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PrintEach week throughout the NFL regular season, we’ll be providing our public perception rankings, a 1-through-32 look at the teams that might be overvalued or undervalued by Joe Public bettors.
There was a little bit of shuffling in the top six this week as the Atlanta Falcons have slowly climbed up to fourth with a 4-0 start. We still project they’d be an underdog on a neutral field against Houston, New England and Baltimore, though.
The Browns and Jaguars remain in the basement and will likely occupy those spots for the foreseeable future.
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On the Rise: Minnesota Vikings (25th to 19th). A team most folks gave zero chance of winning the tough NFC North is suddenly looking like at least the third-best team in that division. A convincing road win at Detroit has Minnesota’s stock on the uptick, but we think they might be favored by a little too much (5.5 points) at home against Tennessee this weekend.
Free Falling: Tampa Bay Buccaneers (22nd to 28th). Perception on Tampa Bay was down entering the year, but after a brief rise it’s fallen even lower than where it started. Public bettors don’t like teams that struggle to score, and Josh Freeman hasn’t shown many signs of improvement in now his fourth NFL season. The Bucs have a bye this week to get ready for a very winnable home matchup with Kansas City in Week 6.
With another win … The Denver Broncos will definitely be in the Top 10. But that’ll be hard to come by as touchdown underdogs at New England this weekend. Denver has the quarterback necessary to be a hugely public team, and bettors are just waiting to throw their full support behind the rest of this team. A surprise win against the Patriots would result in just that.
With another loss … Fans and bettors will be hurling themselves off the New York Jets bandwagon. Especially if it comes in blowout fashion at home on Monday Night Football as big underdogs to the Houston Texans. With all the attention and scrutiny the Jets receive, they’ll see more ups and downs in these ratings than perhaps any other team. Every win seems much bigger than it actually is, and every loss more dreadful.
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For people who like these rankings in plain-old text form, here ya go.
1. Texans (Last week: 1)
2. Patriots (2)
3. Ravens (3)
4. Falcons (5)
5. Packers (6)
6. 49ers (4)
7. Bears (10)
8. Giants (7)
9. Steelers (9)
10. Eagles (13)
11. Broncos (11)
12. Cowboys (8)
13. Chargers (12)
14. Saints (17)
15. Seahawks (14)
16. Bengals (15)
17. Lions (16)
18. Redskins (20)
19. Vikings (25)
20. Panthers (24)
21. Cardinals (18)
22. Bills (21)
23. Dolphins (27)
24. Jets (19)
25. Rams (29)
26. Chiefs (23)
27. Colts (30)
28. Buccaneers (22)
29. Titans (26)
30. Raiders (28)
31. Jaguars (31)
32. Browns (32)
