How the Wild Card Was Won

After one week of thrilling playoff action, we are just about ready to start the next. Last week was filled with surprises, with every home team falling for the first time in NFL history. Of course, surprise is an entirely relative term, considering that the favorites ended up winning each and every game.

There was nothing shocking about last week’s outcomes, as everyone with a minor familiarity with football kindly pointed out. As overly simplistic as ever, much of this analysis pointed towards a single player on each team. It was no coincidence, these people claimed, that the better quarterback came out on top in each and every game. Alex Smith beat Brian Hoyer, Ben Roethlisberger trumped AJ McCarron, Russell Wilson outlasted Teddy Bridgewater, and Aaron Rodgers ran away from Kirk Cousins.

I’m not going to deny that there’s some truth to this, but there was a lot more happening in these games than just the quarterback position. For one, Smith was the only quarterback in the entire field to play what I would describe as a “good game” over the first weekend, and Wilson was actually outplayed by the passer across the field from him. These teams certainly benefited from having a quality quarterback, but there are other aspects of their teams that were just as crucial for their victories, aspects that will prove just as critical for any deeper postseason run.

Kansas City Chiefs: Lockdown Coverage

This is the most obvious case of a quarterback situation being used to oversimplify the outcome of a game, but it’s hard not to blame people for doing so. Brian Hoyer was simply awful on Saturday, and while Alex Smith didn’t do anything spectacular, the gap between average and Hoyer was about as large as it is possible to get.

But as bad as Hoyer was, and as many of the mistakes go entirely on his shoulders, we need to give the defense of the Chiefs some credit as well. This unit has been playing at a top notch level for the past three months, and they delivered their best performance of the season when it mattered the most. Shutting out any NFL team, even one quarterbacked by Hoyer, is quite an accomplishment, and it shows just why Kansas City can be dangerous the rest of the way.

Things started up front where, even with Justin Houston clearly at reduced strength, the combination of Tamba Hali, Dontari Poe, and Dee Ford was enough to apply consistent pressure in the backfield. A couple of Hoyer’s interceptions were thrown with pressure in his face, forcing him into ill timed or inaccurate throws. The easiest way to build a great defense is by pressuring the quarterback, and Houston did that to great effect on Saturday.

If the pass rush was where Kansas City’s defense stopped, they would still be a dangerous unit. But there is more to this team than just the front seven, as they showed in absolutely strangling Houston’s passing game. With a pair of athletic and physical cornerbacks on the outside and an absolute lightning bolt in Eric Berry at safety, it is nearly impossible for any receiver to get open against this team.

I was critical of Marcus Peters last week when picking the Defensive Rookie of the Year, pointing out that his interception numbers are inflated and that he was beaten far more often than a Pro Bowl level cornerback should be. But being second to Ronald Darby among rookies still makes him a pretty damn good cornerback, and as a number two guy opposite Sean Smith he is certainly an excellent piece to have on the defensive side. Smith himself is incredibly underrated, and since coming back from an early season suspension he has been among the top pass defenders in the game.

Houston’s receiving corps doesn’t have the depth to scare anyone, but few teams can boast a receiver with the talent of DeAndre Hopkins. Hopkins finished third in the league in receptions and receiving yards despite the rotating door at quarterback in Houston this year, and the Texans did their best to force the ball to him against Kansas City. But eleven targets turned into just six catches for 69 yards, and Houston’s offense was rendered impotent without the contributions of their best player.

The Chiefs will be facing a different sort of test this weekend against New England. With Julian Edelman and Danny Amendola both reasonably healthy, the Patriots will once again have their full stable of unique receivers to attack the opposing defense. The quick and shifty pass catchers will be a difficult matchup for Kansas City’s larger and more physical cornerbacks, and they could struggle chasing them around the field on New England’s quick passes. This isn’t a great matchup for Kansas City, but if they can find a way to get their hands on the Patriots receivers at the line, they can push them around and disrupt the offense, giving their pass rush the time they need to close in on Tom Brady.

Pittsburgh Steelers: Run Defense

The book on Pittsburgh has been extremely clear this year. Apart from the games they played without Ben Roethlisberger, this has been a team defined by their offense, an explosive unit that needs to put up points to cover the holes on their defense. At times it works, like in their first matchup against the Broncos, but at other times it fails, such as in their shootout loss to the Seahawks. For the first time in recent memory, the Pittsburgh defense is a genuine liability for the team, something that would hold them back even if they didn’t have to worry about the injuries dotting their offense.

There is no way to sugarcoat the wretchedness of the Steelers pass defense, but quietly have been one of the better run defenses in the league this year, a strength that showed up last weekend against Cincinnati. With AJ McCarron under center, it was obvious from the first snap of the ball that the Bengals were going to try to feed their running game, and with a pair of talented backs in Jeremy Hill and Giovanni Bernard, this seemed like an effective strategy. But 78 ground yards later, the Bengals found themselves on the wrong end of the outcome, scoring only 16 points and letting the Steelers take it with a last minute field goal.

The Bengals have one of the best offensive lines in the league, and over the course of the regular season they were one of the most complete and balanced offenses in the league. They should have been able to shove their way through the Steelers, and the fact that they didn’t is a testament to just how underrated Pittsburgh’s front seven is.

Cameron Heyward and Stephon Tuitt don’t get the credit they deserve, but they are two of the best defensive ends in the league, trapped in a scheme that limits their sack numbers and keeps them from drawing national attention. And against the Bengals they were absolute wrecking balls, consistently controlling the line of scrimmage and letting the linebackers flow to the ball behind them.

The linebackers are another story as well, a group of high draft prospects who have unfairly earned the label of disappointments. Each of their four starting linebackers is a former first round pick, including the past three first round picks the Steelers have had. Bud Dupree is still a rookie, and after an up and down season most people have already stopped paying attention to the athletic but raw draft pick out of Kentucky. He had his usual bumps and bruises through the Cincinnati game, but he made several nice plays as well, and he will come along for the team eventually.

The one player that everyone has called a bust is Jarvis Jones. After tearing apart the SEC to the tune of 28 sacks in two years, his lack of athleticism has proven to be a fatal flaw in the NFL. Though he did manage to sack and strip McCarron on Saturday, he still has shown no sign of applying a consistent pass rush. But in his time in the NFL, he has developed into a very quality run defender, a stiff presence on the outside that plays with discipline and closes down running lanes.

And then there's Ryan Shazier. I'm not sure I can put into words what he did this past Saturday. He was absolutely everywhere against the Bengals, making plays in parts of the field no other NFL linebacker could even hope to reach. His speed has always been at another level, but so far in his career he has struggled to stay on the field. He made up for it against the Bengals however, by covering every single part of the field. In the run game and in the pass game, he was the true difference maker for Pittsburgh, keeping the Bengals down even as the Steelers offense was struggling.

Things are going to be difficult for the Steelers this weekend, facing off against a Broncos team with both their leading rusher and receiver sidelined. Ben Roethlisberger will be asked to carry this team on his own, but there’s no way to know what condition he will be in. If the Steelers are going to win this game, they will need to do so by keeping things to a reasonably low score again, hoping they can make a few big plays to fight through a better and healthier Broncos team.

My thoughts on the Broncos are difficult to make sense of. While I agree with the decision to start Peyton Manning, I think that Brock Osweiler might actually give them a better shot to win this particular game. Going forward the Broncos will need the upside brought to their offense by the experience and intelligence of Manning, but against the Steelers their best hope is to simply avoid mistakes. The Steelers will once again stack up against the run, and they will force the ball into the hands of the quarterback. Despite missing a large chunk of the season, Manning still finished second to only Blake Bortles in interceptions, and if pressed he could very easily end up throwing the game back into Pittsburgh’s hands.

Seattle Seahawks: Avoiding Negative Plays

The part of me that is still bitter wanted to make this all about luck, but I have to give Seattle credit for doing some things right. They put themselves in a position where a few breaks were enough to win them the game, and there is no shame in advancing through a few fortuitous bounces. Simply staying alive is the key at this point in the year, and Seattle has found an excellent formula to keep themselves in any game.

