Two weeks in, something is up in the National Football League...

And it's not just that I think that this is a function of an agenda for the league...

(Though one has to wonder if the Michael Vick concussion might well change the plans for the league this season...)

Something is up -- QUITE UP -- in the first two weeks of this NFL season:

SCORING!!

I did a survey, and all it would take for you to do the same is to grab a spreadsheet and NFL.com.

I went back to 2006, and listed all the scores for weeks 1 and 2 of all the NFL seasons as of tonight.

(NOTE: In 2011, because of the pending Monday night game, and 2008, because they actually did the first two teams of byes in week two (!!!), this data is on 31 games total and 15 in week 2. All other seasons discussed have their data on 32 games and 16 games in all weeks.)

I found the following:

WEEK ONE:

2006 Average scoring: 34.56
2007 Average scoring: 38
2008 Average scoring: 40.06
2009 Average scoring: 39.31
2010 Average scoring: 36.56

2011 Average scoring: 47

That's right. You heard me. For the entire first week of this year's NFL season, the average total of each game was FORTY-SEVEN POINTS, a nearly 30% increase over last year and almost 20% higher than any season in the last five!!!

Another thing I checked was the number of 30 point games: The last time, before the 2011 opener, that the losing team scored 30 points in a week 1 game was the Sunday nighter in 2007. In 2006, only 1 team achieved 30 points. In 2007-2010, 5 teams achieved that total each year in week 1.

In 2011, NINE teams reached that plateau.

WEEK TWO:

2006: 36.81 points per game total.
2007: 43.44
2008: 45.67
2009: 44.44
2010: 41.44

A definite increase, in all cases, over week one, every year.

2011? 47.07

A 5 1/2 point increase (about 13%) over last year, and beats every year in the last five.

30-point games were achieved by 6 teams in 2006, 7 teams in 2007, 8 teams in 2010, and 9 teams in 2008 and 2009.

2011? 9 again.

So the two-week averages appear to show that the league wants to bring in money through having the scoreboards roll:

2006: 35.69 points per game total
2007: 40.72
2008: 42.77
2009: 41.88
2010: 39

2011? 47.03 points per game.

That's an eight-point increase over all 32 games last year, over a 20% increase in scoring.

And if you think it's just the lockout...