Noah Underhill provides what he feels are the top 5 things he is surprised about so far this season.
1. Conquistadors are surprising...In a variety of ways. Oh, Mexico City. You are a team of very different wills. You played a close game with the Dreads and you had a surprise domination against the Red Dragons. You held the Dragons who were once thought to have a killer offense and thought of by many as a contender to 3 measly points in which you controlled the clock and broke their will. And then you were pretty decent against the media darling that is the Celtic Tigers; then lose to the Sentinels who were not in a good way. You are 1-3 against a pretty tough road but you have surprised many with your pretty great play (Chum Lee, 6th passing Defense), but You have also surprised many by not being able to get wins with those, and other good performances. Yes, I know it is a tough schedule but I’m challenging you to make the league look stupid when you are in the playoffs at the end of the season.
2. Nate O’Quinn Is out playing Risean Gary. When you talk about the offseason, most of the talk was about Risean Gary. He was (and is still) touted as a guy that would come in and dominate. This hasn’t really been the case. In fact, he has seemed to be a supplementary piece to last years starter, Nate O’Quinn. As I have said before, I am not a huge fan of NO3 but he doesn’t really seem to care about what I think of him. He is right now averaging 7.1 yards per carry and has more yards on fewer carries when compared with his backfield mate. Yes the numbers are comparable and maybe it was the plan all along but I know many were not expecting as much of committee in the backfield and definitely didn’t expect a NO3 career revitalization. We are still early in the season but Risean Gary might be the best thing that has ever happened to Nate O’Quinn.
3. Steamers are kicking booty.
Justin Jones is a God-send for Memphis. A team that toiled down at the bottom of the standings may finally be a contender. While some thought the steamers might be good but nobody thought they would be this good this early. It takes most young teams quite a bit of time to figure out how to win but this team has come out swinging. Yes, 2 of their wins are against the Shams who aren’t world beaters but a quality win against the Gunners should stay with people. Weeks 6-10 looks pretty difficult for them and I don’t expect them to stay unbeaten through that but if they look strong, they might be a contender out of the NFC.
4. Kyle Bane is the Elks leading rusher.
The Elks were always going to be an interesting team this season. There was a bit of buzz surrounding them but that has mostly died down. At the time of this writing, they are sitting at 2-2 with there only win being against half of the Snowhawk's roster. They could still certainly comeback and win games but the way this offense is going I’m not sure. The offensive line has not been up to par giving up 12 sacks (14th worst in the league) and one of the best RBs in the game, Darius Martin is being outgained by his QB. He needs to be more in the offense if the Elks are gonna win games. But on the bright side…. 5. Rookie Tyrone Johnson is leading the RFL in sacks for the Elks
You may be asking me “Who is Tyrone Johnson.” I have no idea. The rookie out of UCF was not on my radar at all. That could be my ignorance but there really hasn’t been anything said about this guy. If you aren’t keeping up with the Elks, you might not even know he exists. But he is good. This could be an early-season overreaction but this is a guy that has a bright future in this league.
These are just some of the many surprises so far this RFL season. What did i miss and what will be the big surprise of the next quarter?