After the botched snap and faceplant by their punter on the opening drive, Seattle played an extraordinarily clean final three and a half quarters. They didn’t make a lot of big plays themselves, but they avoided any disasters, and in a game played in these conditions, that’s all a team really has to do. Sooner or later someone is going to make a mistake, and that team is likely going to be the one to lose.

For the Vikings their first mistake came in the form of an Adrian Peterson fumble, setting the Seahawks up for a lead taking field goal. But even before that, Seattle had managed to dodge a major bullet, with the unforgettable play in which Russell Wilson turned a snap over his shoulder into a forty yard gain. The completion was absolutely incredible, but it was really just a bonus on top of an already great play. The Vikings had Wilson dead to rights in the backfield, and he somehow managed to break their contain, to get away from a potential twenty yard loss that would have eliminated their excellent field position and killed the drive.

The key to avoiding negative plays on offense is usually an offensive line, but this is one case where all the credit has to go to Wilson. Though Bridgewater outplayed him in most measurable ways, Wilson did enough of the smaller things necessary to keep his team in the game. Time and time again he avoided pressure and made a play, either a completion or a throwaway that kept their offense on schedule. He contributed in the running game as well, carrying out fakes to slow Minnesota’s aggressive defense and keep Christine Michael clean in the backfield. The Vikings were tearing apart Seattle’s offensive line, but the versatility of Wilson kept them from making the big plays they are normally capable of.

There is no better example of this than a play that took place on the drive following Peterson’s fumble. Seattle took over at the 40 yard line of the Vikings, in excellent position but still not within reach for Steven Hauschka on this frigid day. Three plays gained them eleven yards and a new set of downs, getting them just barely inside their kicker’s range. The Vikings defense needed a play, and Everson Griffen nearly delivered. On first down Seattle ran a play action with a bootleg to the left, hoping to get Wilson clean to the perimeter. But Griffen stayed home on the fake, and he was in perfect position to bring down the quarterback for a significant loss. But somehow Wilson managed to stay upright long enough to throw the ball out of bounds, avoiding a sack and keeping them in range for what proved to be a game winning field goal.

Seattle’s offense was clicking on all cylinders at the end of the regular season, but things will become more difficult going forward. Against Carolina this weekend they’ll be facing a defense even tougher than Minnesota’s, and though the conditions will be friendlier, they could wind up playing a similar low scoring game. They will need their quarterback to once again use his athletic ability to avoid serious negative plays, because chances are good that Carolina won’t let them off the hook as easily as the Vikings did.

Green Bay Packers: Offensive Playmakers

 

After 35 points in a win against the Redskins, it's easy to forget how bad the Packers offense played over the second half of the regular season. Three times in their final six games they failed to eclipse 20 points, after doing so in all but two of their first ten games. After six straight victories to open the year, the Packers won only four games the rest of the way, in a large part due to the collapse of their offense.

This failure came out of nowhere, and it inevitably provoked a lot of speculation about what could be causing it. The most obvious explanation for the Packers was injuries. Their offensive line fell to pieces after being spectacularly healthy a year ago, and with Jordy Nelson out their receiving corps was as thinner than any that Aaron Rodgers had every worked with. The regression of Eddie Lacy only compounded the problem, stripping any hope of versatility from their offense.

Rodgers was stuck behind a broken offensive line throwing to receivers who couldn’t get open or catch the football, and even great quarterbacks would struggle in this situation. But there was more to Rodgers’s problems over the second half of the season than just the players around him. He was missing throws he normally makes, holding the ball too long and throwing inaccurately when he finally let it go. In a lot of ways, Rodgers was simply bad down the stretch of the season, and he deserves his share of the blame for what happened.

After Green Bay’s performance on Sunday, it is easy enough to give the credit to Rodgers for elevating a mediocre supporting cast. And while he certainly played better than he has recently, it wasn’t by enough to explain Green Bay’s jump in performance. Rodgers still missed a number of easy plays he normally makes, and he still is a reason to be concerned about the Packers going forward. But the performance of the rest of their offense is a reason for optimism, on the off chance they can keep it up.

For the first time all season the combination of Lacy and James Starks flashed the potential they’ve shown over the past two years, controlling the game in the second half as the Packers pulled away from the Redskins. Though Green Bay hasn’t run the ball well this year, their running backs have proven effective on screen passes, and that’s something they can exploit against Arizona’s aggressive defense.

But the real change was on the outside, where Green Bay's depleted and mediocre group of receivers made the sort of plays that have been missing from their offense all year. Randall Cobb looked genuinely elusive for the first time since signing his new contract, and James Jones and Davante Adams actually looked like quality NFL receivers. At times they looked like more than that, pulling contested catches away in crucial situations to keep the Packers offense moving.

Things will naturally become more challenging this weekend against a significantly better defense than Washington’s. As vulnerable as a defense is to a screen when blitzing, Arizona is one of the few teams in the league with the athletes who could make it work. And on the outside they have playmakers to match Green Bay’s, and they will make life significantly more difficult for the Packers receivers. It’s very likely that last week’s performance was just a flash in the pan, but if the Packers are going to have any hope going forward, they will need the players around Rodgers to continue to make plays like they did this past Sunday.

The Next Step

Eight teams are left in contention for a Super Bowl title, and I should probably use this space to write about them. But in truth, none of the four teams that won last weekend particularly impressed me, and it wouldn’t shock me if all four were eliminated in a week’s time. All season it has seemed as if there was a set of teams that was a step ahead of all the others, and very little we saw in the Wild Card round dissuaded me from that impression.

So instead, let’s not talk about the winners. Let’s talk about the losers, the teams that fought all year to reach the playoffs then dropped out in the first round. Disappointment has clouded what should be considered successful seasons, and there are a lot of teams out there who wish they made it as far as these four.

But the NFL never stops, and these teams can’t focus on 2015 for too long. Already the coaches and front offices are turning their attention to 2016. Because a taste of the playoffs only leaves teams hungry for more, and a first round exit can often be a prelude for something more. Taking the next step is always more difficult than people believe, but here are my thoughts on how each of the four first round exits can accomplish it.

Houston Texans

I think it was pretty obvious on Saturday what the biggest problem on Houston’s team is. Brian Hoyer is a below average starting quarterback in the league, but no one could have expected what we saw against Kansas City. Four interceptions and a lost fumble robbed the Texans of whatever hope they had of winning the game. Their defense kept them in it for most of the first half, but Hoyer couldn’t turn it around after halftime, and the game quickly turned into a rout.

Texans fans are justifiably furious with Hoyer, and they’re going to be even more furious when he’s their starting quarterback again next season. Because even though that’s the most obvious hole on Houston’s roster, it isn’t one they’re going to be able to fix. With the 22^nd pick in the draft they won’t be in position to take a franchise quarterback, or at least not anyone who is ready to start off the bat next year. They might be able to grab someone with high upside in the second or third round, but their best bet for next year will be to start with Hoyer back out there.

This is a no win situation. Replacing Hoyer could erase the progress they made over the second half of 2015, but sticking with him will limit their upside in 2016. With Andrew Luck coming back and Blake Bortles developing, a mediocre quarterback won’t be able to win this division like he did this year.

The quarterback situation makes it hard to look at Houston with much optimism, but there are still pieces to build around on this team. Obviously JJ Watt is a nightmare, and both Whitney Mercilus and Jadeveon Clowney performed well as complementary pass rushers as the season went along. Add to that the continued growth of Benardrick McKinney and Kevin Johnson, and this is not the aging defense around Watt that we saw coming out of last season.

The offense, however, is a problem. Arian Foster is still a productive back when healthy, but his health has become too unreliable to build an offense around. They need any sort of weapon to rely on besides DeAndre Hopkins, and they need an influx of youth on their offensive line.

