The AFC North Division is the "biggest, yet ignored" Story of the 2011 Season

[RavenScallywag]

I remember last year, there was debate about which rivalry was bigger...Steelers/Ravens or Pats/Jets. That came to a head late last year, when Ravens/Steelers was SNF, Pats/Jets was MNF. Ravens/Steelers had an absolute slugfest, with that damn Polamalu unseen strip sack near the end. Pats totally blew out the Jets next day, it was never close.

The fact that in addition to the Ravens and Steelers keeping things in lock step through this year, you also had a Bengals team come from total squalor and with a rookie QB and WR, post a winning record and make the playoffs as well? The media may not be paying much attention to it right now, but I bet it'll be recognized soon in the postseason. It'd be interesting to see if the browns can start righting ship too. While I like having easy wins against them, it'd be really interesting to see a division where EVERY team is contending for the playoffs. No other division is that close now.

[GOTA]

A lot of records were broken yesterday and their was a lot of good football games. But ESPN spent countless time on why the Cowboys loss and what's in their future.

That's because Cowboy still equal ratings. That's also why the Tebow Broncos get so much attention. The media is in the ratings business and good defense isn't interesting to the casual fan they chase.

[Real Fan Dan]

Really today is a day it's more fun for national media to talk about the implosions of the Cowboys/Jets. They'll have plenty of time to hype the games later in the week, and I suspect when CIN and PIT win this weekend we'll get plenty of conversation about how good the AFC North is.

Agreed. I know ESPN did the exact same thing thje last 2 years - they spend the entire day talking about the losers, especially big market teams like Dallas, and it looks like they're ignoring at least some of the winners immediately after huge victories. They'll shift over to focusing on the playoff teams pretty quick here, but yeah it looks like they're dissing some teams, like ours. Same thing last year and the year before that.

[Ravenalytics]

While I like having easy wins against them, it'd be really interesting to see a division where EVERY team is contending for the playoffs. No other division is that close now.

NFC North would definitely be up there if Cutler and Forte were healthy.