Week 3 NFL Power Rankings

Bills separate from the second-tier teams. Saints and Cardinals on the rise

For more info you can find the archive of previous Power Rankings posts, including the initial offseason rankings that detail much of the methodology of coming up with the Week 1 rankings.

TEAM OFFENSIVE AND DEFENSIVE STRENGTH

*Downloadable power ratings/rankings available in the paid subscriber Google sheet.

The defensive and offensive strength numbers above are estimated for how much each unit would contribute to point differential against an average team on a neutral field.

A couple strong performances by the Bills have vaulted them to slightly behind the 49ers, and separated from the Chiefs, Lions and Ravens. It’s not just that the Bills won both of their games so far, winning in Week 1 takes on a more positive meaning after the Cardinals turned around and thrashed the Rams in Week 2. That boosts the Bills’ 2024 strength of schedule, bleeding through to the new power rankings.

The Saints are really creeping up the rankings this week. First, they blew out the Panthers, which actually looks less impressive after the Chargers did the same. But beating the Cowboys handily triggered a flashing “buy” sign in my model, moving them into the top-10 of the NFL. You don’t want to overreact to early season results, but underreacting can be just as harmful when projecting the next week’s results.

The Cardinals are another team getting a huge boost from the preseason rankings. Kyler Murray had the best game of his career, and the Cardinals defense shut down an injury-plagued Rams offense. The Cardinals strength of schedule might not be fully accounting for how hurt the Rams were. Even so, hanging tough with the Bills in Buffalo and then blowing out their next opponent means the Cardinals could be for real this year, especially if Murray can make the leap.

The Dolphins get the big quarterback-injury discount this week, with around a 4-5 point discount in overall power ranking for switching to Skylar Thompson from Tua Tagovailoa.

UNEXPECTED POINTS POWER RANKINGS

This week I’m going back to only showing my power rankings, without a comparison to the market. The betting market numbers are too fragile right now, with the some of the rankings and power ratings jumping all over the place. I’ll update this later in the week to add the more solidified betting number.