Week 14 Mess

Let's start with the Chiefs. They're not just not a very good team right now. 

By point differential they are 6th in the league, by record 7th in the league. But they've lost 3 of their last 4 since returning from Germany. Here's how many points the Chiefs have put up in their last 6 games: 9, 21, 17, 31, 19, 17.

It's penalties, it's drops, it's losing the turnover battle. Poor execution in general. Last week they started losing players on defense to injury, and the WR room is so bad you would think it's been decimated by injuries, but nope, these are the starters. They can hang with anyone, but can also lose to anyone. If they were playing the 49ers right now on a neutral field, I think the line should be 49ers -7.5 or something like that. 

They're going to win the AFC West, but could easily be the 3-seed, even if they win out. 

The silver lining? The teams ahead of them don't inspire playoff confidence. The Ravens simply do not seem that strong and Lamar is 1-3 in the playoffs and has the history of blowing the 1-seed. The Dolphins might have the talent to get to the Super Bowl, but they still have to stay healthy and put it together. I'm still more scared of the Bills. (I would very much like to avoid them in the wild-card round. There are so many dogshit AFC teams, please avoid playing Buffalo again.)

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The playoff picture is a mess. The only way to sort it out? Let's start with some Cross-Offs. 

AFC

Cross-Offs: Patriots, Titans, Jets, Raiders, Chargers

Division Winners: Ravens, Dolphins, Chiefs, Jaguars

Wild-Card Hopefuls: That leaves 7 teams fighting for 3 wild-card spots. 

And it really is a mess. Here are the teams in order of my judgement of quality:

Bills, Texans, Browns, Bengals, Broncos, Colts, Steelers

The Steelers just shit the bed twice in a row against gimme teams. I know the Texans had a bad game yesterday, but they also beat the Broncos head to head. Bills, Texans, Browns seem likely but Flacco? The Bengals seemed fine without Burrow yesterday, so maybe them. Who knows?

Does any AFC team seem like they can win the Super Bowl?

NFC

Cross-Offs: Panthers, Cardinals, Commanders, Giants, Bears

Playoff Teams: 49ers, Eagles, Cowboys, Lions, NFC South winner

Wild-Card Teams: Packers, Rams

I don't think the Vikings with Jefferson hurt again and Nick Mullens at QB can do it. 

I think the Falcons/Saints/Bucs are fighting for the division spot but not for a wild-card spot. Still holding out hope for the Falcons like an idiot. 

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Here's how Vegas ranks the only 6 teams with less than 10-1 odds:

SF

Baltimore

Miami

3-way tie: Philly, Dallas, KC

Here's my takeaway. The NFC is top heavy. The AFC is wide open. Could be the year with a 5th seed Bills, 7th seed Bengals or 4th seed Chiefs sneak in to the Super Bowl to face the 49ers/Eagles/Cowboys in the Super Bowl.