Thursday, January 06, 2011

Chiefs Playoff Week: Seeding and Scheduling

It's not too often that the Chiefs are in the playoffs, and it might not last more than one week. So I'm going to make the most of it.

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One of the quirks of the NFL playoffs is that they re-seed the bracket after each round. What strikes me about this is that the winner of the 4-5 matchup doesn't know who they will face in the divisional round until the 3-6 matchup is decided.

Every year they schedule it so each conference has one game on Saturday and one on Sunday, and they never put both 3-6's or both 4-5's on the same day.

For example last year, the AFC had the 4-5 matchup first. The Jets beat the Bengals. But they didn't know their next opponent. If the Patriots won their Wild Card game, the Jets would go to Indy. But since the Ravens won, Baltimore was the worst seed and went to play the #1 Colts. Which meant the Jets as the #5 went to San Diego.

This year, the NFC has the 4-5 first. So the winner of Seattle-New Orleans will have to wait until Sunday to know if they are headed to Atlanta or Chicago.

It's a weird quirk and I have mixed feelings about it. If I was a fan of a 4-5 team (which I am this year) I'd want to know where my next game would be. But it's also fun to think about the Saints watching the Packers-Eagles game knowing it affects their fate. [For that specific example, Atlanta is tougher than the Bears, but the Saints play better in a dome and just beat the Falcons in Atlanta and lost in the playoffs last time at Soldier Field, so I'm not even sure who they'd prefer to play, if they had the choice.]

As for the Chiefs, both the Steelers and Patriots are tremendously tough matchups on the road. Conventional wisdom says the Patriots are the best team in the NFL and they're 8-0 at home...but, I'm not convinced they're the hardest matchup. The Steelers are so difficult to run against and are so good at blitzing that I don't think the Chiefs could muster 14 points at Heinz Field. They'd almost certainly lose at Gillette Stadium, but maybe they get into the 20's there.

But let's not get ahead of ourselves. I'm just hoping for one playoff win.

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