These are issues that can be addressed early in the draft. I’ll hopefully be able to get more in depth with my breakdown of the prospects, but from the early looks I’ve seen, both receiver and lineman have decent depth in the latter half of the first round. The best bet for Houston would be to add through the draft, bottom out in 2016, and hope they can find a quarterback solution after that. Because even though this team has talent to work with, they aren’t ready to take the next step until a couple years down the road.

Cincinnati Bengals

 

This is hard. I mean, how do you figure out the next step for a team that has been trying to figure it out for the past four years? For the fifth season in the row the Bengals dropped out in the first round of the playoffs, and at this point it has become more of a joke than anything else. This is a solid football team, but they haven’t been able to put together what they need to win a playoff game, and right now people are justified in asking whether they should make drastic changes in the way they run things this offseason.

The most obvious place to start is at head coach. I was an advocate of them letting Marvin Lewis go after last year, and it would only seem reasonable to be even more vocal after another year of stagnation. But strangely, I find myself rather ambivalent on the topic. Lewis did a good job this season, managing to win the division and nearly earn a first round bye. Had Andy Dalton stayed healthy, they would very likely still be alive right now. He fixed their pass rush, showed a willingness to embrace creativity from his offensive coordinator, and very nearly won a playoff game without his starting quarterback.

Lewis has received a great deal of criticism for how their playoff loss went down. He’s been accused of losing control of the team, and while I’m not going to argue that the Bengals weren’t out of control, I’m not sure it’s fair to give Lewis the blame. Everything about that game was out of control—the Bengals, the Steelers, the referees—and at a certain point there is only so much a coach can do.

Vontaze Burfict in particular was a major problem, but I’m not sure there’s a force on Earth that can keep him under control. He is simply emotionally unstable on the field, as everyone has known for the past five years. That was part of the reason why the Bengals were able to find a player of his talent as an undrafted free agent, and at this point it might be something that simply can’t be fixed. Some may criticize Lewis for bringing in a player like Burfict in the first place, but this is out of his control as well. He is living under the mandate of owner Mike Brown, who believes that he can bring in and fix any character issues.

It wouldn’t be a mistake if the Bengals fired Lewis, but it wouldn’t be a mistake to keep him around either. If this team is going to take the next step, the key will be getting better on the field. It’s become popular to heap scorn upon free agency as a tool for building a team, but the Bengals are a perfect example of how crucial it can be. No team (except maybe Green Bay and Pittsburgh) spends less on free agency than the Bengals, year after year not even bothering to pursue anyone on the market.

Despite what many fans believe, free agency is an invaluable tool to building a roster. People roll their eyes at failed big money deals like Albert Haynesworth and Mike Wallace, and they forget about the smaller deals given to championship contributors like Michael Bennett. Free agency is a bad way to build a roster, but it is an essential tool to filling in the gaps. Cincinnati (and, to a lesser extent, Green Bay and Pittsburgh as well) has found consistent success in the regular season thanks to the core of their roster, but they haven’t been able to add the talent to get over the top.

The Bengals need to be aggressive in improving their roster. There are plenty of places for them to attack in free agency. Another receiver opposite AJ Green would be nice. A situational pass rusher or another cornerback would push their defense to an elite level. One way or the other, the Bengals have to acknowledge that business as usual isn’t working, and they need to take advantage of all the tools they have to improve their teams.

Minnesota Vikings

The first two breakdowns have been a bit depressing, so let’s get into some optimism. There may not be a team in the NFL with a brighter future than Minnesota. A year in which they were expected to improve and compete for a playoff spot turned into a division title and a near victory over the defending NFC champions, and as crushing as this Sunday’s loss was, the game showed that this team is capable of competing with anyone in the league.

A couple days have passed, and I think I am now in an emotional state where I can talk about this game. By my reckoning this was the fourth most painful loss I’ve experienced as a Vikings fan (behind, in no particular order, 2009 against the Saints, 2003 against the Cardinals, and 1998 against the Falcons). The Vikings absolutely should have won this game, having outplayed Seattle almost from start to finish. And it isn’t just the field goal that sticks in my mind. There was the fumble by Peterson, the dropped interception by Sendejo, and that ridiculous play by Russell Wilson on the botched snap. The Vikings had so many opportunities to win this game, and it hurts that they weren’t able to grab them.

That said, one major factor keeps this loss from joining the other three a the top of my list. Even if they had won on Sunday, the Vikings still would have been long shots to win the Super Bowl. This team isn’t quite at that level yet, and as much fun as it would have been to see a deeper playoff run, I came into the game with very reasonable expectations. The Vikings weren’t in position to compete for a championship this year, but they will be next year, and in the years after that. A team loaded with young talent, they are a few pieces and a little development away from being one of the best teams in the NFL.

Like Cincinnati, this is a team that would benefit from being active in free agency. The Vikings can clear up $11 million in cap space by releasing Mike Wallace, and they can create a similar amount of space if they do as I’ve suggested and part ways with Adrian Peterson. He doesn’t fit with the rest of the talent on their team anymore, and Jerrick McKinnon performed well enough down the stretch to show that he can be a full time runner going forward. By freeing themselves of underperforming veterans, the Vikings can create more than $50 million in cap space, enough to give extensions to some of their young players and to sign free agents to bolster their roster.

There are three positions where the Vikings most obviously came up short this season. On the defensive side of the ball, while they could benefit from less Chad Greenway on the field, their only real weakness was at safety opposite Harrison Smith. This is a position that could definitely be addressed in free agency. Some of these players will ultimately be franchised or resigned, but for right now the league is looking at a free agent field headlined by Eric Weddle, Eric Berry, and Reggie Nelson. A good value choice would be to go after Tashaun Gipson, an excellent cover safety who has become lost in the mire of Cleveland. His skills would perfectly complement Harrison Smith’s and would solidify the Vikings on the back end.

The offense will be more difficult to fix. The offensive line has been the most glaring problem throughout the season, but it may not be the most pressing area to address. They will see immediate improvement with the return of John Sullivan and possibly Phil Loadholt (though Loadholt could end up cut for age, health, and money reasons). Matt Kalil was quietly okay at left tackle, and I still like the potential of TJ Clemmings on the right side. And between Joe Berger, Brandon Fusco, and Michael Harris, they should be able to find two starting caliber guards. Minnesota’s offensive line was a mess this season, but I wouldn’t be hugely disappointed if they made no major changes.

The same cannot be said about the receiver position. Stefon Diggs came on strong early in the season, but he struggled once coverage was directed his way. He has the look of a very good number two receiver, but the Vikings still need a primary option. What I would really like to see going forward is more aggression from Teddy Bridgewater, a willingness to force a ball into tight windows and let his receiver make a play. This year, however, they didn’t have any receivers capable of winning contested catches, which is why Bridgewater ended up sailing so many passes out of bounds.

Unless the Bears let Alshon Jeffery slip through their fingers, free agency doesn’t offer a lot of solutions here. Fortunately, the draft has a good collection of big, physical receivers. Josh Doctson of TCU and Michael Thomas of Ohio State could be available when the Vikings pick at 23, and I wouldn’t be stunned to see a fall from Laquon Treadwell of Ole Miss, who won’t impress anyone with his 40 yard dash time. Any of these three would give Bridgewater a big, physical target who can attack the defense underneath and in the middle of the field.

That brings me to the final big adjustment they have to make on offense, and that’s to the scheme they are running. While I don’t think they necessarily have to replace Norv Turner, the entire coaching staff does need to sit down and discuss how their offense is run. Because right now, the scheme they’re running does not fit the players they have, and at this point it is far easier to change their playbook than their roster. Bridgewater’s sophomore year was a disappointment after a stellar rookie season, and most of the blame for this goes to the coaches for not putting him in a position to succeed. But with better play calling and some key additions to their roster, this team is capable of competing for a Super Bowl as early as next year.

Washington Redskins

This team is harder to figure out, because it still isn’t clear whether or not they were any good this year. Over the course of a 9-7 season they faced only three teams that ended up making the playoffs, losing by 17 to New England, 28 to Carolina, and 17 to Green Bay this past weekend. They looked good down the stretch of the season, but right now there is plenty of reason to wonder if they were just a mediocre team that happened to get hot against an easy schedule.

