Around the National Football League (Week 4)

It is pretty hard to believe after Week 4 wraps up on Monday night we will be one fourth of the way through the 2019 NFL regular season.

This weekend we saw some exciting upsets, high-flying offenses, and some key quarterback injuries. We walk away through four weeks of the season with now just three undefeated teams. The Kansas City Chiefs, New England Patriots, and San Francisco 49ers. We also saw 11 of the 14 road teams win this week, something highly unlikely.

Before we get into a rundown of the weekend, here are the finals from Week Four.

Final Scores

Eagles 34 Packers 27

Titans 24 Falcons 10

Patriots 16 Bills 10

Chiefs 34 Lions 30

Raiders 31 Colts 24

Chargers 30 Dolphins 10

Redskins 3 Giants 24

Browns 40 Ravens 25

Panthers 16 Texans 10

Buccaneers 55 Rams 40

Seahawks 27 Cardinals 10

Vikings 6 Bears 16

Jaguars 26 Broncos 24

Cowboys 10 Saints 12

Stock Up

1. The Cleveland Browns

Remember last week trashing the Cleveland Browns? Well, time to praise them. Conventional wisdom thought Cleveland was going to get smoked in Baltimore on Sunday, and the exact opposite happened. The Browns dominated Baltimore, going for 530 yards of total offense, sacking Lamar Jackson three times, and forcing three turnovers. On offense, the Browns finally decided to run the football, and guess what, it worked. Nick Chubb had a huge day, running for 165 yards on 20 carries and scoring three touchdowns. Baker Mayfield bounced back nicely from his poor performance against the Rams, going 20 of 30 for 342 yards and a touchdown. The Browns defense battled hard, as they have all season long, holding Lamar Jackson to under 250 yards through the air. Finally, the Browns’ defense was able to get some help from their offense on the other end, giving them an extremely impressive victory.

2. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers

Probably no one in the world saw the Bucs coming into Los Angeles and dropping 55 on the Rams on Sunday, but that is exactly what happened. This was a Tampa team coming off an absolutely devastating 32-31 loss to the New York Giants last Sunday on a missed field goal at the buzzer. Hardly anyone thought they would even compete in this game, much less score over 50 points and win it. Jameis Winston had one of the better games of his NFL career, going 28 of 41 for 385 yards and four touchdowns. Former Penn State Nittany Lion Chris Godwin was the star of the game however, catching 12 passes for a remarkable 172 yards to go with two touchdowns. They did this against a Rams defense that had allowed just 22 total points in their last two games. On the defensive side of the ball for Tampa, despite giving up 518 yards of total offense, they forced Jared Goff to throw three interceptions, and took the ball away from LA a total of four times. Tampa heads to New Orleans to take on the Saints next weekend in a match up that will tell a lot about what type of team they really are.

3. The New Orleans Saints

Much to the dismay of many Cowboy fans, the New Orleans Saints clearly had their stock go up on Sunday night. After losing quarterback Drew Brees to a thumb injury two weeks ago, New Orleans went into Seattle last weekend and delivered an impressive victory. They returned home to face Dallas with a chance to move to 3-1 on the year and they did just that. The Saints controlled the game from the get-go, and despite an early first quarter interception, Teddy Bridgewater played a pretty impressive game. He threw for just 193 yards, but only threw seven incompletions and turned it over just the one time. The Saints won this game without even scoring a touchdown on offense. That shows you how good their defense was, or how bad the Dallas offense was. New Orleans held Dallas to just 257 yards of total offense and held running back Ezekiel Elliott to a season-low 35 yards rushing. They also forced quarterback Dak Prescott to have his worst game of the season, going 22 of 33 for 223 yards and an interception. Despite the ineptitude of the Dallas offense last night, and the constant runs into the middle on first down, the Saints proved they are tough to beat at home even without Drew Brees. New Orleans has three out of their next four games against the Buccaneers, Jaguars, and Cardinals. They could easily win all three of these games and be sitting somewhere around 6-2 when Brees is able to return.

Elsewhere Around The NFC East

Philadelphia Eagles

Win: 34-27 over Green Bay

Record: 2-2

Next Opponent: vs New York Jets

The Eagles had an extremely impressive bounce-back win over the Green Bay Packers on Thursday night. Philly was in danger of falling to 1-3 on the season and desperately needed this victory. Quarterback Carson Wentz did not have a huge day through the air, throwing for just 160 yards, but he made his passes count in the red zone throwing three touchdowns. The Eagles defense surrendered 422 yards through the air to Aaron Rodgers and 27 points through the first three quarters, but when it mattered most they pitched a shutout in the fourth quarter and stopped Rodgers in the red zone to seal the victory.

New York Giants

Win: 24-3 over Washington

Record: 2-2

Next Opponent: vs Minnesota Vikings

The Giants, with rookie quarterback Daniel Jones, were able to get their second consecutive victory on Sunday as they defeated the Redskins 24-3. Jones was not nearly as impressive as he was in his first NFL start, throwing for just 225 yards to go with two interceptions, but he did do enough to get his team the victory. The main reason for this was that the Giants defense absolutely dominated the Washington offense. The Giants held the Redskins to just 176 yards of total offense. That is hard to do even when you are facing an FCS team. The Giants have a decent chance to make it three in a row next weekend taking on the up and down Vikings at home.

Washington Redskins

Loss: 24-3 at Giants

Record: 0-4

Next Opponent: vs New England Patriots

There really isn’t much to say about the Washington Redskins except that they are a complete mess. They threw rookie quarterback Dwayne Haskins into the fire on Sunday and he threw three interceptions against a pretty poor Giants defense. You can’t really fault Haskins for this, as it makes zero sense as an organization to throw your future franchise quarterback into the second quarter of a game with no preparation. The Redskins are simply just an awful team, and they will almost certainly have a new head coach by the middle of the season.

Key Injuries

Mitchell Trubisky QB Chicago Bears - shoulder

Josh Allen QB Buffalo Bills - concussion

Tyron Smith LT Dallas Cowboys - ankle

Jarvis Landry WR Cleveland Browns - concussion

Bradley Chubb DE Denver Broncos - knee (out for season)

Melvin Ingram DE Los Angeles Chargers - hamstring

Season long suspension - Vontaze Burfict

Oakland Raiders linebacker Vontaze Burfict has been suspended for the rest of the 2019 season for his helmet-to-helmet hit Sunday on Indianapolis Colts tight end Jack Doyle, the league announced.

Burfict was ejected in the second quarter of the Raiders’ 31-24 win. He was initially flagged for hitting Doyle in the head across the middle. But after the officials conferred, Burfict was thrown out.

The league said that Burfict will be not be paid during the suspension, which covers the postseason as well. The league cited his repeated violations of unnecessary roughness rules in handing out the longest suspension ever for an on-field incident.