Around the AFC West: Manning Milestone, Chargers v. Raiders and other Week 6 Division Storylines

Week Six in the AFC West will feature the San Diego Chargers and Denver Broncos continuing to battle for first place in a very hard fought division. One quarterback is continuing an MVP season while another just reached one of the most exclusive NFL career milestones. On the other hand, you have two teams with much more trying times ahead. Kansas City enters it’s bye week questioning itself on whether they are a better team than their 2-3 record. In Oakland, you have an organization that continues its run of turmoil. They just fired their head coach and are still looking for their first win of the season.

Here are all the Week Six AFC West storylines for this up-coming Sunday:

Standings (Last Week Result)

San Diego Chargers..4-1 (W, 31-0 v. NYJ)

Denver Broncos…….3-1 (W, 41-20 v. ARI)

Kansas City Chiefs…2-3 (L, 22-17)

Oakland Raiders……0-4 (Bye Week)

San Diego Chargers

Branden’s Big Day

Not too many people knew about 23-year old, undrafted rookie Branden Oliver coming into last week’s game against the New York Jets. He made sure people won’t be forgetting about it anytime soon. The Jets were the top-rated defense coming into the game against the run, but Oliver gashed them for 114 yards and a touchdown on just 19 attempts. He also hauled in four receptions for 68 yards and another score.

Oliver, a product of the University at Buffalo, is listed at just 5-7 and 208 pounds. He also wears the number 43 so you can only guess who Oliver reminds people of…and no, it isn’t just the fans and media that see a little bit of former Charger back Darren Sproles in him.

“He reminds me so much of [Darren] Sproles,” Chargers tight end Antonio Gates told U-T San Diego‘s Kevin Acee. “And I played with Sproles so many years. It’s crazy. He’s Sproles, with a little bit more power.”

Ryan Mathews is still 1-2 weeks away from returning to the lineup and Donald Brown is still day-to-day as he recovers from a concussion. He has 4.8 yards per carry on his first 31 carries, 8 total catches for 101 yards. Oliver’s blend of speed, elusiveness and power will get to go up against a Raiders team that allows teams to average 158.2 yards rushing per game (good for 31^st in the league). Needless to say, this is a matchup that he will look to take advantage of. With another strong week on his resume, it will be tough just to turn back to Ryan Mathews completely once he is healthy. Oliver has at least carved out a few touches a game even when their backfield gets back to full health. Who knows, with a performance like last week, Oliver could take hold of the starting running back duties completely.

The Ageless Wonder, Antonio Gates

Antonio Gates continues his fight against father time as the 34-year old future hall of famer starts off the year strong yet again. Many were questioning how much he had left coming into this season but Gates is quickly showing that when healthy, he can still be an effective weapon and one of the more effective red zone targets in football.

After two quiet weeks, Gates exploded for four receptions for 60 yards and two touchdowns in Week 5 against the New York Jets. It is clear that Gates and quarterback Philip Rivers still have unbelievable chemistry with each other (65 touchdowns for the duo, a NFL record between QB and TE), and with the Chargers continuing to employ a pass happy attack, I don’t see why Gates won’t continue to enjoy his already successful season (21 receptions, 275 yards, 5 touchdowns).

It is awesome to see one of the league’s stars continue to shine bright despite already playing in the league for 12 seasons. Gates will have another favorable matchup this week against the Oakland Raiders, a team whose defense has allowed a tight end touchdown reception in each of their last two games.

He also needs just 117 receiving yards to take sole possession of most receiving yards in Chargers franchise history. Look for the early season success to continue.

On Tap: @ Oakland, 4:05 PM (eastern)

The Chargers take on the Raiders in a clash of AFC West rivals.

The Chargers are red hot, especially on offense, as it just seems like everything is starting to click for the banged up group. They have outscored opponents 133-63 on the year, and average 26.6 points (9^th), 369.2 yards per game (11^th) and 281.2 passing yards per game (7^th).

Phillip Rivers continues his MVP like season (1,443 passing yards, 12 touchdowns) has plenty of targets in Gates, Keenan Allen, Eddie Royal, and Malcom Floyd. All of them have over 259 yards receiving on the year. He also has thrown for an average of 345.8 yards in his four road games against Oakland.

