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New York Giants at Cincinnati Bengals Over his last two games, Eli Manning has completed a total of 25 passes in 53 attempts for 317 yards, no touchdowns, and two interceptions. Per Greg Cosell in this week’s preview podcast , some league sources indicate that Manning’s arm looks “tired” of late, and there are some questions about the abilities of New York’s receiver corps to separate from coverage consistently. The cure for what ails the Giants’ passing game could well be a Bengals’ secondary than currently ranks 28th in Football Outsiders’ pass defense rankings . The Bengals’ secondary is the only thing stopping Mike Zimmer’s squad from being elite, but it’s a big problem. Manning will need to get that pass game going again, because his offense will not do much on the ground against Cincy’s stout front seven. We’ll bank on an Eli comeback. Pick: Giants 23, Bengals 17 Tennessee Titans at Miami Dolphins The Dolphins are on a bit of a roll, though they lost last Sunday to the super-hot Colts, and the Titans are just getting rolled, period. Miami is living off their run game to an unexpected degree, rookie quarterback Ryan Tannehill has developed impressively, and the defense is standing tall, especially against the run. Though left tackle Jake Long is having an off-season, the Dolphins’ offense should have enough firepower to pace past a Titans defense incapable of providing consistent pass pressure. That’s not a problem for Miami’s defense, and with Jake Locker expected to start, the ‘Fins should be in the catbird seat. Pick: Dolphins 34, Titans 20 Detroit Lions at Minnesota Vikings A distressing notion for the Vikings and their run-first offense: Quarterback Christian Ponder has completed just 50 percent of his play-action passes in the team’s last three games. That’s down from 74 percent earlier in the season, and the downshift coincides with the relative disappearance of tight end Kyle Rudolph. Opposing defenses are also teeing off on Ponder when the Vikings run play action, and he’s not been effectively mobile enough to bail out. Percy Harvin’s out of this game with an ankle injury, which means that the Lions can stack the box against Adrian Peterson and force Ponder to beat them. Not that stacking the box against Purple Jesus has worked all year, but if Ponder has to make plays and decide the game, the forecast is not good. Pick: Lions 30, Vikings 16 Buffalo Bills at New England Patriots A practical question: How would the Buffalo Bills go about winning this game? By running C.J. Spiller into New England’s underperforming defense? Spiller’s snap counts have been reduced in the last few weeks, for reasons we fail to understand. Exploit the Pats; weak secondary? Ryan Fitzpatrick threw for over 239 yards in a game was against this defense in September, when he went off for 350 yards and four touchdowns — of course, he threw four picks as well, and the Bills lost, 52-28. Beat New England’s underrated offensive tackles with their own pass rush? Yeah, right. Pick: Patriots 42, Bills 20 Atlanta Falcons at New Orleans Saints The Saints showed some interesting new things on defense against the Eagles last Monday night, and the Falcons should take notice. New Orleans defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo finally lined up his scheme and personnel, sending linebackers on blitzes from different levels and harassing Michael Vick throughout Philly’s blowout loss. Of course, Atlanta’s offense is more solid and its offensive line is far stronger, but as much as Matt Ryan has developed this season, he’s still balky when you send pressure right up the A-gaps. The key to an upset, if the Saints are going to accomplish that feat, is to balance pass rush with coverage against the Falcons’ receivers — they’re the best in the NFL at winning one-on-one matchups. Call us crazy, but we’re riding along with the Saints’ recent momentum and saying that New Orleans will do just that. Pick: Saints 31. Falcons 28 San Diego Chargers at Tampa Bay Buccaneers

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Week 10 Sunday Picks: Revenge games for coaches among key matchups (Shutdown Corner)

