For the very first time all season, Houston didn’t have to answer any questions regarding their terrible run defense or inability for stopping big plays. The defense of the Texans instead was able to celebrate their finest performance since the 2004 season as Houston beat the Raiders on Sunday 29-6. Houston allowed only 165 yards, the second fewest in the team’s history and fewest since they gave up 126 yards in a victory over Jacksonville nearly five years ago.

Kyle Orton along with Josh McDaniels as well as a newly dominant defense have all helped to quiet the talk of all the dysfunction during the off season in Denver with 3-0 start to the season. Orton connected with Brandon Marshall on a touchdown pass, while the Broncos defense kept their second opponent in a row from scoring a touchdown as Denver overwhelmed Oakland on Sunday 23-3.

JaMarcus Russell, on one of his career’s most miserable days, got not only a win but also his name put in the history book for the Oakland Raiders. The former No. 1 pick from the 2007 draft, missed high, low and everywhere else in between, completing just 7 out of 24 passes for a total of 109 yards. However when he really needed to Russell was able to focus and engineer a scoring drive of 69 yards during the final two minutes of the game to give the Raiders a very improbable 13-10 win over the error prone Chiefs.

Unfazed by yet another deficit in the fourth quarter, Philip Rivers entered the huddle poised and ready to prove why he was the Chargers $93 million man. The Chargers quarterback was able to answer two Raiders go-ahead scores with two drives for touchdowns while the game winner was scored by Darren Sproles on a run from 5 yards with just 18 seconds to go in the game to provide San Diego with their 12th win in a row over Oakland on Monday night, 24-20.

Record: 5-11