Playoffs, baby! The NFL season is on its way into a very hot phase, starting with the Wildcard weekend! The Kansas City Chiefs receive Tennessee, the Buffalo Bills are allowed to Jacksonville, and the NFC hosts New Orleans thrilling duels against Carolina and Rams vs. Atlanta. Who’s moving into the divisional round? What about the Eagles without Carson Wentz? And who’s gonna play him and win the Super Bowl? In the Super Bowl Panel, mySPOX users will discuss Butfumlbe93, Daniel (operator NFLGermany) and SPOX editors Marcus Blumberg and Adrian Franke.
Daniel (operator NFLGermany):…. Kansas City and Jacksonville. The Chiefs caused a sensation right from the start of the season and surprised almost everyone with their impressive victory in Week 1 at the Patriots. After winning the first five games all together, Alex Smith’s side returned with a small break with only one win from the following seven games, but Alex Smith’s team came back to claim the crown in AFC West. Against Smith, Kelce and Hunt I clearly see the Tennessee Titans at a disadvantage. The other game is won by the Jaguars: In the duel between two teams who haven’t been able to sniff playoff air for ages, I find Buffalo a little out of place in the playoffs. Whether it’s the trades of many top performers or the temporary loss of confidence in Quarterback Tyrod Taylor – in the end, the Bills are somewhat surprisingly in the postseason and will not only be eliminated due to a shattered LeSean McCoy and an outstanding Jaguars defense.
Marcus Blumberg (SPOX): Yes, the picture in the AFC seems to me to be quite manageable. The Chiefs receive the Titans, who have reached the playoffs with difficulty. How? No one really knows, considering the boring play calling. On the other hand, however, the Chiefs have at least rediscovered some of their season’s early season magic, which is why they will probably have an easy time playing with Tennessee. The game on Sunday could have been quite interesting, but since McCoy will either be out of order or at least not at 100 percent, the Bills will be robbed of their biggest weapon. As a result, Tyrod Taylor has to do more with his arm than he might have wished for, which is no easy task against the Jaguar’s passport defence. The defense of the Jags alone should be good enough in this case to effectively obscure the work of Blake Bortles. The Jaguars beat the Bills!
mySPOX-User Butfumlbe93: I’m going with them, the Jaguars and Chiefs are in the running. And that’s not because they both would have been so convincing – their opponents are simply the weakest teams of the post-season. And it’s not even close. According to DVOA, they are the only playoffs teams that have played below average in terms of effectiveness. This is also reflected in the point difference. Here, Titans (-22) and Bills (-57) are in the lower half of the league, while Jags (+122) and KC (+76) rank among the top 10. The Titan-Offense is cruel to look at due to the dust-dry scheme. Mariota gets zero support, but she is disappointed and even massively disappointed. DeMarco Murray threatens to fail and so the hopes rest on Derrick Henry, who comes in the last quarter of the season on ridiculous 2.3 yards per run. Sounds great! The already mentioned McCoy injury makes the game in Jacksonville even more difficult, against this pass defense there is for Taylor and Co. little to take. Buffalo’s only ray of hope: Blake Bortles’ interim high seems to have passed.
Adrian Franke (SPOX): That is indeed the great hope for Buffalo, even before McCoy and his own Run Game:”Already weeks ago I had predicted – admittedly, not exactly a courageous prediction – that the Jags would come into the playoffs – and be sunk there by Blake Bortles. I’ll stick to it, the only question is whether this really happens against this Bills team. And the answer to that question is presumably no. My tip is rather that we see in this game a small renaissance of the Jags-Run-Game, in the Run-Defense Buffalo was one of the weakest teams this season. Jacksonville manages to take the game out of Bortles’ hands again and his own defense, which finally defended the run in a disciplined way against Tennessee, takes care of the rest. The Chiefs Titans game is the most obvious on paper for me. Kansas City’s Downfield Passing Game and the Run Game have woken up again and the Titans don’t have the means and especially not the Scheme quality to take advantage of the Chiefs problems in the Pass Defense. As soon as KC reaches ten points, this game is over.
Page 1: The AFC Wildcard games win…
Page 2: The NFC Wildcard games win…
Page 3: The Eagles are One-and-Done
Page 4: Becomes the playoff X-factor…
Page 5: Playing in the Super Bowl and winning the Super Bowl…