Even if they weren’t all that good this year, there is still reason to hope for improvement next year. Preston Smith became a force as an edge rusher over the final month of the season, capped by his sack of Aaron Rodgers for a safety on Sunday. They still need a lot of help on the back end of their defense, but with Smith and Ryan Kerrigan coming off the edges, this has the makings of a competent defense.

The key to their offseason will be Kirk Cousins. After what he did over the second half of the season, they cannot possibly justify letting him leave in free agency. They will have to spend big money to bring him back, either with a new contract or the franchise tag. If I was them, I would probably go with the latter option, giving him one season to show that he can repeat his success this year. He played extremely well down the stretch, and more than anyone else he is responsible for their playoff appearance. But eight games doesn’t justify a long term deal, and if they give him more time than he’s earned, they could end up digging themselves into a deep hole next year.

There is more reason for optimism for the Redskins than for either AFC team, but they still have to tread carefully going forward. If everything breaks right, this could be the first year of a serious run. The keys to this making this happen will be adding talent to their secondary (a likely target in the draft), trusting that their offensive line can come together, and hoping desperately that Cousins works out where so many similar quarterbacks have failed in the past.

Regular Season Wrapup

The playoffs are about to start, but before we turn our focus entirely to that, we should probably address some of the lingering issues from the regular season. I don’t feel like splitting these things into two separate posts, so I’ll wrap them together, dealing with both the coaching openings and the awards today. Starting on the coaching side of things, I'll go through the seven teams that have fired their head coach so far, sharing my thoughts on the firings and the state of the team going forward.

Coaching Carousel

Tennessee Titans

The order of these teams will be based on how desirable their opening is for a potential coach, and it should come as no surprise that Tennessee leads off the list. The Titans fired Ken Whisenhunt back in November, and they rode interim head coach Mike Mularkey to the worst record in the league. It was a mistake to hire Whisenhunt in the first place, and even though they probably jumped the gun firing their head coach after only a season and a half on the job, it’s hard not to agree that they need to start over.

Fortunately, no team is in a better position to start over than the Titans. Marcus Mariota quieted down after his torrid start, but he still has all the makings of a franchise quarterback, something that gives them an easy leg up over most of the other teams on this list. The other talent around him doesn’t jump off the page, but this is a roster filled with young players who, despite disappointing to this point in their career, have the ability to develop into stars with good coaching. Kendall Wright, Taylor Lewan, and Chance Warmack can form the core of a very good football team, if things break right. Add to that the number one pick in this year’s draft, and Tennessee may be a year or two away from becoming the best young team in the league.

Tampa Bay Buccaneers

This one came out of nowhere on Wednesday night and nearly stole the top spot from Tennessee. In a lot of ways, the Buccaneers are actually better version of the Titans. Their young franchise quarterback was more highly thought of coming into the draft and had a better rookie season. Mike Evans is better than Kendall Wright, and while their young offensive line doesn’t have the same pedigree as Tennessee’s, it actually looked better this year. The only real advantage the Titans have is in draft position, and Tampa Bay’s ninth overall slot is nothing to shake your head about.

So why do I have them ranked below the Titans? Because of how they ended up here. Both the Titans and the Buccaneers hired their last coach in the same season, both bringing in veteran coaches who were gone within two years. The difference is, the Buccaneers actually had a coach who’d produced consistent success at his last stop, and they improved significantly in the time he was with them. Lovie Smith didn’t deserve to be fired, and the instability of the Buccaneers will be enough to unsettle some coaching prospects.

New York Giants

I have mixed feelings about the Coughlin firing. He’s not a bad coach by any means, as two Super Bowls in his twelve years with the Giants attest, and I’m not sure if they’ll be able to find anyone better on the market. There is a strong case to be made that firing him was an overreaction, and there’s a decent chance that this completely ruins the team.

But this is a weird case, since we’re dealing with the oldest coach in the league heading a team with a shrinking championship window. The Giants have fallen short for four straight years, and at a certain point the injury excuse starts to lose its merit. Something was clearly wrong in New York, and they couldn’t just wait to make a change, not with Eli Manning entering the final years of his career.

There are things to like about the Giants job and things not to like. The thing to like is Manning. No other coaching vacancy can boast a quarterback of his caliber, which gives the Giants a leg up on the rest of the field. On the other hand, the talent on the roster is pretty bare outside of quarterback, and it’s possible that whoever ends up as coach, the Giants will end up fighting the same battle of mediocrity over the next few seasons as they would have with Coughlin.

Miami Dolphins

Like the Titans, the Dolphins spent the latter portion of the season with an interim coach at the helm. And like the Titans, there is a lot of very appealing talent on this team. Lamar Miller is criminally underused, but when he has been allowed to contribute, he has been a dynamic playmaker. Ndamukong Suh was better this year than most people realize, and he will live up to the hefty contract the Dolphins gave him. Perhaps the most talented position is wide receiver, where rookie DeVante Parker came on strong after struggling with injuries early in the season, giving them the perfect big, fast complement to the small and shifty Jarvis Landry.

So why are the Dolphins so low on my list? Because of the quarterback. I’m sure most of you are familiar with the concept of Schrodinger’s Box (you know, the analogy a physicist came up with to explain how ridiculous it was to compare a quantum system to macro phenomena, which over the past eighty years has been used exclusively to compare macro phenomena to quantum systems?). Well this is Schrodinger’s Coaching Vacancy. It is either a perfect opportunity or a career killer, and there is no way to know until we open the Ryan Tannehill box.

Tannehill was bad in 2015. And he wasn’t that great in 2014 either. His 2014 season looked like it would be a perfect bridge year, a season of decent play that showed his growth before an explosion the following season. That explosion never came, and now his contract is casting a pall over the entire Dolphins franchise. Whether he plays well or not, the Dolphins are stuck with him for next season, and possibly even the season after that. If Tannehill is a bust, then the entire team will likely be scrapped in two years, and whoever takes this job will be thrown out the door with the quarterback they inherit.

Philadelphia Eagles

Who wants Chip Kelly’s mess? As good a coach as I think Kelly is, it’s hard not to argue that he was a disaster in his one year as a GM. Maybe if he’d been given more time, he would have been able to shape this roster into what he wanted, but as a one year project it stands as a major problem for whoever follows him up. The lack of playmakers on offense, the contracts given to Byron Maxwell and DeMarco Murray, the questions at the quarterback position. Even with young talent like Fletcher Cox and Jordan Matthews, it’s hard to imagine anyone leaping at the opportunity to coach this team.

If only for this reason, I think Philadelphia should have given Kelly another chance. This year was a disaster, but they were actually closer than most people realize, and with another year Kelly might have been able to pull something together. Of course, he also could have sunk them into a much deeper hole, and I’m not sure to what extent we need to give him the benefit of the doubt. But what’s done is done, and the fact remains that this team is in seriously bad shape going forward.

San Francisco 49ers

Huh. Who would have guessed that firing one of the best coaches in the world and replacing him with the first guy to walk through the door would prove to be a bad decision? In all seriousness, did anyone actually expect the Jim Tomsula era to go well? He was fun for a little while, and maybe we thought he would last more than a year, but it was clear to everyone from the start that the 49ers had taken a significant step down at the coaching position. Followed by an exodus of players the likes of which has never been seen before, there was no way anyone could have expected more from San Francisco than what they got this year.

In terms of the talent on the roster, the 49ers are in a better position than Philadelphia, with more intriguing prospects and fewer onerous contracts. But as ugly as things got in Philadelphia, they don’t compare to the mess that’s been made in San Francisco. Jim Harbaugh proved that simply winning football games isn’t enough to cut it in this organization, and Jim Tomsula showed that even being well liked didn’t guarantee more than a single season.

