NFL: Week Six Results, an Analysis; Broncos vs. Chargers---Could be listed as “NFL Game Of The Year!” // MLB: Brief Wrap, League Championship Series

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“SPORTS NOTEBOOK” will continue to post its columns Tuesday and Friday of each week---Ed. & Publ., Marvin Leibstone.

NFL   ---   WEEK Six of the NFL’s 16 game season is rarely “the tell” about which teams will compete during post-season play, though it sends signals about those likely to reach that point by, say, Week Eight or Week Nine. However, Week Six’s completion does suggest which teams will probably finish the season at .500 or higher, though even a 6-0 franchise could start losing frequently and end up 6-10 as the season closes. And, there have been 0-6 franchises finishing the year at 9-7 and 8-8. Right now, 11 NFL franchises are at .500, which can be a continuing number through December---the number is five fewer than half of all of the NFL franchises.

The NFL’s bottom five are those with but one win since the season began: the New Orleans Saints (National Football Conference South), the Carolina Panthers (NFC South), the Jacksonville Jaguars (American Football Conference South), the Cleveland Browns (AFC North), and the Kansas City Chiefs (AFC West). This being so, sports miracles do happen every year; we can’t say for sure that these teams will be the NFL’s bottom five at the end of the season.  

Ahead of the entire 32 team league with five or more wins to date stands the NFC South’s leading franchise, the 6-0 Atlanta Falcons, and the AFC South’s leading team, the 5-1 Houston Texans, also the AFC North’s 5-1 Baltimore Ravens. Right now, these three are the season’s Brahmins---bettors are laying down money that they will be Super Bowl candidates.

And, there are six teams with four wins since the start of the season, all within the NFC, three within the NFC West---the Arizona Cardinals, the San Francisco 49ers, the Seattle Seahawks, fourth being the NFC East’s New York Giants.

So, there is a fat middle, today consisting of more than 15 NFL teams that are 3-3, 2-4 and 2-3. What chance have they for a victory finish come December, for a shot at the Super Bowl? At first glance, you might say, “No Way, Jose!” But leading the AFC West are the Denver Broncos, a 3-3 franchise barely ahead of the 3-3 San Diego Chargers, and atop the AFC East sits the 3-3 N.Y. Jets, almost of a tie with the 3-3 New England Patriots. Division leaders matter, in spite of low win/loss records. What’s that? Yes, all four AFC East teams are approaching Week Seven at 3-3/.500.     

We could therefore comment safely after Week Eight that a 4-4 football team could continue its win/loss trend and face Week Eight’s 8-0 Atlanta Falcons or Week Eight’s 7-1 Houston Texans at the Super Bowl, providing that the latter two also keep up their win/loss trends.

But it’s not Week Seven yet---the NFL standings are still more of a crapshoot than certainty.

Broncos vs. Chargers----  IT took less than a second half’s 18 minutes during the Denver Broncos 35-24 comeback win against the San Diego Chargers for answers to questions about the Broncos to shift dramatically.

Yes, the team put together by Denver’s VP John Elway and John Fox can be a post-season contender.

Yes, Denver’s quarterback Peyton Manning will be the leading factor for a Denver offense capable of outperforming rivals and sustaining double-digit wins, especially via high fourth quarter gains close to being a trend.

Yes, the Denver offense can spoil an opposing team’s pass rush abilities, giving Manning the time and space required for his pass and rush pursuits.

Yes, while it may take Manning somewhat longer than in his past to read an opposing team’s defense nuances, his accurate readings of the most accomplished defense squads are still best in the NFL and can serve to expand attack attributes in a game’s second half.

Yes, the Broncos wide receivers, tight ends and running backs can be in sync with Manning’s fast and hard pass and handoff attempts (in the second half vs. the Chargers, Manning completed 12 passes inside of nine minutes, the coordination with receivers Eric Decker and Brandon Stokley as timely as could be).

Yes, Denver’s defense can turn aggressive, enhance its mobility, strike from screening, and disrupt a QB and cause fumbles and intercepts, then score.

But---the possibility of the above affirmations about the Broncos was dissolving fast during the first half vs. the Chargers, as San Diego’s offense ripped through the Denver defense for 24 points, while the Denver offense couldn’t score, impaired by special team errors, an intercept resulting in an 80 yard run for a Chargers touchdown and a receiver’s accidental fall when a caught pass would have put Denver back in the game.

Starting with the third quarter, it was as if the Denver offense decided angrily “We won’t take it anymore,” Manning and his pass receivers and runners suddenly driving the ball forward through a weakened and puzzled Chargers defense for three touchdowns, the first from an eight play/85 yard drive, while later Elvis Dumervil, Von Miller and Derek Wolfe of the Broncos defense intervened with attempts by Chargers QB Phillip Rivers to move the football forward effectively, causing San Diego fumbles that Denver’s cornerback Tony Carter picked for a 65 yard run and a TD, soon a turnover, leading to points above those gained by Manning’s offense.

Viewers may have been astonished that reality was outdoing Hollywood moviemaking---did they really just see the Broncos score five touchdowns in a second half against a team that seemed in the first half to be withdrawing them from post-season contention, sending them to their locker room, sullen, behind (ugh!), 24-0?

The Broncos hit the fourth quarter’s two-minute warning having made the history books from its up from zero win, about to put the Chargers asunder with an 11 point lead, having kept the Chargers as scoreless in the second half as the Broncos were in the first (Had emissaries from the football Gods sprinkled strange dust across the field? They’ve always liked those Manning brothers, haven’t they?).  

By game’s end, Manning had completed 24 of 30 pass attempts, his best throw/catch ratio of the season. Of the Broncos 366 yards, Manning threw for 309. Manning was not sacked during the game, Rivers ate grass four times.

The Broncos and the Chargers will face each other again on November 18. Prior to that game, the Broncos will be facing the now 1-4 Saints, the 3-3 Cincinnati Bengals and the 1-4 Panthers. If maintained is what was witnessed last night in the second half vs. San Diego, the Broncos could be 7-3 before its 11th game, with only one of its remaining games of the season vs. a team that today is above 3-3, the Baltimore Ravens.

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MLB: Briefs---  The NLCS series is tied at 1-1, San Francisco having beat the St. Louis Cardinals yesterday, 6-4, after losing to the Cards in an earlier game, 7-1. For the AL crown, the New York Yankees are behind the Detroit Tigers by two games, losing yesterday to the Tigers, 3-0, and in an earlier game to the Tigers, 6-4.

Noted in the 2012 post-season MLB games held so far is that the inning-by-inning leads, they seem to be more from sudden bursts of above-the-margin competencies exhibited by a few individual players rather than by teams as a whole, that is, not from consistent base-running resulting in RBI’s or super alert fielders supporting an effective starting pitcher and relievers, instead from, say, a home run by the Cardinals Matt Holiday or a rally begun by the Cards Marco Scutaro offsetting that, or from a game begun by Detroit’s Justin Verlander.

Of course, it’s too early to tell now what the outcomes for either league will be. New York transplants living “out west” now, and who remember the Giants being home-based at New York’s Polo Grounds, they are aching for a San Francisco/New York WS match-up.

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