroit Lions on Monday Night Football. I then proceeded to pay their dominating win over the Minnesota Vikings absolutely no mind.

However, they got my attention again with their romp over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in England. They had to weather a tough storm at the very end, but the Bears were in the driver's seat for much of the game. They would have lost such a game earlier in the season, but on Sunday they held on.

I'm still not entirely convinced that the Bears can make some noise in the NFC North, but the Lions had better start looking over their shoulders. 

New York Jets (No. 14 overall)

Just as they had so many times this season, the Jets looked dead in the water on Sunday against the San Diego Chargers. They were down by 11 points on two different occasions, and they looked totally outmatched.

The next thing you knew, the Jets' defense showed up and Mark Sanchez started chucking the ball to Plaxico Burress in the red zone. These two things allowed the Jets to come back and steal a 27-21 win.

Granted, you obviously have to take a home win over an underachieving Chargers team for what it's worth. However, the bright side is that the Jets showed some grit. They're going to need that if they want to keep pace in the AFC East. 

Atlanta Falcons (No. 11 overall)

In the days leading up to Sunday's tilt, you just got the feeling that the Falcons were going to hand the Lions their second straight home loss.

Sure enough, the Falcons got the job done with a 23-16 win. To boot, they were in control for pretty much the entire game. Hats off to them.

Are the Falcons back to being the team that went an NFC-best 13-3 last season? Honestly, I think it's a little too early to tell.

But hey, things are definitely looking up. 

Houston Texans (No. 10 overall)

With a whole extra week to prepare, I figured the Tennessee Titans were going to destroy the Texans.

Instead, as usually happens whenever I make predictions, the exact opposite happened. The Texans ran all over the Titans, beating them by a final score of 41-7.

Just like that, the Texans grab control of the AFC South. That doesn't necessarily make them one of the league's best teams, but the division should be theirs for good, considering the quality (or lack thereof) of the other teams. 

New Orleans Saints (No. 5 overall)

There never was any doubt that the Saints were going to dismantle the Indianapolis Colts on Sunday night. The only real question was how bad it would be.

As it turned out, it was bad. The Saints got five touchdown passes from Drew Brees and won 62-7. Nobody could have helped the Colts. Not even Andrew Luck.

Either way, the Saints looked very much like the Saints again after their slip-up in Tampa Bay in Week 6. That's a bad thing for the rest of the league.

Zachary D. Rymer's Week 8 Power Rankings

Rank	Team	Record
1	Green Bay Packers	7-0
2	New England Patriots	5-1
3	Baltimore Ravens	4-1
4	San Francisco 49ers	5-1
5	New Orleans Saints	5-2
6	Pittsburgh Steelers	5-2
7	Buffalo Bills	4-2
8	New York Giants	4-2
9	Detroit Lions	5-2
10	Houston Texans	4-3
11	Atlanta Falcons	4-3
12	San Diego Chargers	4-2
13	Cincinnati Bengals	4-2
14	New York Jets	4-3
15	Chicago Bears	4-3
16	Oakland Raiders	4-3
17	Dallas Cowboys	3-3
18	Tampa Bay Buccaneers	4-3
19	Washington Redskins	3-3
20	Kansas City Chiefs	3-3
21	Philadelphia Eagles	2-4
22	Tennessee Titans	3-3
23	Cleveland Browns	3-3
24	Carolina Panthers	2-5
25	Seattle Seahawks	2-4
26	Denver Broncos	2-4
27	Jacksonville Jaguars	1-5
28	Arizona Cardinals	1-5
29	Minnesota Vikings	1-6
30	Indianapolis Colts	0-7
31	St. Louis Rams	0-6
32	Miami Dolphins	0-6