The problem here is at the top end of the organization. Trent Baalke has combined disappointing drafting with terrible management of the staff, and he’s sticking around for another year primarily because the ownership doesn’t want to face the PR nightmare that would come if they canned their GM only a year after choosing him over Harbaugh. He is hanging on by a tenuous thread, and any coach who signs on will have to do so understanding that the top of the organization is in a very fragile state. If they bring in a new GM in a year or two, there's a good chance he'll want to start over with a coach of his selection, lending a level of uncertainty to this job not found in other places.

Cleveland Browns

Are you surprised that the Browns are at the bottom of this list? Is there any way I could have possibly justified putting anyone else down here? The Browns are an absolute wreck of a franchise, and somehow they keep finding new ways to sink lower. The last five coaches fired in the AFC North have all been by the Browns. Their last four head coaches have all lasted two years or less. They’ve taken instability and turned it into their brand, and now they’ve made things worse by completely reshaping the structure of their front office. They’ve brought in a lawyer and a baseball administrator to help run the team, creating a power structure that simultaneously reduces the power of the GM role and scares off anyone who would want to come in. The last time the Browns were looking for a coach they had to go to their fourth or fifth option before they found someone to agree to do it, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they had to go even deeper now.

This team is dysfunctional to the point that it’s hard to blame Mike Pettine for what has happened. Normally the situations around Johnny Manziel and Justin Gilbert would be enough to justify getting rid of a coach, but in Cleveland they can’t possibly be this picky. Pettine may or may not be a good coach, but there is no way anyone could have succeeded in the position he was put in. I hope he gets another chance someday, because it really isn’t fair what this organization is doing to the coaches they end up hiring.

End of Season Awards

This awards season should prove to be one of the most interesting in recent memory. Of all the races there isn’t a single one that is clear cut, and for several awards there is a case to be made for three or four different winners. In some instances this is due to the strength of the field, in others due to weakness, but either way it will lead to some highly entertaining discussions to follow going forward.

Defensive Rookie of the Year

Who Should Win: Ronald Darby, CB Bills

Who Will Win: Marcus Peters, CB Chiefs

This one will fall into the classic trap of cornerback evaluation. Peters has gotten the most attention, earning a trip to the Pro Bowl, and it is easy to see why. He finished with a league leading eight interceptions, the most by a rookie cornerback since Anthony Henry in 2001. But as impressive as this is, interceptions aren’t the best way to measure a cornerback. Peters has made a lot of big plays, but he has also surrendered a lot of big plays too, near the league in receptions, yards, and touchdowns allowed.

A closer look reveals that Ronald Darby has actually been the better rookie cornerback. Buffalo’s defense was disappointing this year, but it wasn’t because of their coverage on the back end. Darby combined with former first round pick Stephon Gilmore to give the Bills one of the best cornerback duos in the league, a pair of athletic and physical lockdown defenders. It’s a shame that Peters’s interceptions total has distracted people, because beyond that it’s hard to argue that he does anything as well as Darby.

Offensive Rookie of the Year

Who Should Win: Todd Gurley, RB Rams

Who Will Win: Jameis Winston, QB Buccaneers

I honestly don’t know how to approach this one. Early in the season it looked like Marcus Mariota was going to run away with it, only to fall off and be replaced by Amari Cooper as the favorite. Then Gurley turned it on, performing over a span of several weeks like the best running back in the league. But he slowed down as the year progressed, and Winston came on, putting himself in position to grab the award only to fall off down the stretch.

No one has put together a complete season, so I will give the award to the player with the highest peak. Gurley was truly a game changing force for a stretch, and in a year of historically bad rushing production, his thousand yard season stands up against any runner in the league. I think Winston will end up winning the award, both because he plays quarterback and because his stretch came most recently. But any of Winston, Gurley, or Cooper could reasonably end up winning it, and I wouldn’t be too heartbroken to see any of them lose in the end.

Comeback Player of the Year

Who Should Win: Eric Berry, S Chiefs

Who Will Win: Eric Berry, S Chiefs

I don’t know if there has ever been an award with this deep a field of potential winners. Doug Martin recovered from two subpar seasons to finish second in the league in rushing. DeAngelo Williams was pulled off the scrap heap to become a key part of the best offense in the league. And then there is Arizona, who could conceivably make a case for Carson Palmer, Larry Fitzgerald, Patrick Peterson, Chris Johnson, or Dwight Freeney. Any one of these players would be deserving, and probably would win in another year.

But in the end, this is the easiest award to pick of all. I do wish we could get into a more in depth conversation for this, but when a guy comes back from cancer and plays at an elite level in the league, he’s going to win.

Coach of the Year

Who Should Win: Ron Rivera, HC Panthers

Who Will Win: Ron Rivera, HC Panthers

A few weeks ago this was a very interesting race, but a sort of consensus seems to have been reached. As excellent a job as Bruce Arians, Mike Zimmer, Bill Belichick, Andy Reid, and Mike Tomlin have done, I don’t see any way we can give this award to anyone but Rivera. Maybe we all just collectively misjudged the Panthers before the season, but it still seems hard to reconcile the results they’ve gotten with this talent. If a coach can turn Ted Ginn into a top receiving threat and develop a fifth round cornerback into a Defensive Player of the Year candidate, then it’s hard to argue that he doesn’t deserve this award. It’s closer than the final results will probably end up looking, but Rivera is the right choice in the end.

Offensive Player of the Year

Who Should Win: Antonio Brown

Who Will Win: I have no clue

This is the most awkward award of them all, because no one can really seem to agree on a definition. Since every year the MVP goes to the best offensive player, it often seems redundant to give this award as well. So in the past it has become sort of a runner up MVP, which means it would go to either Cam Newton or Carson Palmer. But at times the voters seem to forget all about this and hand it off to whoever wins the MVP, meaning it will again go to either Newton or Palmer. (You’ll have to scroll down a couple inches to find out who I actually think will win. I’m sure the suspense is killing you.)

I think at some point soon we need to sit down and give a hard definition of this award, and I think we should make this an award for the best non-quarterback in the league. Let the quarterbacks have the MVP every year, and give this award to a running back or wide receiver or offensive lineman (like that is ever going to happen) who dominates at the highest level. And this year that would be Antonio Brown, who finished with 136 catches for 1834 yards, both marks in the top five in league history.

Julio Jones had better numbers, but he did so in a more pass happy offense with a quarterback who played all sixteen games. Brown had to deal with Michael Vick and Landry Jones for four games this season, and he still nearly broke every receiving record in the book. If Roethlisberger had been healthy all year, Brown would have finished with 150 catches for over 2000 yards, and even with the drop in production, he still had the best season of any receiver in the league.

Defensive Player of the Year

Who Should Win: JJ Watt

Who Will Win: JJ Watt

In many ways, a slightly down year has demonstrated just how dominant Watt is when at his best. He was his usual destructive self for the first half of the year, before a broken hand limited his playmaking ability down the stretch. He still finished with a league leading 17.5 sacks, and he was a major part of Houston’s run over the second half of the year.

But if there was a year that someone would challenge him, this was it. Josh Norman took the next step and became one of the best cornerbacks in the league, the clearest case of player growth on a team that leapt to the best record in the NFL. Before a torn ACL ended his season, Tyrann Mathieu showed himself to be every bit the unique playmaking force he was in college. Von Miller led the best defense in the league, Aaron Donald and Khalil Mack took massive steps forward in their second seasons, and Seattle’s defense was filled with its usual depth of athletic playmakers.

And none of them could touch Watt. Even though was injured, even though he wasn’t at his best the entire year, he was still the class of the NFL on the defensive side of the ball. With every season that passes he is moving himself further into the conversation for greatest defensive player of all time, and over the next five years he should be the first name in any conversation for this award.

MVP

Who Should Win: Cam Newton

Who Will Win: Cam Newton

This is another award that has emerged as a consensus after a tumultuous season, and I can’t say I disagree with the outcome. For the past month this has been essentially a two man race, with Carson Palmer and Cam Newton battling for the award as their teams raced for the top overall seed. The final outcome of their teams doesn’t mean a lot to me (though it does to some of the voters), but in the end Newton proved that he deserved the award more than Palmer.

