Philadelphia, PA (My Sportsbook) - Do any of the people who seriously discuss the notion of an NFL franchise in London actually possess the ability to think? I'm not saying it'll never happen, but the only way my eyes will witness it is if my head is thawed out by the good people at the cryogenics lab and shipped next-day delivery across the Atlantic Ocean.

London is my favorite city in the world next to Baltimore (also known as the London of the state of Maryland), but no coach, executive, free agent, or draft choice would ever willingly sign up to work in a place where the shortest road trip would entail a six-hour flight from five time zones away.

And that's before you get into the long-term feasibility and cultural implications of having a franchise in London, where a West Ham United- Blackburn Rovers game in the Premiership will always generate more interest than anything the NFL has to offer.

A four-game-per-season series at Wembley, in which the same team wouldn't have to travel to Europe more than once a year? O.K., that might work, though teams from the west coast of the U.S. are still going to be dragged along kicking and screaming.

And that's the rub. The main objectives of the NFL's international effort are public relations and marketing the game (and merchandise), and the league needs to be very careful that its current constituents will be willing to continue smiling through an occasional long, debilitating road trip and/or the loss of a home game, lest the promotional effort should backfire.

Some more Week 7 observations:

I WAS SURPRISED THAT...

...the 49ers gave Shaun Hill the hook. Hill hadn't played well in the first half against the Texans, completing just 6-of-11 passes for 45 yards as San Francisco fell behind, 21-0, at the half. But the Niners were also 3-2 and tied for the NFC West lead coming into the day, so the move to Alex Smith seemed a bit sudden from that standpoint. All Smith did was win himself the starting job until further notice, completing 15-of-22 passes for 206 yards, three touchdowns - all to tight end Vernon Davis - and a game-ending interception in a 24-21 near-miss defeat for San Francisco. Wideout Michael Crabtree made an impact with five catches for 56 yards in his NFL debut.

...Cedric Benson and the Bengals ran roughshod over the Bears. I thought Cincinnati would win, but certainly didn't expect Marvin Lewis and company to completely run visiting Chicago off of the Paul Brown Stadium field, 45-10. Benson torched the team that drafted him for a career-high 189 yards and a touchdown on a whopping 37 carries, and Carson Palmer was a jaw-dropping 20- of-24 for 233 yards and five touchdowns during a game in which Cincinnati punted just once and did not commit a single turnover. The Bears were not so lucky, as "bad" Jay Cutler (26-of-37, 251 yards, 1 TD) threw three interceptions during a game in which Chicago (3-3) never really competed.

...JaMarcus Russell finally got benched. Russell had remained in the Raiders lineup despite some of the worst football you'll ever see from a human being, and had even received a public show of support from owner Al Davis a little over a week ago. To the great joy of the Oakland faithful, Russell (6-of-11, 61 yards, 2 INT, 1 lost fumble) was lifted at halftime of a 24-0 game against the Jets. To their consternation, Bruce Gradkowski (10-of-19, 97 yards, 1 lost fumble) led exactly the same number of scoring drives as Russell in what would become a 38-0 loss. Oh, and Richard Seymour and that playoff-bound Raider defense gave up 316 yards on the ground, including 144 and two touchdowns to rookie Shonn Greene.

...the Cowboys took it to the Falcons. Dallas had been unspectacular in pre- bye efforts against the Chiefs and Broncos, while Atlanta was seemingly ready to take the next step following back-to-back wins over the 49ers and Bears. But after claiming an early 7-0 lead, the Falcons took the rest of the night off, with Tony Romo (21-of-29, 311 yards, 3 TD) outplaying Matt Ryan (19- of-35, 198 yards, 2 TD, 3 turnovers) in what would become a 37-24 Cowboys domination. DeMarcus Ware had two of Dallas' four sacks of Ryan, who had been dropped just twice during the team's first five games.

...the Panthers came up small against the Bills. Carolina seemed certain to get to 3-3 against a depleted Buffalo team featuring backup quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick, and one that hadn't won on the road in back-to-back weeks in five years. But the Panthers once again refused to take care of the football, with Jake Delhomme (27-of-44, 325 yards) throwing three more interceptions to go along with a critical lost fumble by punt returner Kenneth Moore, and Buffalo cashed in on enough short fields to come away with a 20-9 victory. Fitzpatrick (11-of-22, 123 yards, 1 TD) was reasonably efficient for a team that did not have a turnover on the day, and likely earned himself at least one more start for a Buffalo (3-4) club that hosts Houston next week.

I WAS NOT SURPRISED THAT...