ENGLEWOOD, Colo. (AP) – Eric Decker spent his first year in the NFL recovering from a foot injury that ended his college career and his second season catching an average of two passes a game from Tim Tebow. Now, he’s Peyton Manning ‘s top target, and a busy one at that. The Denver Broncos’ third-year pro leads the team with 46 receptions and seven touchdown catches, all of which have come over the last five games as the Broncos have begun revving up under their resurgent quarterback. That’s roughly the same production Decker had all of last season, when he led the team with 44 catches but scored half of his eight touchdowns before Kyle Orton lost his starting job by Week 6. With 583 yards so far, Decker is the biggest beneficiary of Manning’s arrival in Denver. He’s on pace for his first 1,000-yard season, a stark contrast to last year, when he caught just 14 passes once the Broncos dusted off the old read-option offense to fit Tebow’s unusual skill set. Manning and Decker wasted no time hooking up at local high school football fields to begin working on their timing this spring, and they’ve spent countless extra hours after practice honing that synergy. “I think in any relationship, whether it’s a significant other or a teammate, the more time you get the better it always develops,” Decker said. “And I think the more we get on the same page, the more we understand nonverbal cues, certain routes and how to read defenses. All of those things, you can use to your advantage offensively. We’re definitely clicking more as a unit offensively.” It’s not quite the chemistry Manning built up with Reggie Wayne or Marvin Harrison in Indianapolis – or the comfort zone he maintains with Broncos slot receiver Brandon Stokley , a former teammate of his with the Colts, for that matter – but it’s getting there. “I see a big body, a good athlete, a good football player, a smart football player who understands what Peyton’s looking for and what he’s looking at,” said Carolina coach Ron Rivera, whose Panthers (2-6) host the Broncos (5-3) Sunday. Manning leads the league in passer rating and is smack dab in the middle of the conversation for another MVP trophy, and a big reason is Decker, his 6-foot-3, 218-pound wide receiver who was kept out of the end zone during the team’s 1-2 start but who hasn’t been denied a touchdown since the Houston Texans shut him out on Sept. 23. Demaryius Thomas is also having a big year. His 45 catches for a team-leading 756 yards are already career highs and he’s tied his career best with four TD receptions so far. Decker, who’s been targeted a team-high 69 times, and Thomas have combined for 1,339 yards receiving, most by any tandem in the NFL. “Experience is your best teacher, so I think I do know more about my teammates and about what certain guys like, and how a guy’s body moves and when he’s going to come out of a break,” Manning said. “The more repetitions you get, the better. I don’t know them as well as I would if I would’ve played with a guy for five years. It’s been a crash course and everybody’s been cramming.” Thomas came into the league the same year as Decker, and both have hit their stride this season after dealing with injuries much of their first two years with the Broncos. “Every day we push each other,” Decker said. “That’s the best thing about our relationship, is that we really respect one another. We’re good friends – we used to be roommates – but we’re also competitors at the same position.” Decker also is benefiting from his first full training camp this summer. Last year there was the lockout and his rookie year, he was still on the mend. He had missed the last half of his senior season at the University of Minnesota after tearing the ligament that holds the first two toes together in a game against Ohio State in October 2009. Called a Lisfranc injury, it requires a long and arduous rehab with no guarantee of success. His draft stock dropped after his injury, but the Broncos took him with the 87th overall pick and preached patience with him. “It wasn’t until my second year in Denver I started to feel good, feel like I had my strength, that I wasn’t thinking about it and it wasn’t hurting after practice,” Decker said. Decker, who only caught a half dozen passes his rookie year, when he was primarily a kick returner, received a call from Stokley right after he got hurt. Stokley had suffered the same ligament injury in 2002 and he shared his advice about rehab and adjusting to the NFL. The two became fast friends, then teamed up together in Denver in 2009 and again this season. “Man, I’ve had a ton of injuries, Achilles, knee, you name it, and that was by far the worst one,” Stokley said. “It made me want to know if I really wanted to keep playing football. It was a beast. They did the surgery, you’re on crutches, in a boot and then once you heal up, they have to operate again to take out the screws, and you’re back on crutches, in a boot. “Then, it just hurts every day. Every morning, it’s killing you. The pain is so incredible,” Stokley said. “But one day, I finally turned the corner.” Just like Decker. He said that’s the one thing that really resonated with him during his comeback: Stokley’s admonition to stay on top of his rehab and his rest and to keep a positive attitude “because he said one day it’s going to feel good.” “And it’s funny, because that one day came and the pain just went away.” Notes: CB Tracy Porter (seizure symptoms) will miss his fourth straight game, coach John Fox said Friday. … S Jim Leonhard , the Broncos’ new player rep, said the NFL Players Association sent an email to all of the league’s players this week reminding them that even though voters in Washington state and Colorado approved recreational use of marijuana on Tuesday that it’s still prohibited by the league. “It was obviously directed at the Seahawks and Broncos, but it went out to everyone,” Leonhard said. “They just wanted to remind everyone that our drug policy’s still our drug policy. Nothing’s changed.” – By Arnie Stapleton, AP Sports Writer (© Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)

