NFL: No More Undefeated Teams

After this past weekend we have no more undefeated teams in the NFL. The final two that had a zero in their loss column both fell to the hands of a way lesser opponent on the same day. The San Francisco 49ers lost on the road to the Cleveland Browns in the 1:00pm EST time slot by a final of 19-17 after the Niners missed the winning field goal as time expired. Next up was the Philadelphia Eagles turn in the 4:25pm EST time slot as they fell on the road as well to the New York Jets by a final score of 20-14 as the Jets scored 8 unanswered points in the 4th quarter. This now brings me to the entire point of this article.

Are the Browns or Jets going to the Super Bowl because they defeated the two best teams at the time in the entire NFL. Of course not. They both have championship caliber defenses, but they don’t have anything else on the roster, on the staff, or in the organization that is ready for that. What these two games showed was that it is really hard to win in the National Football League, and it is even harder to win on the road in this league. If anything, for teams as good as the 49ers and Eagles to lose in the fashion they did and to the teams they did, it can be a huge blessing for them, and a huge nightmare for the rest of the league. Instead of continuing to win and resting on their success, they’ve been awaken with what their weaknesses and deficiencies are. Now they have plenty of time to identify and correct to get even better for a stretch run as 2 of the teams with real shots at a title. These games were nothing more than 2 very good NFL teams losing on the road to 2 other NFL teams. It happens regardless of who, what, where, when, and why…because again, this is the NFL. Simple as that. The bad aren’t suddenly great and the great aren’t suddenly bad. Any given Sunday is all this is.