...the Vikings were handed loss number one by the Steelers. The stars did not seem to be aligning for Minnesota, which came off a physical last second- thriller against the Ravens last week, were facing the NFL's top passer, Ben Roethlisberger, without top cornerback Antoine Winfield, and were one week away from a monumental showdown at Green Bay in Week 8. And though Minnesota had its chances, two defensive touchdowns by the Steelers in the fourth quarter helped Pittsburgh pull off a 27-17 triumph. A 77-yard fumble return for a touchdown by LaMarr Woodley, and 82-yard interception return for a score by fellow linebacker Keyaron Fox, helped snuff out two deep Minnesota drives to deny Brett Favre (34-of-51, 334 yards) what would have been his first career win in Pittsburgh.

...the NFL's two representatives of Missouri lost home games by a combined score of 79-13. The Rams (42-6 losers to the Colts) and Chiefs (37-7 to the Chargers) have been bright, shining emblems of a new and terrible NFL lower- class, along with the Browns, Raiders, and Buccaneers, to name a few. It was a bad weekend all-around in the Show-Me-State, as Mizzou was also handled, 41-7, by the visiting Texas Longhorns on Saturday. I don't know if St. Louis is really "Baseball Heaven," but I'm pretty sure Missouri is football hell.

...the Dolphins gave the Saints all they could handle. Those arguing that Miami had just the type of physical, ground-control approach to compete with New Orleans were looking mighty good when a Ronnie Brown second-quarter touchdown put the Fins ahead, 24-3. But the Saints showed just how worried they were about 21-point deficits when they stormed back and outscored Miami by a 43-10 count the rest of the way in an eventual 46-34 victory. Two pick- sixes off of Chad Henne and improved play by Drew Brees (22-of-38, 298 yards, 1 TD, 3 INT, 2 rushing touchdowns) and the New Orleans offense helped the Saints pull ahead in the fourth quarter.

...we saw Josh Freeman for the first time. Buccaneers head coach Raheem Morris had made no secret of the fact that Freeman's time was coming, and in the fourth quarter of the Bucs' 35-7 loss to the Patriots, the first-round rookie out of Kansas State received his first shot. Freeman completed 2-of-4 passes for 16 yards and a five-yard rush but did not lead a scoring drive in relief of Josh Johnson (9-of-26, 156 yards, 1 TD, 3 INT). No word on whether Freeman or Johnson will get the start when Tampa Bay returns from the bye to host the Packers.

THREE QBs WE'LL SEE BEFORE THE END OF THE YEAR (OTHER THAN VINCE YOUNG)

-Brett Ratliff, Browns. Cleveland has seemingly given up on Brady Quinn, and Derek Anderson has completed 23-of-70 passes over the past three weeks for a team that is now 1-6. Browns coach Eric Mangini was very high on Ratliff, a former undrafted free agent out of Utah, when both were with the Jets, and once arriving in C-Town, dealt for him in the draft-day trade that helped Gang Green land Mark Sanchez. Little reason not to find out if Ratliff can play.

-Luke McCown, Jaguars. David Garrard has been extremely inconsistent for Jacksonville, and though the Jaguars are 3-3 and not tanking yet, it seems like just a matter of time given results like the Jags' 41-0 loss in Seattle a few weeks ago. McCown very nearly won the starting job in Tampa Bay in the preseason, and was traded to Jacksonville due to a numbers crunch after losing No. 1 duties to Byron Leftwich (remember him?). You have to believe that Jack Del Rio and offensive coordinator Dirk Koetter are intrigued about what they might have in McCown.

-Matt Moore. Panthers. Moore was elevated to the No. 2 QB spot in Week 1, when Josh McCown suffered a season-ending broken foot while subbing for Jake Delhomme, aka Mr. Turnover. Moore hasn't played since throwing 11 passes in that loss to the Eagles, but Delhomme now has four touchdown passes and 13 interceptions for a Carolina team that is 2-4 and going nowhere. Interestingly, the Panthers' second-most-experienced quarterback is their third-stringer, A.J. Feeley, who has 15 career starts with the Eagles and Dolphins but hasn't won a game that he opened since 2004.

QUIZ TIME

My favorite web site of all time, sporcle.com, had an interesting fill-in-the- blanks quiz last week. The task was to name all 28 NFL starting quarterbacks the week BEFORE Brett Favre made his first start as a pro on Sept, 20, 1992. I somehow managed to get 27 out of 28 (missed New England's QB), and if you don't think that's good enough given my position, you should know that the week before Favre's first start I was just beginning my tenure as associate editor of The Cardinal, the newspaper at Cardinal Gibbons High School in Baltimore, MD. We had some non-NFL things going on that week.

Here's the quiz:

http://www.sporcle.com/games/ryanmccrystal/prefavre

Enjoy.