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Healthy Decker Reaching New Heights With Manning

ATLANTA FALCONS at NEW ORLEANS SAINTS

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Friday injury report for Week 10 (Pro Football Weekly)

Once again, it’s time to gear up for this week’s slate of NFL games with analysis from the best in the business — Greg Cosell of NFL Films and ESPN’s “NFL Matchup.” Greg gives you a sense of the week’s upcoming games you won’t get anywhere else, based on his conversations with players and coaches past and present, and his OCD-level evaluation of coach’s tape.  Since the podcast was recorded on Friday morning, we started by reviewing the Indianapolis Colts’  Thursday night win over the Jacksonville Jaguars. The Shutdown Corner Week 10 NFL Preview Podcast with Greg Cosell Here are the Sunday and Monday games, in order of discussion: New York Giants at Cincinnati Bengals Tennessee Titans at Miami Dolphins Detroit Lions at Minnesota Vikings Buffalo Bills at New England Patriots Atlanta Falcons at New Orleans Saints San Diego Chargers at Tampa Bay Buccaneers Denver Broncos at Carolina Panthers Oakland Raiders at Baltimore Ravens New York Jets at Seattle Seahawks Dallas Cowboys at Philadelphia Eagles St. Louis Rams at San Francisco 49ers Houston Texans at Chicago Bears Kansas City Chiefs at Pittsburgh Steelers Some words of wisdom from Mr. Cosell: On Blaine Gabbert’s future: “It’s a question that many teams go through with young, highly-drafted quarterbacks: At what point, and after how many throws, do you say that this is what this guy is? Or do you start kidding yourself that he will get significantly better? Now, I’m sure that if you spoke to people in the Jaguars organization, they would say, ‘Oh, we don’t have enough weapons yet, and if we get that, he’ll be better. You know how I feel about this — you have to isolate the play of the quarterback. And when you look at Gabbert, while he’s certainly incrementally improved from last year, he’s also not improving enough, in my view, on a week-to-week basis. Where you can feel comfortable saying, ‘This guy’s trending upward.’ The Shutdown Corner Week 10 NFL Preview Podcast with Greg Cosell He’s now started over 20 games, and there are people who will tell you that you can’t make a true evaluation until a quarterback has started 30 games, or 50 games, and that’s fair. We’re not here to rip Blaine Gabbert, we’re trying to have a philosophical discussion on how you evaluate quarterbacks. But even with younger quarterbacks, you’d like to see attributes. Ryan Tannehill has played very well; he’s also had some negative moments. But when you look at his body of work, and you look at the pros and cons based on attributes that lead to success, the pros far outweigh the cons. But when you stack up the pros and cons on Blaine Gabbert — the characteristics, traits, and attributes as an individual player — you’re probably looking at more cons than pros.” On New Orleans’ effective blitz concepts versus the Eagles:

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The Shutdown Corner Week 10 NFL Preview Podcast with Greg Cosell (Shutdown Corner)

