Week 4 - Monday

'76 Pittsburgh vs. '88 Cincinnati

It was a brisk fall day at Three Rivers Stadium as the 1-2 Steelers looked to turn their season around against the 2-1 division rival Bengals. Only 46,000 were in attendance, but Pittsburgh would soon find they may more reasons to draw fans.

After a few 3 & outs in the 1st quarter, Esiason would put together a great drive, with Wilson taking a 1 yard run for the first score. Pittsburgh would try to put together a drive, but settled for a 40 yarder from Gerela. The Bengals, still leading 7-3, would get Breech close enough to nail a 35 yarder and go up 10-3. Pittsburgh would need to start scoring to get in the game, and they found their opportunity.

On the 1st play of the 2nd quarter, Bleier told his teammates not to worry about any FG's, as he took a handoff and ran 53 yards for the TD to put the Steelers back in the game.

After stopping the Bengals again, the Steelers would put together a real drive this time, and as they reached the red zone, Harrison found an opening to get an 8 yard score and put Pittsburgh in the lead 16-10 with the missed PAT. At just 18 minutes into the game, things were moving along great.

And then came the slowdown. With 4 minutes left in the 1st half, Esiason couldn't find enough gap in the Steel Curtain to score, so he had to settle for another FG by Breech to come within 3 of the tie. And from that point on, almost nothing happened. Both teams would battle to a standoff. Pittsburgh got a Safety halfway through the 3rd quarter, but even then couldn't capitalize on the effort. The Bengals defense stayed solid and held Bradshaw at bay, holding him to just 41 yards all game.

If anything, it was the 223 yards rushing by the Steelers that exploited the holes in the Bengal's tiger skin. With his big play, Bleier had 97 yards on the day and Franco Harris had 79. Even Bradshaw kept the ball for 29 yards over several attempts.

For the Bengals, Esiason looked good but the Steel Curtain kept the usually active Icky Woods to just 34 yards, and put up 4 sacks on the day against Boomer.

Pittsburgh 18, Cincinnati 13

Stats So Far

And now that we've completed 4 weeks of LFL action, it's time to get a quick overview of Conference and League leaders. We'll do this again likely 2 more times in the season (just after halfway and again at the end) to see how things trend.

AFC

Houston's Arian Foster leads almost every category in rushing. With 76 carries, he nets 426 yards and 7 TD's, well ahead of his closest competitors. In fact, the next 2 leaders in TD's are Morris and Csonka for Miami at 4 each.

On the receiving side, Houston again shows some dominance as Andre Johnson leads with 448 yards. Jimmy Smith is on top of TD's with 5. But the duo of Gary Collins and Paul Warfield of the '69 Bengals looks ominous, with both players on the top 10 list at over 320 yards each.

Tom Brady's cool composure and 64.5% completion has brought him the highest QB rating in the league at 95.1, but it's the Colts' Morrall who leads the AFC (and the league) in yards and TD's. Morrall, who has not had much luck winning games, has put up 1142 pass yards for 10 TD's. Nelsen and Fouts come in close behind.

For kickers, Gostkowski remains one of the few still hitting 100% of his attempts. Stenerud of the '69 Chiefs is also perfect but hasn't put up as many points.

The Steel Curtain is looking like the D that brings the sacks to it's opponents. Four different members of the Steel Curtain are in the top 10 at 2 sacks each. Vrabel of New England leads with 4. But with interceptions, Scott for the '72 Dolphins already has 6 on the season - a number many backs hope to grab all year.

For all those sacks, the Steelers come in 4th in Total D. The Bills, who held opponents to less than 285 yards per game, come out on top, just edging out the '72 Dolphins.

The Texans, no surprise, lead on Offense with almost 395 yards per game. And despite Arian Foster's dominance as a solo rusher, it's teams like Miami and Pittsburgh who have threatened teams even more with a duo of impressive rushers. The Dolphins lead Rush OFF with 969 total yards split mostly between Csonka and Morris. Perhaps they should take on the jets, who lead Rush DEF, having held ball carriers to just 3.4 yards / carry and 255 total yards (~64 / game!)  Cincinnati has the top passing defense.

The Jaguars prove the leaders of efficiency, leading the scoring category with 109 points on offense, despite having very few top 10 players.

Finally, as far as turnovers go, the '72 Dolphins are the team to fear, having picked up 12 fumbles and 10 INT's already, but only losing 8 and 2 themselves, for a margin of 3 / game. The next closest teams in the AFC are the Colts and Bengals with a 0.8 margin.  Teams like the Ravens and Chiefs have picked up 20 as well, but lost just as many.

NFC

With only 88 carries across 4 games, Jim Taylor leads the NFC, and the league in rushing. With a massive 673 rushing yards for Green Bay, 8 TDs and an average yards/carry of 7.6, he has been a force to be reckoned with. This is in part due to more than a handful of huge 40+ yard runs, with his 78 yard TD run also the longest in the league so far.

Mark Bavaro averages over 20 yards per catch but Atlanta's Mathis leads in receptions and yards, with 25 snags for 498 yards. 4 TDs  from Arizona's Larry Fitzgerald shows who Palmer's top scorer is. In fact, with Palmer's 7 passing TD's, he ties Cam Newton, but his 911 passing yards leads the NFC. But when it comes to QB's, Brees is in the lead with 67.5 completion % and a 93.2 rating, putting him just under Brady in the league.

For kickers, nobody is 100% on FG's in the NFC, but Atlanta's Anderson has made 9 of 10.

On Defense, Krause of the Purple Eaters leads with 6 INT's, but the Rams' Youngblood already has 7 sacks of his own to put him in the leaderboard.

In an impressive showing, Green Bay leads total Offense at 413 yards / game average, and total Defense at 253.6 yards / game. This puts them #1 in the league on D. But against the run, they only come in 4th in NFC; the other 3 teams average around 70-some yards per game. The '98 Falcons are #1 in that list, but last place with pass Defense. Tampa Bay is the team to dread there, having only allowed 50% of passes for 129.1 yards average.

Perhaps TB is so good against the pass because they've learned to be so good at passing themselves, as their 235 yards / game is tops. Given how far below this is from AFC numbers, one can only imagine how hard it is to pass against the NFC teams.

The highest scoring team in the NFC, and in the league, is the Cardinals, with 114 points in just 4 games. Green Bay and Atlanta lead close behind, in both conference and league.

As many impressive defensive stats as we've seen, perhaps it's the mere 35 points allowed by the Rams that earns them recognition, as no other team can boast such low scores.

Defense looks a little more frightening in the NFC as turnover margins are much higher. Chicago leads with a margin of 2, having gained 14 (half in their first game!) and only lost 8. This makes them 2nd in the league, but only slightly ahead of teams like Tampa Bay, Atlanta and New York with margins of 1 or higher. Dallas is struggling the most in the league, having gained 7 turnovers but giving up 23 of their own (1/2 on fumbles, 1/2 on INT's)