NFC 1. Seattle Seahawks, 5-0 2. Chicago Bears, 5-1 3. Tampa Bay Buccaneers, 4-2 4. Dallas Cowboys, 2-3 5. Green Bay Packers, 4-1 6. Los Angeles Rams, 4-2 7. New Orleans Saints, 3-2 Outside looking in: Arizona Cardinals (3-2), Carolina Panthers (3-3), San Francisco 49ers (3-3) AFC 1. Pittsburgh Steelers, 5-0 2. Tennessee Titans, 5-0 3. Kansas City Chiefs, 4-1 4. Buffalo Bills, 4-1 5. Baltimore Ravens, 5-1 6. Cleveland Browns, 4-2 7. Indianapolis Colts, 4-2 Outside looking in: Las Vegas Raiders (3-2), Miami Dolphins (3-3) You're reading that right folks; Miami is one game behind the #6/7 seed and 1.5 games behind the Bills for the division. The Chiefs have the Bills tonight as well, meaning we might end this week only a half-game back. It's way too early to start talking playoffs though...or is it?
It might be too early but damn it feels good to even be dreaming a little bit. This is the best I’ve felt about our team in a long time!
I was wondering when someone was going to bring this up again. It is way way way too early to even think about playoffs but I will admit, the thought briefly crossed my mind last night. Maybe for about half a second but still.
You have very winnable games against the Rams, Cards, Bengals, Chargers and another Jets game. That gets them to 8 wins. Then games against Raiders, Patriots and Broncos games that will be competitive toss-ups. Then the other Bills game and a Chiefs game that they'll be huge dogs. It's quite possible to see them win 10 games, but they have to win all the games they should win and a few they shouldn't. The second half against the Jets was pretty underwhelming offensive-wise. You could say that they took their foot off the pedal, but Fitzpatrick isn't going to be $$$ all season. What's encouraging is that the Defence is rounding into form. L's against Buffalo and Seattle were 100% the Defence's fault. Perhaps a level of improvement there is what they needed.
I take part of that back. The Seattle Loss is partially on the offence refusing to score touchdowns and settling for Field Goals. You felt the Ghost of Tony Sporano haunting that game. But they had the lead against the Bills and gave up two soul-sucking TDs immediately after.
Yeah, I'm not really thinking about playoffs at this point either, but I posted anyway to get some people excited. We're usually not seeing our team peaking this early either though! There's 10 games left and a ton of football to play still, but I'll keep this thread updated as long as it's relevant.
It's never too early for fans to discuss the playoffs. The team yes, fans...no. Like I said before the season my expectation is to hover around .500 most of the year, so a small push in either direction could make or break the season in terms of playoffs. Goal one is always to get back to .500 when you are under, so goal one has been accomplished. Now we want to get on the right side of it where it takes a loss to pull you back rather than a win to get even. If we go to 4-3 I will start to look at the playoffs as a realistic but unlikely goal for this team. If we go back to 3-4 my sights as a fan will be in us getting back to even again.
I can literally see us getting on the I can actually see us getting on the right side of .500. The Rams I think are suspect. Granted, when we defeated the 49ers, we did so against a depleted defense. I understand that but, the 49ers were able to relatively move the ball effectively against the Rams defense. They didn't get anything with us! We shut their offense down like a Covid lockdown! If we were able to do that, I don't see the Rams' offense being much of a threat and with how our offense has been playing overall, I actually believe we can move the ball against the Rams' defense. We just need to get a bit more effective running the ball between the tackles and set up play action. Arizona after that in Arizona worries me. We historically don't do well going out to the left coast and Cardinals aren't playing "bad" football. Tonight's game against the Cowboys will be one of interest to me. After that comes the Chargers in Miami. Hopefully we're going to give Herbert a PROPER welcome to the NFL!
How do we fair on the next Buffalo game? If we win that game then I think it's a possibility worth talking about.
The Bills have a walk in the park next week against the Jests but after that, their schedule gets a bit tougher and will be tell tale. They host the Patriots, then the Seahawks and then go to the desert to take on the Cardinals. If they come out of this 4 game stretch on top, then the are indeed the real deal. If they're exposed...and we continue to improve as we have been?
The Bills are definitely "for real" this season, so it would probably take 11+ wins to take the division (I'm guestimating the Bills at 10-6 or 11-5). Could the Dolphins be a 12 win team this year? Probably not since that's finishing the year with just one more loss total. But with the extra playoff spot, 8 wins possibly gets us in and 9 would give us a really good chance. I definitely like our chances of winning 6 or 7 more games. 8 Sun, Nov 1 vs Los Angeles 1:00 PM 9 Sun, Nov 8 @ Arizona 4:25 PM 10 Sun, Nov 15 vs Los Angeles 4:05 PM 11 Sun, Nov 22 @ Denver 4:05 PM 12 Sun, Nov 29 @ New York 1:00 PM 13 Sun, Dec 6 vs Cincinnati 1:00 PM 14 Sun, Dec 13 vs Kansas City 1:00 PM 15 Sun, Dec 20 vs New England 1:00 PM 16 Sun, Dec 27 @ Las Vegas (TBD) 17 Sun, Jan 3 @ Buffalo 1:00 PM I like our chances against both LA teams, the Bengals, the Jets, & Denver. Arizona is also winnable and so is the 2nd Pats game...hopefully we split there. Honestly, I think we have a legit chance of winning the next 6! KC, Buffalo and Vegas should be losses but luckily they're at the very end, so maybe by that time we're treating them like playoff games and on a different level. With the Dolphins team from the past 3 weeks, I can see us winning 9 or 10 going into that final game. And if that happens, maybe we're playing Buffalo in week 17 for the division. Again, it's way too early but it could be a pretty exciting finale to the season. One other thing to consider though is "Tua Time"....we'll likely be a different team when he actually takes over. Maybe that equals a few extra wins or losses, it's impossible to predict from a rookie.
Well, we play them at Buffalo in Week 17, so after that game is over we should have a really good idea!