Oakland is just too overmatched in this one, as their defense doesn’t look to be the recipe this week for stopping this Chargers attack. They also have one of the worst offenses in football, and it will be tough for them to compete once San Diego starts to put points up on the board. Oakland might start off strong, but they don’t have enough talent to keep up as San Diego wins easy in this one.

Denver Broncos

500 Touchdown Passes for Peyton Manning

I know the opening space on the Broncos was given to quarterback Peyton Manning just last week, but he takes it over again as we need to send along congratulations on Mr. Manning joining one of the most exclusive clubs in professional football.

In last week’s four-touchdown performance, Manning joined the 500-touchdown club, joining just Brett Favre as the club’s only members. The four brought Manning up to 503 career passing touchdowns, just 3 off of the NFL record of 508 owned by Favre. Needless to say, Manning is going to shatter the NFL record and with a couple more seasons at his high level of play, might just set it at an unreachable level.

Oh, and if the 500-club wasn’t enough, Manning also set his career high for passing yards, as he threw for over 479 yards last weekend against the Arizona Cardinals. Manning now owns a ridiculous 109 QB rating to go along with completing 66.5% of his passes for 1,293 yards, 12 touchdowns and just three interceptions.

Breakout for Demaryius Thomas

Demaryius Thomas finally had his breakout game of the season, as he went off for 8 catches on 16 targets for 226 yards and two touchdowns against the Cardinals secondary.

It’s amazing to think the day that could have been if a 77-yard touchdown between Thomas and Manning wasn’t negated by penalty. Thomas was experiencing a slow start to the year by his standards and it is nice to see Manning and Thomas reestablish what was such a dominant connection just a year ago.

It is also good for the Broncos as it looks like Thomas was able to shake whatever foot injury he was dealing with in the first month of the season. He looked explosive and blazing fast on his touchdowns of 86 and 31 yards. The effort resulted in being awarded with the AFC’s Offensive Player of the Week honors for Thomas for his Week 5 effort.

On Tap: @ New York Jets, 1:00 PM (eastern)

The Denver Broncos travel to New York to take on a team that has a lot of question marks but is short on answers.

The Jets just got beat down by the Chargers 31-0 last week, as we saw Michael Vick make his first appearance in a Jets uniform. It wasn’t a pretty half of play (8 of 19 for just 47 yards) and they will keep Geno Smith as the starter, for now.

The Jets have a horrible secondary and are overall just too overmatched for a Super Bowl hopeful squad like Denver. Expect a lot of scoring for the Broncos and not too much coming from the Jets side of things, cross country flight be damned.

Kansas City Chiefs

Forgetting to Pound the Rock

For such an experienced, winning coach, Andy Reid sure does make you scratch your head with some of his game-day decisions, especially when it comes to managing the clock.

The latest head scratch in this trend came this week in which star running back Jamaal Charles carried the ball only 15 times despite averaging 5.3 yards per carry (for a total of 80 yards). To make it worse, on countless times, Reid looked to the passing game instead of just handing it off to try to convert third-and-shorts, all of which went unsuccessful when he attempted to do so.

I just don’t get it. The Chiefs are a running football team that needs the running game working in order to win. Their offense is not a spread the field attack; they are a power team that can set up a lot of their offensive passing attack off of play action.

It is baffling to me why you let one of the most dangerous players in the league (not to mention the most dangerous player on your team) only touch the ball 15 times, especially when he was being effective with his touches.

Reid should come back to his senses and force feed Charles when the team comes back out in Week 7 after their bye.

Fighting for a Wildcard

Teams won’t admit to doing it but the media and fans alike are always looking ahead in the season in trying to see which teams will be standing come playoff time.

The Chiefs already find themselves in a tight spot after their 2-3 start to the season. The thing is, this Kansas City team is not a bad unit and is definately a team that is better than its record. The question becomes, just how much better are they?

After their bye week, the team needs to come out strong in Week 7, or they might fall too far behind their division foes. You have to think that the Chargers or Broncos are going to win the division, both teams that the Chiefs are two games behind. If that is the case, the other team is probably going to wrap up one of the other AFC Wildcard spots. It is too early to say anything for certain, but both San Diego and Denver look like double digit win teams this year.

If that is the case, the Chiefs are going to be in a big battle for that last Wildcard spot. They are currently 12^th in the AFC but the good news is that they play a lot of the teams that are sitting in the middle-of-the-pack category. They have games still against the Jets, Bills, Raiders (twice), Broncos, Pittsburgh and San Diego (twice).

