NFL Power Rankings, Week 2: The Kirk Cousins contract is officially a bust

We’re only in Week 2 of the 2019 NFL season, and this league has already fallen off the rails. Let’s try to make sense of it all with this week’s power rankings.

Rankings will be based on a number of factors, but the main overarching question when I decide on the order will be “If these teams played on a neutral field, who’d win?” So I won’t be overreacting to upsets and flukey results. One team beating another does not guarantee a higher ranking.

These are tier-based rankings. And instead of writing a few inane sentences on each team, I’ll highlight one team from each tier and give them a little more attention.

With that out of the way, let’s rank some teams…

Tier 1: No one team should have all that power

At what point do we officially start UNDEFEATED WATCH?

1. Patriots (2-0, Point Differential: +73)

It’s only two games, but we’re already getting into historic territory with this Patriots team. New England is the first team since 1975 (!) to outscore its opponents by 73 points over the first two weeks of the season. Not even the undefeated 2007 team, which steamrolled teams right from the jump, came out of the gates that hot.

As scary as the offense could be when/if Antonio Brown gets more acclimated, the defense has actually been the better of the two units so far. The Patriots defense, which I ranked as the best in the league before the season, has given up only three points COMBINED through the first two weeks. That’s tied for the post-merger record with the ’76 Oilers, ’70 Lions and ’81 Bills.

Playing the Dolphins, who might have trouble winning the SEC, certainly helped, but the Patriots shut down a Steelers offense that was expected to be pretty good. That same Steelers offense put up 26 points on a solid Seahawks defense without Ben Roethlisberger for much of the game. And, based on the Expected Points Added metric, New England’s defensive performance in Week 1 wasn’t all that much better than it’s performance in Week 2. Miami average -0.67 EPA per play against the Pats. The Steelers averaged -0.51.

After watching the Dolphins game, I feel confident saying Bill Belichick and offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels probably took it easy on their former colleague Brian Flores. The Patriots ran the ball a ton on early downs instead of attacking the Dolphins’ vulnerable secondary. And when the Patriots did pass, it appeared they were more concerned with getting Brown involved than they were running their regular offense.

The 43-0 scoreline looks bad but the Pats could have made it a lot worse.

Tier 2: So, who’s coming in second?

I’m not saying I’m close to putting the Chiefs in the same category as the Patriots, but if Patrick Mahomes keeps playing like this AND Kansas City goes all-in and trades for Jalen Ramsey, I will be tempted.

2. Chiefs (2-0, Point Differential: +32)
3. Ravens (2-0, Point Differential: +55)
4. Rams (2-0, Point Differential: +21)
5. Cowboys (2-0, Point Differential: +28)
6. Eagles (1-1, Point Differential: +1)
7. Saints (1-1, Point Differential: -16)

The sky is not falling in New Orleans. Not yet, at least. Drew Brees is one of the very best quarterbacks in the league and an annual MVP candidate, but the Saints should be just fine without him over the next six weeks.

Teddy Bridgewater did not look great against the Rams on Sunday, but that was a gameplan tailored for Drew Brees. If you ask ANY quarterback not named Brady or Rivers to try to impersonate Brees, you’re going to have a bad time. Give Sean Payton some time to put together a plan for Bridgewater, and he’ll look a lot better.

The Saints’ schedule over the next month-and-a-half isn’t too daunting. After two tough games against the Seahawks (away) and Cowboys (home), New Orleans gets the Buccaneers, Jaguars, Bears and Cardinals before a bye week. By then, Brees is expected to be back for the team’s first matchup with the Falcons. If they can win three of those six games, they’ll be in fine shape for the stretch run.

No team in the NFC South appears ready to run away with the division during Brees’ absence, anyway. The Falcons, probably the second-best team in the division, had to hang on at home against a depleted Eagles team, and Atlanta’s schedule is pretty rough over the next six weeks:

@ Indianapolis
vs. Titans
@ Houston
@ Arizona
vs. Rams
vs. Seattle

That’s five games against teams that had a winning record in 2018. The Falcons will be happy with three wins over that stretch. Even if they somehow win four, they’ll only have a one- or two-game lead on the Saints with two head-to-head matchups left on the schedule.

Tier 3: The rest of the playoff contenders.

Honestly, I don’t know what to make of any of these teams. The first few of them are very capable of jumping into the next tier. The rest will be in the playoff race all season … I think. 

