There’s on real playoff spot open in the AFC. Every other team is fighting for seeding. The Patriots win and they lock up the bye. The Patriots lose and the Chiefs win, that two seed goes to Kansas City. The Chiefs lose and the Texans win then Houston gets the three seed. The point is that every single one of those teams is safe. Even the Buffalo Bills are safe. The six seed in the AFC is not obvious. There are three teams fighting for one spot. Here, we’ll rank their chances as well as which team would be the best team to make the playoffs. We’ll go worst to first.
Oakland Raiders
The Raiders need to first beat the Broncos in Denver. That’s not easy as the Broncos have been playing well since Drew Lock took over. If Oakland can steal a victory, they also need the Steelers and Titans to both lose. The Steelers are playing the Ravens. The Ravens aren’t playing most of their key talent. The Titans are playing the Texans. There’s no reason for the Texans to play anyone important if they can’t improve their seeding. That would be very Texans for the team to play Deshaun Watson or even force Will Fuller or DeAndre Hopkins onto the field.
Even if all the above happens for the Raiders, Oakland would still need the Colts to beat the Jaguars to win the final spot on a tiebreaker.
The fact is, unless you’re a Raiders fan, you probably don’t want to see the Raiders make the playoffs. They aren’t ready yet. They aren’t going to be competitive rolling into Kansas City, Foxborough or Houston for a first-round game. There’s no chance the Raiders could end up playing another game in the Oakland Coliseum. The Raiders making the playoffs would be lambs to the slaughter. No need to seeing that happen.
Pittsburgh Steelers
It’s simple: the Steelers need to beat the resting Ravens in Baltimore and have the Texans beat the Titans. I can make it more complicated if you wish because the Steelers still get the sixth seed if they lose, the Titans lose, the Raiders lose, and the Colts beat the Jaguars. If the Jaguars beat the colts — and all those losses happen — the Titans will actually go to the playoffs. This sixth seed is tough to figure out.
If the Steelers can’t beat the Ravens backups, they probably don’t deserve to make the playoffs anyway. The Duck Hodges honeymoon is over, but the Steelers have no other option at quarterback since Mason Rudolph is out for the season. That’s why we probably don’t want to see Pittsburgh in the playoffs. They will lose their first-round game with their limited offense unless the defense can make the game extremely ugly.
That defense is something though. Minkah Fitzpatrick forcing turnovers every game has slowed down a bit, but he’s changed the entire Steelers defense. T.J. Watt should either finish as Defensive Player of the Year or come very close to the top of that award’s list. It would be tough to upset the Chiefs, but maybe the Steelers could scare the Patriots or Texans. Still, the best option for the sixth seed is the most obvious.
Tennessee Titans
For weeks, we were told by experts who didn’t like the Patriots or Texans, that Tennesee was actually the third-best team in the AFC. Once the Titans made the chance to Ryan Tannehill, they were an unstoppable force of an offense. Some of their numbers backed that up. Tannehill was hitting passes at over 70-percent and his yard-per-attempt was insanely high. The thing is the Titans weren’t exactly crushing world-beaters. Tennesee is currently 1-3 against teams that are making the playoffs in the 2019 season.
The Titans do have the 13th best DVOA going into Week 17. That puts them ahead of both the Steelers (18) and Raiders (24). It also puts them ahead of the Texans (15) and just behind the Bills (11).
The point is that the Titans are the best team remaining that could grab that final seed if the AFC. They’ve already beaten the Chiefs, and they could give Kansas City a good game in the six-three matchup. If they found out a way to win that first-round game, they may even give the Ravens a tough game — at least tougher than the Steelers or Raiders could. Basically, Patriots fans should be cheering for the Titans to make the playoffs because it’s the only possible way the AFC Title game would ever get played in Foxborough — and yes I am considering the Texans. They would get smoked by Baltimore in Baltimore. It already happened.
So if you want competitive games, you should be cheering for the Titans for the sixth seed. We would get rejuvenated Tannehill, Tractorcito Derrick Henry, a good defense, and a possible Mike Vrabel mustache.