As you can see, there is plenty of time to make up the games they are currently behind. If the Chargers, who are the Chief’s opponent in Week 7, are able knock Kansas City to 2-4, things are going to become that much more desperate. The division is already out of reach; the Chiefs need to make sure they are focused on collecting victories to keep their post-season dream alive.

Bye Week

It is time for the Chiefs to take a week to get as healthy as possible and then come back strong against a very tough matchup that they have facing them in Week 7.

There has been some good for the team this year. We touched on the breakout of tight end Travis Kelce last week, and he added another touchdown (his third) last weekend. Take these crazy numbers into account: 85 percent of Kelce’s 20 receptions have resulted in first downs while 30 percent of those receptions have gone for at least 20 yards. He also is leading NFL tight ends in yards after the catch with 178.

Also on the offense, back up running back Knile Davis has also broken out as a quality player, showing that he could carry the load when needed. Davis has gotten some extended playing time with Charles banged up with a bum ankle, and has taken advantage rushing for 327 yards on 73 carries. He now gives the Chiefs the 1-2 punch that they were lacking coming into the season. He will also help keep Charles fresh for later in the season.

On the defensive side, safety Husain Abdullah has stepped up after the Chiefs lost Pro Bowl Eric Berry. The sixth-year pro really gives the Chiefs a player that they can move around in different spots in the secondary. He already has 25 tackles and one interception (which he returned for a touchdown) on the year.

In conclusion, this is a team that is much more talented than it’s record. The offense should focus around the running game and work from there while the defense has to stop the run a little bit better. Not stopping the run allows for teams to continue to rack up first downs and time of possession against you, and the defense needs to do a better job stopping opposing rushing attacks. Despite being a good unit overall, they are still allowing 127.4 yards rushing to opponents.

Few tweaks here and there and this is a team that is a veteran team that is going to be ready to make a playoff run come their second half of the season.

Oakland Raiders 

Getting back to running the Football: Who Gets the Most Touches?

It will be interesting to see how new Head Coach Tony Sparano uses both of his running backs as he gets to take control of the offense.

Sparano has always been a run-heavy coach, back from his time with the Miami Dolphins, and I would expect no different from a team that currently has a rookie quarterback starting for it.

The problem is who gets the carries in Oakland?

Darren McFadden has been able to rush for 151 yards but he has done so on 45 attempts (giving him an average yard per carry of 3.4). Maurice Jones-Drew has been just as ineffective in his limited playing time with the team (due to injury), amassing 12 yards on 11 carries.

If I am running the offense, McFadden is my guy. He has always been an extremely talented running back who just hasn’t been able to stay healthy. From a pure talent and age point (McFadden is still just 27) the team should see that Run DMC is the way to go. He is also a slightly better target out of the backfield at this point of his career, and has already caught 11 receptions for 75 yards and a touchdown.

MJD is still a talented back, but age isn’t exactly on his side and other than Buffalo’s Fred Jackson, I have yet to see a running back get stronger as he crosses into his thirties. The Raiders aren’t going anywhere this season, they might as well see what they have in McFadden to see if it will be time to close the book shortly on him as well. This is a rebuilding team with a lot of question marks and right now running back isn’t really too high on that list of them.

10 Straight Losses and Not a lot of Points to go with It

Coming into this weekend against the Chargers, the Raiders are currently on a ten game losing streak that dates back to last season. The team also has not scored more than 14 points in any of their games this season.

I was looking for good points to build on for the team after their bye last week, but there really isn’t any. The offense is brutal (last in the league in points, yards and rushing yards per game) and the defense isn’t that much better. Even if the defense were world-beaters they still couldn’t overcome the fact that the team cant put points on the board.

This year is all about giving rookie Derek Carr his playing time so that he can develop and the team can compete in the future. It is going to take some patience, but it is really all you can do in an already lost year.

Odds are the Raiders are about to drop to 0-5 to start the season.

On Tap: at home against the San Diego Chargers

See the “On Tap” section for the Chargers to see a complete preview of the game. To sum it up again, the Raiders are way overmatched, and will have a tough time keeping up with a red-hot San Diego team.

Enjoy Week 6 everyone!