The NFL is looking into whether the Ravens had a "bounty" on Steelers' rookie running back Rashard Mendenhall and receiver Hines Ward when they battled in Week Four. During the '2 Live Stews' syndicated radio show on Oct. 17, when Baltimore's Terrell Suggs was asked, "Did you all put a bounty out on that young man [Mendenhall]," Suggs replied, "Definitely. The bounty was out on him, and the bounty was out on [Ward] -- we just didn't get him between the whistles." Ray Anderson, the NFL's executive vice president of football operations, said the league is looking into the comments. "That 'bounty' notion is completely against the rules," Anderson said. "To the extent that someone is engaged in that activity, we will look into it and address it. Yes, we've seen the comments, and we're trying to determine the completeness of the circumstances."

The scoreboard is where games are officially won and lost, but they are largely decided by the team that wins the battles of yards per pass, yards per carry, penalty yards lost, first downs, and turnovers. For this reason, I created the following formula called the ?Trench Counter? to look at which team truly controls the game: (2x Yards per pass) + (2x Yards per carry) + (.5 First downs) - (Penalty yards/10) - (2.5 Turnovers) - (Opposing Team's Trench Counter) Click here for more information on the Trench Counter For the 2008 season, our weekly team rankings will be based solely off of this formula. 1. New York Giants: 13.2 The Giants have rushed for twice as many yards as they?ve given up (725 to 328), while piling up 15 sacks. Between Justin Tuck, Mathias Kiwanuka, Domenik Hixon and Sinorice Moss, the depth of the Giants has perhaps been the most impressive part of their 4-0 start. 2. Pittsburgh Steelers: 8.0 Sunday night was the first time since Week 12 in the 2006 season that Ben Roethlisberger threw at least 40 passes. The Steelers are now 2-3 when he throws the ball so frequently in his career. 3. Philadelphia Eagles: 7.0 The Eagles? record keeps making me look bad. If it wasn?t bad enough for the 2-2 Eagles to be ranked first last week, now they?re third with a 2-3 record. If you wipe away the Rams? game, they have a season Trench Counter average of 2.4, which puts them at 15 and sounds at least a little more fair than three although I still believe they?re better than a few more than half the NFL. 4. Baltimore Ravens: 6.5 The Ravens out-rushed and out-passed the Titans while also converting eight more first downs, but they allowed an 81-yard drive for a field goal early in the 4th and an 80-yard drive for a TD on the next possession to offset three separate three and outs for -4, 5 and 8. 5. Washington Redskins: 5.9 - Still no turnovers after five games? Check - No panic after being down 0-14 on the road at Philadelphia? Check - Get back into the game with three Shaun Suisham field goals in the second quarter, including one right before the half where Jason Campbell goes 50 yards in 53 seconds? Check - A win with 100+ yards rushing on the road for Portis against the NFC East? Two-for-three 6. Carolina Panthers: 5.8 After a couple impressive early performances from Jonathan Stewart, DeAngelo Williams has taken the reigns. He carried the ball 20 times for 123 yards (6.2 avg) and two TD's while catching one ball for a TD against the Chiefs. 7. Atlanta Falcons: 5.2 Matt Ryan has passer ratings of 137.0, 120.6 and 94.1 in Atlanta three wins, while in the losses he?s been down to 29.6 and 60.8. 8. Tennessee Titans: 4.8 After an excellent game at Cincinnati (98.9), Kerry Collins has been incredibly ordinary (72.0, 68.6 and 52.0). He?s been just good enough to allow a dominant Titans? defense to win games for him. Whether it?s Vince Young or Collins, the Tennessee defense just wins football games. 9. Dallas Cowboys: 4.8 With the exception of their opening field goal that came off an interception deep in Cincinnati's territory, the Cowboys? touchdown scores came on drives of 75, 80, 59, and 80, as Tony Romo?s offense had to work especially hard to score. Four different Cowboys scored touchdowns as Jason Garrett tried to keep all of the galacticos happy. 10. Minnesota Vikings: 4.5 The Vikings gave a clinic in New Orleans on how to get just 32 yards on 21 carries from your superstar, give up two punt returns for TD's and still win the game. All you have to do is have your backup running back throw a touchdown pass and have Antoine Winfield do just about everything else. 11. Miami Dolphins: 3.8 There is no mistaking that Ronnie Brown is the featured back once again in Miami, rushing 24 times for 125 yards (5.2 avg), but they will continue to put Ricky Williams on the field beside him in the Wildcat formation that has been so hugely successful. 12. Denver Broncos: 3.3 Brandon Marshall and Eddie Royal combined for 48 yards, but Denver still managed to get into field goal range enough times for Matt Prater to sneak past the Buccaneers. 13. Arizona Cardinals: 3.3 Larry Fitzgerald and Edgerrin James made about as much as Steve Breaston and Tim Hightower will make all season on Sunday, but the contributions of the latter were just as valuable. 14. San Francisco 49ers: 2.7 The 49ers' defense stayed on the field way too long against New England as J.T. O?Sullivan ran back towards Mike Martz without getting a single first down seven times and five straight at one time. 15. Tampa Bay Buccaneers: 2.4 The Bucs averaged 6.3 yards per carry but had five three and outs. 16. Chicago Bears: 2.3 Typical Bears football on Sunday in Detroit: two TD's from Matt Forte, two field goals from Robbie Gould, a defensive TD from Charles Tillman.. and 334 yards with two touchdowns from Kyle 'Magnificent Mile' Orton. 17. Buffalo Bills: 1.4 The Bills are 7-2 when Marshawn Lynch rushes for 75 or more yards. He rushed for 55 against the Cardinals in Glendale. 18. San Diego Chargers: 1.3 The Chargers had just 10 first downs against Miami. For the season, their opponents are +29 in that category. 19. New York Jets: 0.1 The biggest piece of news coming out of the bye week in Jet-Land is Brett Favre putting wild turkeys in teammates' locker rooms. 20. New England Patriots: -1.1 Without the 66-yard Matt Cassel to Randy Moss touchdown pass in their third series, the Patriots would have gone three and out on their first three series and the entire complexion of the game and probably New England?s season would have been different. 21. Houston Texans: -2.5 The Texans dominated the Colts for about 52 minutes on Sunday. 22. New Orleans Saints: -4.1 - Martin Gramatica somehow kicks a 53-yarder to tie the game at 20 - A 2nd and 3 for the Vikings becomes a 2nd and 13 after two false starts - Gus Frerotte throws two incomplete passes on 2nd and 3rd downs - Reggie Bush returns his second punt of the game for a TD to give the Saints a 27-20 lead This looked like enough for the Saints to have a real signature win, but Berrian, Gramatica and Kaesviharn happened. 23. Green Bay Packers: -4.7 Unlike their losses to Dallas and Tampa Bay, Aaron Rodgers had a passer rating over 100, but like the 236 yards rushing against Barber/Jones and 178 against Graham/Dunn, Turner and five other Falcons combined for 176 against the Green Bay rush defense. 24. Jacksonville Jaguars: -5.3 Both Fred Taylor and Maurice Jones-Drew were each held to under 2.0 yards per carry (1.9 and 1.4 respectively). The Jags simply win when they can run the ball and lose when they can?t. 25. Indianapolis Colts: -6.3 The Colts really didn?t deserve to win that game in Houston on Sunday. They were outplayed in virtually every facet of the game and were down 17 points until Tom Santi of all people caught a TD to make it 27-17. But after two conservative runs by Ahman Green, Sage Rosenfels tried to scramble for the first and ended up fumbling it to Gary Brackett for a TD. Rosenfels fumbled the ball away again on 3rd and 9 as he was sacked, giving the Colts the ball at Houston?s 20. A Joseph Addai 15-yard run setup Reggie Wayne for the game-winning TD on the next play. 26. Oakland Raiders: -7.5 Another week, no game, still Tom Cable. 27. Seattle Seahawks: -7.7 It was all downhill after a nice 17-yard pass to Deion Branch on the first play from scrimmage of the game for Matt Hasselbeck and the Seahawks. Everything came back ok on Hasselbeck?s hyperextended knee, which is good news, but it will continue to bother him for the remainder of the season. I hyperextended my knee 10 years ago, and it still bothers me from time to time. Any kind of injury is exactly what a QB that has ratings of 53.9, 42.5, and 46.7 with a 104.6 outlier against the Rams doesn?t need. 28. Cleveland Browns: -8.5 Romeo Crennel, Derek Anderson, and Braylon Edwards had two weeks to prepare for the undefeated Giants. 29. Cincinnati Bengals: -8.9 I really didn?t see Cedric Benson?s 10 carries for 30 yards in his home state coming when they signed him. 30. Kansas City Chiefs: -9.5 The Chiefs allowed almost as many yards on one play to DeAngelo (32) as their own entire rushing game could muster in 17 attempts (35). 31. Detroit Lions: -14.4 Since his six catch, 129 yard, two TD day against the Packers in Week 2, Calvin Johnson has caught just six balls for 56 yards. 32. St. Louis Rams: -15.0 Even with the bye and coaching change, the Rams will have a difficult time getting their first win of 2008 at red hot Washington.