The traditional stats favor Palmer, but once you factor in Newton’s 636 rushing yards and 10 touchdowns, things become a lot closer. And when you sit down and watch the two of them play, it’s hard not to be staggered by the way Newton is performing this year. He is everything to this offense, elevating a mediocre receiving corps and turning a potent running attack into one of the most dangerous in the league. The ball just comes out of his hand different than it does for other quarterbacks, making up for the inability of his receivers to create separation by fitting into windows that other quarterbacks simply can’t hit.

Carolina put together one of the best seasons in recent memory, despite not being all that impressive on paper. Their performance can be attributed to many things, but a great deal of the credit belongs to their coach and quarterback. If everything goes as expected, they will celebrate with well earned hardware, and will be able to move on from the regular season and turn their attention to a playoff run.

2015 Playoff Preview

Okay, we made it. After seventeen long weeks, twenty of the NFL’s teams have been eliminated, and we’ve reached the point where the games really start mattering. Eleven games remain in the season (twelve if you have any interest in the Pro Bowl, which I unfortunately do), and with each game another team will be eliminated until there is only one remaining.

If history has taught us anything, it’s that any one of the twelve remaining teams could go on a run and win this thing. But if history has taught us anything else, it’s that we often overstate the randomness of the NFL postseason. In all likelihood, the winner will come from the group of four or five teams that have established themselves as the best over the course of the season.

But for now, let’s enjoy the delusion of hope. Twelve teams remain, and for each team there are reasons to believe that they can pull it off, and reasons to believe they’ll fall short. You might think while reading this that the order I put these teams in has to do with the chances I see of them winning the Super Bowl, and you’d probably be right.

Minnesota Vikings

Why they can’t win:

It hurts me to start here, but I have to do it. It was a really tight decision between them and the Redskins, and it ended up coming down to the opponents in their path. In order to even make it to the Championship round the Vikings will need to knock off the Seahawks and the Cardinals, arguably the two best teams headed into the playoffs. This is too tall a hill to climb for this talented but inexperienced team. Their potential is still fantastic, and a year or two from now this team can compete for a championship. But as they are now, they should be happy with the experience they can gain.

Why they can win:

Damn it, I still have hope. The Vikings just went into Lambeau Field and beat Aaron Rodgers and the Packers, despite having possibly the worst game of the season from their offense. The Packers game aside, Teddy Bridgewater has been playing well down the stretch, and he can give this offense the boost it needs to complement an elite, and now mostly healthy, defense. The Vikings almost beat the Cardinals a few weeks ago, and they almost beat Denver earlier in the season. It would take a lot of good breaks, but this team isn’t as easy an out as people seem to believe.

Washington Redskins

Why they can’t win:

This one is pretty easy. No playoff team has a worse record than the Redskins, and no team is more of a surprise as a playoff representative. They wouldn’t have even come close to making the playoffs if Tony Romo hadn’t gotten injured, and they only pulled away at the end of the season thanks to the collapses in Philadelphia and New York. A first round exit is almost a formality now, as Packers fans have to consider themselves almost lucky that they lost last week and get to face Washington in the first round.

Why they can win:

Here’s a question I have to pose, one most people will laugh off: What if Washington is actually a good football team? They struggled early in the year, but this is a young roster that really came together down the stretch, behind a quarterback who has strung together enough good games that we have to at least consider that he’s turned the corner. This is a team that won six of its final eight games, two more than the team they are facing on Sunday. For reasons both on and off the field we have all written off the Redskins as a joke, but they are a much better football team than anyone is giving them credit for.

Houston Texans

Why they can’t win:

This is going to be a recurring theme in the AFC, but there’s no point in running from it. The quarterback position is an absolute mess on that side of the playoff field, and even though Houston isn’t in the worst shape, the roster they have around Brian Hoyer is probably the weakest of any team. They pulled away in a weak division, but they are going to be facing a new level of competition in the playoffs, demanding even more of stars JJ Watt and DeAndre Hopkins. These two have the ability to take over games, but this is not an effective formula for four straight victories.

Why they can win:

Hoyer is a problem, but as I made clear above, this is a common theme in the AFC. And of the other teams, only Pittsburgh and Cincinnati can boast a weapon on par with DeAndre Hopkins. If their defense can turn the game into a slog, a few big plays from Hopkins can singlehandedly carry this team against any opponent. And again, the path in the AFC is so much easier than in the NFC, putting them ahead of better teams like Minnesota and Washington.

Green Bay Packers

Why they can’t win:

It seems like we’ve been waiting half the season for Green Bay to come out of their funk, and maybe by this point we should just accept that this is a flawed team. It took a while for the loss of Jordy Nelson to catch up to them, but once their offensive line started struggling with injuries the weakness at wide receiver really showed up. Randall Cobb has been perplexingly mediocre this year, and Davante Adams is one of the worst starting receivers in the NFL. Add to that the inconsistencies of Eddie Lacy, and even Aaron Rodgers has struggled to make this offense run. They have the potential to pull it together, but it may be too late now for them to turn things around, especially with the difficult road through the NFC.

Why they can win:

Still, Aaron Rodgers. He’s been the best quarterback in the league for the past five seasons, and a bad stretch of games hasn’t changed the awe inspiring and terror inducing abilities he possesses. The offense isn’t as good as it was a couple years ago, but the defense has improved in that time, enough that even a mildly spectacular performance from their quarterback can be enough to win this team a game against any foe in the league.

Pittsburgh Steelers

Why they can’t win:

A few weeks ago I called the Steelers secondary “the worst in the league, and possibly the worst I’ve ever seen”, and even after a successful playoff push, I am not going to back down from this statement. Their pass defense is dreadful, and I’ve long since given up hope that they will come to their senses and get Antwon Blake the hell off the field, despite the fact that their defense has improved significantly each of the past three games when he went out in the second half (once to injury, twice to temporary benching). No other playoff competitor has any part of their team that is even close to as bad as Pittsburgh’s secondary (except possibly Seattle’s offensive line), and this could prove a fatal blow to an otherwise stacked team.

Why they can win:

If there’s a year to have a bad pass defense in the playoffs, this is it. The most dangerous quarterback the Steelers will have to worry about beating prior to the Super Bowl is a beaten up Tom Brady on an offense devoid of weapons, a task that might even be within their limited capacities. And even if they can’t hold the opponents down, they can keep up with anyone in a shootout. Ben Roethlisberger is the best quarterback in the AFC, and he has a case to make as the best in the entire playoff field. And Antonio Brown somehow just keeps getting better, the most dangerous offensive weapon in the league playing with a quarterback who knows how to feed him the football.

Kansas City Chiefs

Why they can’t win:

I just, I just can’t get over Alex Smith. He has played remarkably well this year, definitely the best season of his career, but it’s still hard for me to believe that a 31 year old quarterback has completely reinvented himself in a way that can make a significant difference. It would be one thing if he was just riding a strong running game and an elite defense, but without Jamaal Charles he is the heart of their offense, in a lot of ways the best thing they have going for them. Sooner or later, the Chiefs are going to need him to make plays down the stretch to win the game, and until he’s shown he can make those plays, I just can’t see it happening.

Why they can win:

They’ve won ten straight right now, so what’s another four? Over the second half of the season no team was playing as well as Kansas City, and with a shaky AFC field they could easily keep their momentum going. Not only that, they’ve done most of it without their best defensive player, and the return of Justin Houston can only give their defense a boost. I’ve questioned Smith in the past, but right now he is the third best starting quarterback in the AFC field. He nearly led San Francisco to a Super Bowl four years ago, and the Chiefs have the same makeup as the team he just barely fell short with.

Cincinnati Bengals

Why they can’t win:

Sorry to be repetitive, but again, quarterback issues. We still don’t know if Andy Dalton will make it back for this Saturday’s game, and if they’re stuck with AJ McCarron they’ll be trotting out the worst quarterback in an abysmal group. It doesn’t help that they’ll start out matched up against a Steelers team that thrashed them only a month ago and probably should have won the first time they played earlier in the season.

