NFL's Wacky Playoff Seeding Needs Major Reboot: While parity is preferred, the NFL's top teams deserve their due in the postseason.
While it was entertaining see the 7-9 Seahawks host and beat the 11-5 Saints in a wild-card tilt five seasons ago, it's hardly a model to strive for. It's time to blow up the machine.
Why should this year's Redskins -- or anyone from the NFC East -- be handed the fourth seed and a home game in January? Why should the moribund AFC South keep the Chiefs, Steelers or Jets out of the playoffs?
Division rivalries matter, but if the best club in the NFC East finishes 7-9, they don't deserve an invite to the party.
We asked Bill Smith of NFL Research to help recast the playoffs using two formats. The first, below, uses the NFL's current tie-breaking system to give fans the six best teams in each conference, regardless of division standings. Here's how it would look after Week 14 in the AFC:
Colts need 10 things to break right for playoff berth
By Dan Hanzus
Around the NFL Writer
Updated: Dec. 28, 2015 at 04:38 p.m.
The Colts are dealing with a good news/bad news situation as they head toward the final week of the regular season.
Let's start with the good news. Everybody likes good news. The Colts remain mathematically alive to make the playoffs. That's pretty good news, right? But here's the bad news, and yeah, it's pretty bad: There is no freaking way the Colts will make the playoffs.
The Texans' win on Sunday against the Titans gives Houston at least a tie in each of the first five tiebreakers, according to ESPN.com. The Colts need to tie the fifth tiebreaker -- strength of victory -- then come out on top in the sixth tiebreaker, strength of schedule.
So how does that happen? Well, 10 separate things need to break Indy's way to save the season. Ten! Here's what has to happen:
» Colts win over Titans
» Jaguars win over Texans
» Broncos win over Bengals in Week 16
» Ravens win over Bengals in Week 17
» Bills win over Jets
» Falcons win over Saints
» Broncos win over Chargers
» Dolphins win over Patriots
» Steelers win over Browns
» Raiders win over Chiefs
According to ESPN, there is a 0.03 percent chance of all this falling the Colts' way -- 3,326-to-1 odds. These are bad odds.
Heroes: Long-Picked-On Passers Turning Week 16 Into A Carnival Of Anti-Logic
There was a time when the name Brandon Weeden exclusively conjured images of a beguiled 30-something ginger trapped under our nation's flag:
Three years later, the oft-ridiculed Weeden is the toast of Houston after guiding the Texans to the brink of an AFC South title with Sunday's nearly perfect performance in a 34-6 wipeout of the Titans. Coming into the game with 11 straight losing starts, Weeden won his first tilt in 1,113 days, putting on ice the slings and arrows he's endured since entering the league as an aged rookie. It was especially intriguing to see Weeden become the first player in Texans history to throw for two scores and rush for a touchdown in a single start while Dallas -- the team that released him in November -- floundered with Kellen Moore under center:
Cowboys QBs this season, ranked by passer rating:
Brandon Weeden 92.1
Tony Romo 79.4
Matt Cassel 70.6
Kellen Moore 45.5
Then again, it was the Texans who sent Ryan Mallett packing after one-too-many broken alarm clocks, only to see the enigmatic passer lead the lowly Ravens to a stunning win over the Steelers, a loss that put Pittsburgh into potential playoff oblivion. The well-rested Mallett threw the ball a whopping 41 times for 274 yards and a score against a bewildered Steelers defense still wondering what hit them.
The soon-to-be-dead Colts are an impossible watch, but who predicted in August that old-as-the-woods Matt Hasselbeck would join forces with Clipboard Jesus to win a game in December? Probably the same group of all-knowing seers who put their money on Case Keenum slaughtering the previously white-hot 'Hawks.
As if concussions will end football. Now that is a pipe dream. Anyone who believes that should live on planet earth for a few months and witness the chase for money.
Kelly didn't have close relationships with many of his players, and former Eagles running back LeSean McCoy and cornerback Brandon Boykin were critical of him after he traded them.
Lurie said he wants "someone who interacts and communicates very clearly with everyone he works with."