8. Packers (2-0, Point Differential: +7)
9. Chargers (1-1, Point Differential: +3)
10. Colts (1-1, Point Differential: -4)
11. Vikings (1-1, Point Differential: +11)
12. Browns (1-1, Point Differential: -10)
13. Seahawks (2-0, Point Differential: +3)
14. 49ers (2-0, Point Differential: +38)
15. Falcons (1-1, Point Differential: -12)
16. Titans (1-1, Point Differential: +28)
17. Texans (1-1, Point Differential: -1)
18. Bills (1-0, Point Differential: +15)
19. Bears (1-1, Point Differential: -5)

We’re now officially past the halfway point of Kirk Cousins’ fully guaranteed contract, and it might be time to officially declare it a mistake.

The Vikings effectively hid Cousins in Week 1 in an easy win over the Falcons — he attempted only 10 passes — but that wasn’t an option in Week 2 after the Packers jumped out to an early lead. Cousins was forced to throw, and it did not go well despite him getting good support from the run game.

The Vikings brought in Gary Kubiak as a consultant to help with the offense, and the early returns have been good for the run game but Cousins has looked uncomfortable with making tougher throws downfield. His average pass has traveled 9.4 yards downfield. He’s tied for sixth in the NFL along with … Patrick Mahomes. Unlike Mahomes, Cousins has had a difficult time completing those passes. His “Completion Percentage Above Expectation,” a metric tracked by NextGen Stats, currently sits at -5.2%, which ranks ahead of only three quarterbacks who have started and finished both of their team’s games in 2019.

If this continues all season, the Vikings will have their work cut out for them in the offseason. Cousins is due $31 million in 2019, so they’d either have to build a good roster around an average quarterback making about 20% of the cap, or they’d have to find a team willing to trade for an average quarterback with a $30 million price tag. Good luck.

Tier 4: Not terrible, but also not doing much this season.

I toyed with the idea of putting the Lions in Tier 3, but the rest of these teams are firmly entrenched here. 

21. Lions (1-0-1, Point Differential: +3)
20. Raiders (1-1, Point Differential: -10)
22. Buccaneers (1-1, Point Differential: -8)
23. Panthers (0-2, Point Differential: -9)
24. Cardinals (0-1-1, Point Differential: -6)
25. Steelers (0-2, Point Differential: -32)
26. Redskins (0-2, Point Differential: -15)
27. Bengals (0-2, Point Differential: -25)
28. Jets (0-2, Point Differential: -21)
29. Broncos (0-2, Point Differential: -10)

After a rough first half against the Lions, Kliff Kingsbury’s offense has looked darn good. That is until the team gets into the red zone. Arizona has scored a touchdown on only 25% of its red-zone possessions. That ranks 31st in the league.

I don’t think Kingsbury’s scheme has been the problem. He never had problems scoring in the red zone at Texas Tech and had a deep arsenal of concepts that helped the Red Raiders finish of drives.

That should translate to the NFL.

This is mostly a talent issue. The best offensive coaches are adept at creating space for their playmakers — which Kingsbury has done thus far — but that’s really hard to do in the red zone. Especially in the NFL, where players are bigger, stronger and faster. You need talent to win in a phone booth and the Cardinals just don’t have it. The offensive line can’t overpower opposing fronts, and nobody in the receiving corps is capable of consistently winning one-on-one matchups. Larry Fitzgerald is great but he runs like a tight end now and does not create a lot of separation.

Until Kingsbury gets some more talent to work with, the Cardinals’ red-zone issues could persist.

Tier 5: There’s always 2020.

The Dolphins probably deserve to be in a tier of their own, but bad is bad. 

30. Jaguars (0-2, Point Differential: -15)
31. Giants (0-2, Point Differential: -32)
32. Dolphins (0-2, Point Differential: -92)

The Giants finally did it. Eli Manning had been benched, and the Daniel Jones era has started. For more on Jones and what I think he can be as a starter, check out my film piece on his time at Duke.

While I don’t believe Jones will ever be a top-line starter, he has more than enough tools to develop into a competent starter. He’s accurate in the short and intermediate passing areas, and he routinely gets the ball out on time.

The most underrated aspect of his game is his mobility. He was used in the run game at Duke, and I expect that to continue in New York. Saquon Barkley, who has been carrying the Giants offense on his back in 2019, could be a big winner after this move. With defenses now having to account for the quarterback in the run game, Barkley should have more space to run. He doesn’t need much of it.