Why they can win:

Experience losing playoff games is still experience in playoff games, and that gives Cincinnati a leg up against some of the other teams. I’ve been skeptical of their roster in the past, but it is probably the most complete in the AFC field. Dalton was playing extremely well prior to his injury, and if he can conjure some of that early season magic, he can challenge Smith for the title of third best quarterback in the AFC, a serious threat behind the best offensive line in the conference and supported by the second best defense.

Denver Broncos

Why they can’t win:

This actually hurts. Peyton Manning has been one of my favorite players to watch play in my lifetime, and I consider him to be the greatest quarterback of all time. More often than not I found myself cheering for him when the playoffs came around, and the inability of his teams to get him over the top was frustrating beyond end. It’s sad then that the best defense he has ever played with happened to come together in the year when he finally fell apart. Give Manning this defense in Indianapolis—or even two years ago in Denver—and he would have won multiple Super Bowls. But now he may not even be starting for the Broncos, potentially still benched behind a quarterback who has shown flashes but simply isn’t capable of leading this team where it needs to go. One of the best defenses in recent memory was paired with the greatest quarterback of all time, and the timing simply didn’t work out.

Why they can win:

It feels weird to try to follow that up with optimism, but here I go. That defense I mentioned is good—very, very, very good. They have a pair of elite pass rushers, a dominant run stuffing line, and three top notch cornerbacks on the back end. Against the offenses they will face in the AFC, they can keep things into a low scoring slog, and if they can get even a flash from Manning, they have a chance to win any game. We haven’t seen a quarterback this bad win a Super Bowl since the 2002 Buccaneers, but we may not have seen a defense this good since the 2002 Buccaneers. It will take a lot for a defense to carry a team to a championship in this era, but this might just be the team that can pull it off.

Seattle Seahawks

Why they can’t win:

The first round bye is incredibly underrated, and it’s part of the reason Seattle is below the team they humiliated just two days ago. The other part is their offensive line, which is an absolute disaster right now. Everyone is leaping onto Seattle’s bandwagon after their win over the Cardinals, seemingly oblivious to the fact that this was a team that was handled by the Rams less than ten days ago. This is the worst Seahawks team we’ve seen in four years, and they will face an uphill fight in a conference led by two teams that have done a fairly good job matching up with the Seahawks over the past three seasons.

Why they can win:

I don’t need to get too deep into this point, since everyone else is shouting it from the rooftops. Seattle has played extremely well after a slow start to the season, looking at times like the most dominant team in the league. If they gave an MVP for the second half of the season, Russell Wilson would get it in a landslide. And they’ll be getting Marshawn Lynch back, adding a running dynamic to an offense that has been a world destroying machine for two months now.

Arizona Cardinals

Why they can’t win:

The formula to beat Seattle is clear, and last Sunday, Arizona couldn’t pull it off. Even going against a battered version of one of the worst offensive lines in the league, they could not find a way to pressure Russell Wilson. He was free to stand in the pocket and wait for his receivers to come open, against a secondary missing its most dynamic playmaker in Tyrann Mathieu. Other teams are more than capable of copying this formula, and against the elite quarterbacks in the NFC field, the lack of a pass rush will force Arizona to win shootout after shootout in order to come out on top.

Why they can win:

This past Sunday’s game shook things up, but until then there was a very strong case to be made for Arizona as the best team in the league. They combine an explosive offense with a playmaking defense in a way no other team in the league can, and they constantly force opposing defenses to play on their heels to defend them. The Seahawks game was a good wakeup call for a defense that is more than capable of bouncing back, especially if matchups break their way. Top to bottom there may not be a more complete team in the playoffs, and they are more than capable of beating any foe set in their path.

Carolina Panthers

Why they can’t win:

It’s been a remarkable run for Carolina, but this entire time it seemed like there was something off about it. They aren’t loaded with talent like Denver or New England, and they haven’t won games with the authority of the Cardinals. An easy schedule got them a lot of wins, but as the season went on it became a running joke each weak to ask if the Panthers were the worst X-0 team of all time. When they finally went down to the Falcons, it wasn’t the great upset a 14-0 team losing usually is. The talent on this team isn’t overwhelming, there are obvious holes on both sides of the ball, and there is a general sense that their record overstates how good they actually are. Sooner or later, that is bound to catch up with them, and no one would be particularly surprised if they wind up facing the Seahawks as underdogs two weeks from now.

Why they can win:

Much has been made of Carolina’s weak schedule, but they do boast victories over both Seattle and Green Bay. They have home field advantage on their side, they have the MVP under center, and they have a defense that consistently churns out new superstars each year. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a number one seed so overlooked (other than the one seed in the AFC this year), and at a certain point we may just have to accept that the Carolina Panthers are a really, really good football team.

New England Patriots

Why they can’t win:

This team is battered, and this team is flawed, and there is only so much that Bill Belichick can do to hold things together. Even if Julian Edelman can make it back, there’s no guarantee that he will be the player we’re used to seeing. This offense has been stripped bare, both in the weapons department and along the offensive line. Rob Gronkowski and Tom Brady are still incredible, but they can’t carry an offense by themselves, not against the elite teams they will have to beat to claim another title.

Why they can win:

New England isn’t as good as some of the teams above them on the list, but they have by far the easiest path. It’s often an oversimplification to break a game down as a matchup of quarterbacks, but when this team is going to be putting Tom Brady out against a field of backups and journeyman veterans (assuming they can dodge Ben Roethlisberger), the disparity should be enough to decide games. Add to that a first round bye, championship experience, and possibly the greatest coach in NFL history, and the Patriots have to be considered the favorites to win the Super Bowl, if only because of they have the best odds of making it there.

What to Watch in Week 17

This post has become an annual Week 17 tradition, and it is one of my favorite to write. The final week of the season is always one of the most exciting of the year, with the sixteen prior weeks of football culminating in either heartbreak or a postponement of heartbreak for another couple of weeks. Everything is on the line this weekend, and all eyes will go to the games with major playoff implications.

Of course, this means no one will be paying attention to the other games, the ones where there is absolutely nothing at stake. These games will be quickly ignored and even more quickly forgotten, and at a certain point we have to wonder why they even bother playing them. This is how an average fan feels about these games, and they are 100 percent correct. Unfortunately, I am not an average fan. My fanhood is probably best described as “an unhealthy obsession”, which means that I’m going to watch every game I can, no matter how meaningless it is.

This year we are facing an extreme case. Of the twelve playoff spots, ten have already been claimed, and it would be nothing short of a miracle if Indianapolis managed to claim the AFC South. In reality, the only games that affect who makes the playoffs are Pittsburgh at Cleveland and the Jets at Buffalo.

Besides that, there are some matters of seeding at stake. The Broncos could end up with the top seed if all goes right, or they could wind up with the sixth. The Bengals are fighting for a first round bye, while Carolina and Arizona are competing for the top seed in the NFC. And of course, Minnesota and Green Bay will play the night game for the NFC North title.

All total, that gives us two games that will decide who makes the playoffs (again, not counting Indianapolis’s pipe dream) along with seven games that affect seeding. That leaves us with seven games, seven games that will be played regardless of how little anyone cares. I’ll mostly focus on the relevant games, but I’m sure I’ll flip to these games at some point, and when I do, this is what I’ll be watching for.

Tennessee Titans @ Indianapolis Colts

Why to Watch: First Overall Pick

Whatever you do, do not watch this game when the Colts are on offense. We have all seen far, far to much of both Ryan Lindley and Josh Freeman at quarterback, and the fact that the Colts have gone from Andrew Luck to this pair of options over the course of the season is one of the great tragedies in the NFL this year. No one wants this season to be done more than the Colts, and unless something utterly insane happens, they’ll get their wish at the end of this weekend.

And with Marcus Mariota out on the other side of the field, there isn’t much reason to watch Tennessee either. Of all the games this weekend, this is probably the hardest to justify turning on. The only thing that salvages it is that there is something at stake in this game. With a loss the Titans will claim the first overall selection in next year’s draft, giving them the opportunity to have their pick of all the available prospects.

