NFL Power Points: Chiefs reign supreme

Updated: October 28, 2003, 3:01 PM ET
By By Ryan Early | NFL Insider
And then there was one. The Power Points can no longer escape the obvious, that the Chiefs are not only the last undefeated team in the league, but they are playing the best football as well. Their 33 point win over the Bills on Sunday showed equal dominance by the team's offense and defense with five touchdowns scored and seven turnovers forced. What's even scarier for the rest of the league is that an undefeated season looks like a real possibility. They have just two upcoming games against teams in the top half of the power points, the #10 Broncos at Denver in week 14, and the #7 Vikings at Minnesota in Week 16. The Chiefs have played pretty well no matter the location, so home field advantage will play a negligible part in those contests. In this age of free agency and parity, teams aren't supposed to threaten the '72 Dolphins perfect season. But they also say that records are meant to be broken.

The Power Points are calculated solely on the hard data of game results. There are no external adjustments added in for the type of weather that the game was played in, or what type of surface, or whether a key player was injured or not. So the Power Points formula has no idea that the Broncos have lost their first and second string quarterbacks. Denver has now lost two games in a row, but with a 5-3 overall record and a difficult recent schedule, the Power Points are making all kinds of allowances for the game results. Instead of punishing the Broncos too badly for their 20 point loss to the Ravens, Baltimore is rewarded. The data also corresponded well to a building trend concerning the Ravens home field advantage, which exploded up to 7.4 points. How else to explain their loss in Cincinnati in Week 7 followed by a pummeling in Baltimore of the top 10 Broncos?

Next week's prime time games could not have a bigger contrast. On Sunday night, the Packers and their #2 offense visit the Vikings' #3 offense. Both teams have mediocre to poor defenses and special teams, pointing to a major shoot-out in the Metrodome. The following night, the battered and bruised Broncos host the bloody and hobbling Patriots, who won this past week despite not getting the ball into the end zone. The phrase "defensive struggle" isn't strong enough to describe this contest.


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