Former NFL quarterback Trent Dilfer believes that the defense of the Titans may just be as good as that of the 2000 Ravens. Dilfer, now an analyst for ESPN, was the quarterback of Baltimore's 2000 team. "The profile is very similar. Four games into the 2000 season, that was a very good Ravens defense that just kept getting better. The challenge for Tennessee is whether they can continue to improve," Dilfer said. "I would not say right now they are as good as the end product of the 2000 Ravens. But they're the first defense I've seen that has the potential to have the same end product." Tennessee has allowed just 46 points through the first four games of the season, and stand at 4-0.

Baltimore cornerback Samari Rolle underwent neck surgery on Friday and will miss at least a month of action. "We have a time frame on him, and it's maybe a month-plus," coach John Harbaugh said. "That's where it's at right now. He had surgery this week on his neck, just to kind of clean things up in there a little bit. And it'll be multiple weeks. We just don't know how long right now."

Ray Lewis has been a veteran mentor to several players throughout his career and reached out to Chris Johnson this week, the rookie running back out of East Carolina for the Titans. "It was a nice little conversation," Johnson said. "He seems like a really good guy. He told me he liked my game and he likes what I have been doing and he has been following me since college. He told me to continue to keep it up and if I ever needed to talk about anything I have his number. I thought it was pretty cool that he called." RealGM Note: Johnson is currently ranked 8th amongst running backs in season FIC and has an excellent Reina Value of +1,832%.

Ravens' running back Willis McGahee has received some criticism for his inability to stay healthy, but fired back on Thursday. "I want to finish a game," McGahee said. "That?s the goal: finish the game, be out there for my teammates in the fourth quarter, not trying to come back in the fourth quarter and not be able to finish. I want to finish a complete game and walk off the field with a bruise on my arm and things like that. "I would say it?s frustrating, but not frustrating. It?s nothing major pulling me out. It?s the little things like the eyes. Then, Monday night, I hurt my ribs. In football, you have to deal with the injuries."