For other teams this might be more meaningful, but since the Titans already have a commitment at quarterback, they have less need to jump ahead of the other bottom feeders. There isn’t one player who jumps out as a desperate need for them, and even if they win and end up with the number two selection, they’ll probably get the player they want the most. So yeah, this game is pretty meaningless. But I promise the rest have better reasoning.

Jacksonville Jaguars @ Houston Texans

Why to Watch: The Offense of the Future

I know there’s still a long way to go and a lot of moves to be made, but clear me a spot on the 2016 Jaguars bandwagon. They will have the opportunity to add a quality player in the first round of the draft, and they will be getting Dante Fowler back after he missed his entire rookie season with a torn ACL. Fowler is, if you’ll recall, one of the players I had in the conversation for the best available last year, along with Amari Cooper and Todd Gurley. (I spent last week going over predictions I got wrong, so let me pat myself on the back for these two, okay?)

But the real treat in Jacksonville, both for the present and the future, is their offense. The jury is still very much out on Blake Bortles, but he has made strides in his second year after looking like he didn’t belong in the league for much of his first. And while the offensive line in front of him is still a disaster, the weapons he has to work with stack up with any in the league.

TJ Yeldon has exceeded expectations at running back, and Denard Robinson is always an interesting change of pace option. Marqise Lee is a talented young receiver, and he is only the third option in the passing game. Allen Hurns would be drawing praise as one of the best young talents in the league was it not for his teammate Allen Robinson, who has already established himself as possibly the most dangerous deep ball threat in the league. His speed is functional at best, but his ball skills are second to none, his strength and length making him almost uncoverable at times. And of all the names I just gave, Robinson is the aged veteran of the group, at 25 years old. This offense is good, this offense is young, and as much fun as it is to watch now, it is only going to get better.

Washington Redskins @ Dallas Cowboys

Why to Watch: The New Kirk Cousins

I don’t think it’s come as a surprise to anyone that the Redskins are entering the final week of the season with nothing to play for. Of course, we all figured that would be because they’d been eliminated five weeks ago. Instead they are the only team in the league to be locked into a specific seed, and the only affect this weekend will have on them will be whether they host either Minnesota, Seattle, or Green Bay in the first round.

There is absolutely nothing worth watching on the Dallas side of the ball right now, so if this game comes on, you should take a closer look at the team headed for the playoffs. In particular, watch their quarterback, the biggest reason for their recent run of success. There was never any doubt that Kirk Cousins could play at a high level, but through the first three seasons of his career he had a consistent flaw that held him back. Through his first three years he threw interceptions on 4.7% of his passes, an ungodly high rate. And early in the year, it looked like not much had changed, throwing eight interceptions in his first six games as the Redskins got off to a 2-4 start.

In the nine games since then, things have changed completely. He’s thrown only three interceptions in that span, and his success has been crucial to Washington’s late season push for the division title. Nine games doesn’t undo everything that came before, and it is very possible that he could fall back into his old habits. Washington’s success going forward depends on Cousins, and every game he plays is crucial to that future. The longer this goes on, the more faith we can have in Cousins as an option for the future, but one bad game could reveal just how unlikely and unsustainable this recent run has been.

New Orleans Saints @ Atlanta Falcons

Why to Watch: Star Power

Sometimes bad football teams can be fun to watch just because they have some good players. The Saints have a dreadful run defense in front of a historically bad pass defense, but on offense they still have Drew Brees slinging the ball around, even though he’s playing injured and has reached the point where his Hall of Fame abilities have started to decline. And guarding him is one of the unheralded up and coming stars in the league, a young offensive tackle with otherworldly athleticism and almost unlimited upside. Terron Armstead has been playing at a Pro Bowl level this season, and you might want to take a look at him one last time before you forget his name over the offseason.

The Falcons boast the one true defensive star in this game, the somehow still unappreciated Desmond Trufant. Trufant has been one of the best cornerbacks in the league over the past two years, and he is only going to get better, as he is just now finishing his third season. But he won’t be enough to stop this game from devolving into a shootout, boosted by Julio Jones on the Falcons offense. This game will see a lot of points scored, and it will be a lot of fun, even if the quality of football being played will occasionally border on unwatchable.

Detroit Lions @ Chicago Bears

Why to Watch: The End in Detroit?

For a team that hasn’t had a lot of success, the Lions have been one of the more stable franchises in the league over the past seven years. Calvin Johnson and Matthew Stafford have been the faces of this franchise since 2009, and it’s hard to imagine a Lions team without their two highest paid players.

But that could very easily be a reality going forward. Johnson and Stafford have been the primary pieces of this roster for the past several years, but their heavy contracts also severely limited the team’s abilities to add to their roster. They lost Ndamukong Suh in a large part due to the money they had tied up in their two offensive stars, and now that Johnson has started to show signs of age, the Lions have to consider tearing things down and starting from scratch. For the first time they will actually be able to save money by releasing these two players ($11 million next year for each of them, potentially more if they designate them as post June 1^st cuts).

Releasing these players is an option, and even though I don’t think it’s a likely or reasonable one, it’s still something we should be aware of going forward. These two formed the core of one of the league’s most exciting offenses just a couple years ago, and this could be their last chance to play together. If it is, they have a chance to go out with quite a splash, facing off against one of the league’s most vulnerable defenses in a game that will draw as much disinterest as any in the league.

  

St Louis Rams @ San Francisco 49ers

Why to Watch: Gabbert Time

This one is pretty tough too. I suppose you can watch the Rams go for an 8-8 record, but you can do that every year. This Rams team is the definition of stagnation, and you won’t miss out on much (or gain much) by waiting eight months to see the exact same team next year.

So I guess we have to look to the 49ers for a reason to watch this game, and fortunately they have provided a good one. Seven weeks ago they announced that Blaine Gabbert was taking over as their starting quarterback, a move no one could have expected would actually last for the rest of the season. But Gabbert has been remarkably competent since taking over, a major step up from the utter disaster he was in Jacksonville. He’s been good enough that people have started to wonder if he might be worth a hard look as their quarterback option for next year.

This will be a good game to look at to evaluate whether Gabbert has truly grown. In Jacksonville his biggest issue was his inability to handle pressure, and so far this year his best games have come against Arizona, Atlanta, Cleveland, and Chicago, teams with no hint of a pass rush. That won’t be the case against St Louis who, even without Robert Quinn, still have one of the most dangerous fronts in the league. Chris Long has been underrated for years, William Hayes almost singlehandedly beat Seattle last week, and Aaron Donald is one of the top five defensive players in the league. And they’ll all be coming after Gabbert on Sunday. If he can handle this, then he may be worth consideration going forward. But there’s also the chance that the same old Gabbert reveals himself, and that the 49ers are in even worse shape than we believe.

Philadelphia Eagles @ New York Giants

Why to Watch: What Will Philly Become?

I’m not going to argue that the Eagles made a mistake firing Chip Kelly (they did, but that’s for another time), but I think we can all acknowledge that Philadelphia is in a very bad place right now. For the past three years—most obviously in the past year, but even before that—this team was turned over to one of the most unique minds in football, a man with a very particular way of doing things and an eventually fatal stubborn devotion to his plan. This team was never what Kelly wanted it to be, but it got close, and now that they are tearing things down, it’s hard to see a clear path for them going forward.

They will likely sleepwalk through this game, as will their opponents and most of the fans who end up watching it. The rest of their staff is remaining intact for the final week of the season, and they aren’t going to radically overhaul their schemes for a meaningless final game. But now that we know that Kelly isn’t coming back, we can look at this team from a new perspective.

The most obvious question is what the hell they are going to do at quarterback. The contract they gave DeMarco Murray means they are likely stuck with him for the foreseeable future, and there isn’t much they can do to overhaul their defense. But Sam Bradford is a free agent, and with no other obvious solutions available, the Eagles still might want to bring him back. He has been quietly solid over the second half of the year, and even though he’s no long term solution, he can be a bridge if Philadelphia feels the need to once again tear down and reshape its roster.