Mid-Season Awards
Best Team: New England. Pittsburgh is certainly looking impressive, coming off back to back wins over the Pats & the Eagles.
MVP: Peyton Manning. An easy pick despite his team's somewhat disappointing 5-3 record; with 26 TDs and four interceptions, Manning is having a career year. One problem with the no-huddle offense is that it tends to skew time of possession to the other team, which puts extra pressure on an obviously shaky Colts defense. The Colts show this in their statistics, with an average TOP of 28:23 versus their opponents' 31:37. This was also evident in the statistics for the most famous no-huddle team, the Buffalo Bills of the late 1980s-early 1990s who rode the offense to four consecutive Super Bowl appearances, and four consecutive defeats.
Rookie of the Year: Ben Roethlisberger. Another easy pick.
Defensive Player of the Year: Ray Lewis. His team has the best defense in the league, and he's the best player on that defense.
Coach of the Year: Cowher & Schottenheimer are getting most of the attention so far. I'm going with Belichick. His team has had a bullseye on it since they won the Super Bowl, and has only stumbled once. They're still the team to beat in the postseason.