November separates NFL contenders from pretenders by Ted Sevransky of The gaming Today

November is the time in the NFL where we separate contenders from pretenders. This week, I focused on the NFC. My power ratings have the Giants, 49ers and Falcons as the top three teams in the conference. Who among the rest can challenge for NFC supremacy? Read on to find out.

Chicago Bears

This offense just isn’t working. Facing a bottom tier defense, Jay Cutler still couldn’t find any receivers open downfield. They committed their 17th false start penalty in the first quarter here, by far the most in the NFL.

Starting a drive from their own 10, a false start immediately followed by an illegal hands to the face penalty resulted in a safety. Chicago is ranked No. 30 in the NFL in passing despite facing a soft early schedule – not what we’re used to seeing from Super Bowl contenders in the modern age of football.

Chicago’s blocked punt TD is just one more example of how good these special teams right now. Devin Hester’s punt return inside the Titans 10 set up the Bears second score. The passing numbers are so weak in large part due to Chicago leading throughout the second half during most of its 7-1 start.

When your defense forces turnovers in bunches on a weekly basis, stuffing the run and notching 25 sacks (2nd most in the NFL), it can mask a lot of offensive weakness. Cutler was taking hits even in max protect schemes, just poor blocking fundamentals. Don’t be fooled for a moment by the 51 the Bears hung on Tennessee – this offense isn’t capable of producing points in bunches.

Tampa Bay Bucs

Tampa’s got injury problems on the O-line with Pro Bowl guard Carl Nicks going on IR this week. They’ve got attrition in the secondary, dumping Aqib Talib at the trading deadline and facing an Eric Wright suspension. But none of that seemed to matter here, because this Tampa Bay offense has suddenly sprung to life and completely changed the personality of this team.

QB Josh Freeman finally has legitimate playmakers that he trusts at WR, which allows him to chuck the ball up and let his guys go get it. That exact type of pass was the Bucs first TD, a floater into the end zone for Vincent Jackson. With rookie RB Doug Martin developing into a star, this is a potent offense.

There’s good and bad when we talk about this defense. Tampa controlled the line of scrimmage, stuffing the Raiders running game. DE DaQuan Bowers is finally healthy and contributing and they got their sixth sack of the year from Michael Bennett. The Bucs defense has a whopping 66 plays of negative yards, most in the NFL.

However, trying to protect a fourth quarter lead, this pass defense fell apart like it did in a similar spot against the Giants. Still, this team is a potential second half ATS juggernaut.

Detroit Lions

Detroit entered Week 9 with a losing record and a losing overall record since their 5-0 start in 2011, but this team is poised to make a second half run. Two things are dramatically improved for Detroit compared to last year.

First, they can run the football even in the red zone, something they couldn’t do at all a season ago. Mikel LeShoure punched in an easy rushing TD in a first and goal situation for the first score, and did it again on their second. Joique Bell had room to run all day too – this OL is finally starting to jell.

And make no mistake about it – Detroit’s defense is not a bottom tier unit any more. Both the stats and the results show it clearly. Detroit had 13 first downs, 224 yards of total offense and two TD’s (not even counting Jason Hanson’s missed field goal) before the Jaguars had a first down.

Last week, the Lions converted on an NFL season high 12 third downs, and here, they were 8-12 on third down tries. With the emergence of Titus Young and Ryan Broyles as threats along with Megatron, this offense is going to be very difficult to get off the field.

Green Bay Packers

From a betting perspective, the vast majority of NFL skill position players are easily replaceable. However, that doesn’t seem to be the case in Green Bay. Greg Jennings has been hurt for most of the season. Jordy Nelson didn’t stay on the field long enough to complete the first drive of the game. The downfield vertical passing game hasn’t been working as well, even with Aaron Rodgers throwing his 16th red zone touchdown pass of the year (most in the NFL) on Green Bay’s first drive.

Randall Cobb is developing nicely; JerMichael Finley remains an elite pass catching TE James Jones is good at WR, but this offense is clearly affected. They had as many drops (4) as completed passes (4) by midway through the second quarter. Of course, Rodgers then proceeded to throw a perfect end zone strike to Cobb for his second TD.

Since Green Bay’s loss to Seattle on Monday Night Football, Rodgers has thrown 21 TD’s only 3 INT’s, as good as any QB in the NFL right now. And there was a concerted effort to run the football here; an area where the Pack have been noticeably lacking for several years. Using that strategy, the Packers had four “three and outs” and a 2-yard field goal drive trying to kill clock with a lead in the second half.

Green Bay leads the NFL in sacks, and the pass rush was in John Skelton’s face all afternoon. But when the pressure didn’t get there, this secondary got picked apart, really missing Charles Woodson’s presence. There are lots of open spaces in their zone coverages.

Seattle Seahawks

This supposedly dominant run defense hasn’t faced many top notch RB’s this year. They’ve seen two in the last 3 weeks – Frank Gore and Adrian Peterson – and were absolutely torched both times. At times, this defense looked like USC against Oregon on Saturday Night, with Peterson repeatedly gaining eight or nine yards before getting touched. This pass defense got torched at Detroit last week. Seattle’s highly ranked stop unit is good, but not great.