Three Takeaways From The NFL Week 3

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In spite of all the stats and numbers, nothing is still certain in the NFL after Week 3. Yes, the New England Patriots seem to have turned back the clock like it’s 2007 all over again but we all know what happened eight years ago: the Patriots ended up losing the Super Bowl although they won their previous 18 straight games. Green Bay Packers are frontrunners in the NFC but can they keep it up? And what about those 0-3 NFL teams that have to defy history in order to reach the playoffs? Can the Baltimore Ravens, Detroit Lions, Chicago Bears and New Orleans Saints snap the 82-no-playoffs streak (since 1998, 82 teams started 0-3 and none of them reached the post-season)? We will have to wait and see and until then, let’s just live in the moment and recap the most important moments from Week 3.

Passing: Tom Brady, Peyton Manning Reach Milestone

No more deflating games football fans, Tom Brady is up and ready for yet another career-defining season. Brady became the first quarterback to pass the 1,000-yard mark in this young NFL season. He is also the fourth player in league history to throw the ball for 400 or more touchdowns. His first touchdown pass happened in 2001, against the Chargers. His 400th? Just take a look:

 

Brady finished the game with 358 passing yards and two TDs as the Patriots bamboozled the Jacksonville Jaguars 51-17. The other ‘aging’ quarterback from the AFC Conference, Peyton Manning wanted his share of history and completed on Sunday his 6,000th career pass. Only legend Brett Favre has more completions than Manning (6,300). The Denver Broncos quarterback also has 535 passing touchdowns. Can Brady touch him? Or better yet, can anyone touch him in the foreseeable future? How about Tennessee Titans rookie Marcus Mariota? Three games into his career and he’s already rewriting history. We all know about his first game but against the Indianapolis Colts, he tied an NFL record for most passing TDs thrown so far:

Receiving: Julio Jones, A.J. Green Impress

There was plenty of action on the receiving end also. The Atlanta Falcons’ wide receiver Julio Jones is unstoppable to start the season: he leads the league in receptions (34), receiving yards (440) and first downs (23). So far, he scored four TDs and after Sunday’s win, he became the first player in NFL history to run at least 135 yards in the first three games of the season. If he keeps it up, well he might break some other records like these ones:

 

A.J. Green isn’t that far behind Jones in the receiving leaderboard. Green is fourth in the receiving yards category (335) but most of those yards were piled up on Sunday, against the Baltimore Ravens. In that particular game, he caught the football 10 times for 227 yards becoming only the second player in history to finish a pro game with at least 10 catches, 225 receiving yards and two touchdowns. Can the Bengals wideout be stopped? Apparently not:

The Football Field Is On Fireeeee

But not all interesting facts happen in-game. For example, this weekend, in St. Louis, during the pregame introductions, with all the noise and fireworks, the football field caught fire…literally:

 

Let’s go Rams! #NFL #STL #Rams

A photo posted by Kyle Peebles (@just_peebs) on

The Rams were preparing to play their home game against the Pittsburgh Steelers when hell broke loose. Or was it predetermined to fuse the Steelers? But enough fire jokes: fortunately, nobody was hurt and the game was delayed only 28 minutes. As for the game, the Steelers came up with the win but lost quarterback Ben Roethlisberger in the process for a ‘number of weeks.’ The Rams lost their second straight game after the emotional opener against the Seattle Seahawks. Their offense was out of sync plummeting into last place in the NFL. Can they salvage something from this season – apart from a burnt turf of course?

By: Florian Gheorghe