DENVER (CBS4) – The numbers and the standings will change, but heading into this week’s games, they were lined up too perfectly to ignore. Broncos quarterback  Peyton Manning  reached the halfway point of the season with a 5-3 record and 2,404 yards passing. Colts quarterback  Andrew Luck  reached the halfway point of the season with a 5-3 record and 2,404 yards passing. Though Manning, the 15-year veteran, and Luck, the rookie out of Stanford, are hardly mirror images, their fates over the past 12 months have been as interconnected as their numbers were entering this week. And so far, this has all the makings of a win-win situation for both teams and both quarterbacks. Colts interim head coach and offensive coordinator Bruce Arians, who also worked with Manning when he was a rookie, says Manning was great in his first year and Luck is every bit as good. “He’s light years ahead of where we thought he would be,” Arians said. “There’s nothing really left to put in the playbook that we haven’t installed, and he’s been extremely good in clutch situations.” Had the Colts chosen not to part ways with Manning – the quarterback who essentially defined the franchise for a decade and a half – they may still have picked Luck first in the draft. But chances are he’d be watching, not playing. There’s no crystal ball to tell how that would’ve gone. But installing Luck as the starter is working out just fine. If the playoffs had begun at the season’s midpoint, the Broncos and Colts, who beat Jacksonville 27-10 on Thursday night, would have been matched up for a first-round game. Despite that, despite the winning record and the 10 touchdown passes, Luck only gave himself a ‘C’ when asked for his own midseason grade. RELATED: Luck runs for 2 TDS, Colts beat Jaguars 27-10 “I think a perfect grade would be if you won every game, didn’t have any incompletions, no interceptions, so we’ll keep working until we get to there,” he said. Some things he’s doing, however, go well beyond average. This week, Luck’s jersey was sent to the Pro Football Hall of Fame after he threw for a rookie record 433 yards in a 23-20 win over Miami on Sunday. With that performance, he joined Manning as the only other player to throw for 300-plus yards four times in his first year. While many teams will dumb down offenses, or build them to fit specific skills of rookie quarterbacks (see the Redskins and  Robert Griffin III  or the Seahawks and  Russell Wilson ), Luck is essentially working with a complex, pro-style offense – and is also asked to pick up the slack for a running game ranked 19th in the league. Despite the running game, and despite receiver  Reggie Wayne  standing as Indy’s only “big name” playmaker, the Colts have the NFL’s fourth-ranked offense. Luck has won close games (three-point wins over Miami, Minnesota and Green Bay and an overtime win over Tennessee), has engineered big comebacks (from 21-3 down against the Packers) and has quickly gained the confidence of his teammates. “He has definitely come in and helped us win games,” Wayne said. “For the offense, he’s put us in good situations to make plays. He’s made some unbelievable throws, especially on the run. He’s used his feet well.” While Luck has been piling up yards, his quarterback rating was only 79.0, 25th in the NFL, in part because he completed only 56.5 percent of his passes and was averaging an interception per game. The Colts, meanwhile, still have two games left against AFC South leader Houston and one game at New England. Daunting. Still, with a rookie quarterback and coming off a 2-14 season, there weren’t many people picking the Colts as playoff contenders in 2012. “I’m really pleased with where he’s at, his competitiveness, his spirit, his grit, leadership,” Arians said. “Those are things you hope you have in a quarterback, and he’s got them all.” Denver’s schedule was frontloaded – Houston, New England, Atlanta and Pittsburgh were among the first five opponents. Because of that, and because Manning was coming off injury and starting with a new team, expectations weren’t that high for early in the season. But after a 2-3 start, the Broncos have won three straight. It’s an understatement to say Manning has been rounding into form. He has completed nearly 76 percent of his passes over the last five games. He leads the league in passer rating (108.6) and has 20 touchdowns and only six interceptions. He says he always expected to improve as the season wore on. “I think you never stop learning,” Manning said. “Eight games and I’m in my 15th year, you’re still learning, but I think we’re working to try to get on the same page and trying to be more productive each week than we were the week before.” When he chose Denver, Manning’s ability to bounce back from his injury was every bit as big an unknown as how Luck would respond to his first year in the NFL. As the season has gone on and the Broncos’ offense has risen to the top of the AFC West behind the league’s fourth-ranked passing game, questions about Manning’s arm strength have all but disappeared. The chemistry Manning built with Wayne, Marvin Harrison and Dallas Clark in Indianapolis is slowly seeping into the offense in Denver, where  Eric Decker ,  Demaryius Thomas  and Joel Dreessen  are getting the hang of doing things Manning’s way. “I think the more we get on the same page, the more we understand nonverbal cues, certain routes and how to read defenses,” said Decker, who has caught touchdown passes in five straight games. “All of those things, you can use to your advantage offensively. We’re definitely clicking more as a unit offensively.” When Manning chose Denver, he was very clear about his goals. The decision, he said, was about winning now. At 36 and with the injury he was returning from, he knows there aren’t many more seasons left to win another Super Bowl. “I realize I don’t have 14 years left, by any means,” Manning said on the day he signed. Luck, on the other hand, might. And he certainly wasn’t joining a team that was one, or even two or three pieces away from Super Bowl contention. Or so the Colts thought. Asked to compare the quarterbacks at this stage in their careers, Arians said he’d give Luck the nod, mainly because they’ve asked him to do more than they asked from Manning. “Peyton, we gave two or three plays in the huddle, he was great at that phase of it, but we didn’t do the no-huddle until his second year,” Arians said. “I think (Luck’s) a step ahead only because of what we’re asking him to do. And he’s doing it with a bunch of rookies, whereas Peyton had some really good players on that team.” By EDDIE PELLS, AP National Writer … AP Sports Writer Michael Marot in Indianapolis contributed to this report. (© Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)

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Manning, Luck Succeed From 2 Sides Of The Spectrum