Mid-Season Team MVP Awards – AFC East

We’re at the midway point of the season, with every team in the league having played either seven or eight of its 16 games. This feels like a perfect time to check in with each and every one of the NFL’s 32 teams, and hand out some mid-season Most Valuable Player awards.

New England Patriots – Aqib Talib

ATLANTA, GA – SEPTEMBER 29: Aqib Talib #31 of the New England Patriots celebrates after an interception against the Atlanta Falcons at the Georgia Dome on September 29, 2013 in Atlanta, Georgia. (Photo by Scott Cunningham/Getty Images)

Not surprisingly, all the candidates for this team’s mid-point MVP are on the defensive side of the ball.

Chandler Jones is faring very well after an up-and-down rookie year. The defensive end has posted 6.5 sacks in his first 8 games, already an improvement on the 6.0 sacks he managed last season. More impressive than that, though, is his 44 combined tackles, which is around twice as many tackles as the average recorded by most defensive ends at this stage of the season. Jones has been a factor in the run game just as much as he has as a pass rusher.

Devin McCourty deserves recognition as probably the second MVP on this team right now. He was playing as well as any safety in the league even before his impressive tip drill interception with Marquise Cole last week against the Dolphins.

However, Aqib Talib has been without a doubt the stand-out performer for this Patriots team in 2013. The big corner-back has been the most dominant corner in the league bar none through the first half of the season. He’s tied for the league lead in interceptions with 4, and he’s tied for 7th in passes defenced with 9.

Impressively, he’s managed that whilst literally shutting down the opposing offence’s best receiver week after week. Cornerbacks are very rarely the reason a team wins a game. Talib has won not one but two games almost single-handedly for New England this season.

Against the Falcons, he recorded 4 passes defenced and 1 interception going up against Julio Jones and Roddy White. The best of those passes defenced came against Roddy White. On fourth down late in the fourth quarter and up by 7, Talib got his hand in front of Roddy White in the end zone to knock Matt Ryan’s pass away, effectively winning the game for New England.

Against the New Orleans Saints, he was asked to play man-on-man coverage against the 6 foot 7, 265 lb tight end Jimmy Graham, who led the league in receiving yards and was top five in the league in touchdown catches and receptions at that point in the season.

Talib didn’t allow Graham to have a single catch. That pretty much says all that is needed about the season this guy is having.