Week 6 of the NFL season is now complete. The best teams are starting to elevate themselves above the pack and the worst are starting to get left behind.
Instead of going the boring route and reviewing the 5-1 Dallas Cowboys epic victory over the Seattle Seahawks in Seattle, in which many of my comments from two weeks ago remain the same, I thought it was time to separate myself from the pack and take a look at the teams down the bottom end of the ladder.
I am looking at the Jacksonville Jaguars and Oakland Raiders, the last remaining winless teams in the league.
Jacksonville Jaguars
The Jaguars came oh so close to causing a come from behind upset against the Titans on the weekend, but unfortunately it was not to be. Josh Scobee’s final minute field goal was blocked by Titans nose tackle Sammy Lee Hill.
You have to wonder if the Jaguars could have used one more play to make the kick easier for Scobee instead of taking the shot at third and 2 with 12 seconds left on the clock.
Nevertheless, the team remains 0-6 and that number one overall draft pick is looking more and more likely.
The Jaguars are an interesting team to watch, they have a non-existent running game, a rookie quarterback trying his hardest to get something out of every play, a motley crew of receivers whom you never know if they will turn up each week and an embarrassingly bad secondary.
Blake Bortles was inserted into the team to begin the second half of the team’s third match of the season and has looked much better than Chad Henne did in the opening two games, although that’s not very hard.
Bortles has not been helped by Jaguars terrible offensive line, ranked 32nd in the league at pass protection according to Football Outsiders through five weeks. If Bortles can stay upright, and receive support from more than just rookie wide receiver Allen Robinson, he could possibly lead the team to a victory in two weeks’ time against the Dolphins.
While Bortles is a raw talent with plenty of upside, the Jaguars defence is an absolute mess. Ranked 29th in the league in defensive efficiency, 30th in total yards against and 30th in passing yards against, the Jaguars secondary has been torched by Nick Foles, Andrew Luck, Ben Roethlisberger and Phillip Rivers to start the season.
The defence finally held their own in a match for the first time on Monday, holding the Titans to 233 passing yards. But before we get too far ahead of ourselves, it’s important to remember that this was a Charlie Whitehurst-led offense.
There is not much that can be said about the Jaguars passing defence that is positive so I won’t add anything else. But I hope, for long suffering Jacksonville fans’ sake, the Jaguars can end their winless streak in the next couple of weeks, see enough promise from Bortles to back as the quarterback of the future and still pick up a top five draft pick.
Oakland Raiders
Heading from the east coast to the west coast and we have our second and final winless team, the Oakland Raiders. The Raiders are arguably more of a mess than the Jaguars – especially given they’ve already sacked their coach, Dennis Allen, after just four matches.
However, like the Jaguars, the Raiders showed plenty of fight against the Chargers on Monday and some would even suggest that the Raiders did enough to win that match. Like Bortles, the Raiders are led by a rookie quarterback who, despite some poor numbers, has showed promise over the last month, especially against the Chargers.
Carr has shown enough to fans to generate some hope among the Raider Nation and enough to the team to warrant continued investment as the season has progressed. It is clear that the Raiders and Carr did plenty of work over the bye week, overcoming an ankle injury, opening up the playbook and giving him a greater level of control over the offense.
It goes without saying that the Raiders have a poor defence. It’s ranked 22nd in the league in defensive efficiency and has struggled against the likes of Rivers, Tannehill yet held the Patriots to just 16 points and Ryan Fitzpatrick to 139 yards. Unfortunately Arian Foster was able to run for 138 yards himself during that match.
The defence is led by an ageing veteran in his 17th season, Charles Woodson, after a number of free agent targets did everything they could to avoid playing for the team. The Raiders also have a promising rookie on the defensive side of the ball, fifth overall pick Khalil Mack.
The outside linebacker is used in both 3-4 and 4-3 defences, a big ask for a rookie, and mostly in the pass rush and run defence. He has shown enough over the past five games to suggest that he could be a star in the future, but knowing the Raiders luck, he will probably suffer a career ending injury just before he can become a star.
The rest
Closely following the Jaguars and Raiders are the teams with just one win. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers have been blown out twice in the past three matches. The New York Jets have a starting quarterback who can’t adjust to west coast time and an underprepared backup quarterback. The St. Louis Rams are led by a third-string quarterback, and finally Washington, who enjoy losing too much.
The Buccaneers entered the season as a potential playoff contender. They had a new coach, new quarterback and seemingly one of the best defences in the league. Sadly for the Bucs, the Josh McCown experiment has failed, Doug Martin has been a shadow of his former self and you can never call yourself the best defence in the competition when you give up scores of 56, 37 and 48. Glennon has certainly shown more promise than McCown but it is unlikely he is the quarterback of the future.
Despite all the flaws with this team, they are still only two and a half wins out of the division lead and if they suddenly caught fire, a 9-7 finish could lead to a division title.
Another team that entered the season with high expectations is Washington. Unfortunately, everything that could possibly go wrong, seemingly, has gone wrong. Serious injury to RGIII, tick, playing in one of the hottest divisions in football, tick, a very tough schedule, tick.
The problems with this team were confirmed a week ago when team members seemed to accept that near enough is good enough, that putting in a good effort is all that is required. When Griffin went down with a dislocated ankle, the team would have been hoping that Kirk Cousins would have been able to step in and hold the fort until Griffin’s return, which is still at least a couple of weeks away.
This has not been the case, as many oft-overlooked flaws in Cousins game have been seriously exposed, especially in the blow out loss to the Giants. Not including the Jacksonville match, the team has been outscored by over 50 points without Griffin, not just reflecting Cousins’ struggles, but the defence’s issues.
The defence has been pretty good against the rush in recent weeks, but very poor in pass defence. Maybe if they were operating in a poorer division, like the NFC South, the return of RGIII could spark a revival, but sitting at 1-5 in a division with two 5-1 teams the only thing the Redskins are fighting for now is a high draft pick.
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