AFC Playoff Picture

This conference has weakened. The tide has now turned back in favor of the NFC. We will find out for sure in February though.

Let's start with the AFC East. New England has already clinched and probably will get the No. 1 seed in the bracket. The interesting thing is that the Patriots are probably better off playing in a dome or in some warm weather spot then at Foxboro. They obviously want to win home field and that would close their season on an eight game winning streak. That being said, the defense is just horrible. How can Bill not get this thing right? It's part personnel too. But man can Brady just light up the scoreboard. Try getting down 14-0 to them. We'll see what happens but the Patriots are going to be the betting favorite in the AFC but I still think it will be Baltimore or Pittsburgh. I just don't see New England beating both of these teams.

Next up is the AFC North. Baltimore or Pittsburgh? Baltimore, you know, could have run the table and finished 13-3 and gotten the No. 1 seed. Instead they lost but caught a big break when the Steelers lost too. There is no way they make that mistake again. They will finish 12-4 and win the AFC North and the potential No. 2 seed. Pittsburgh will obviously end up being the five seed. They should be focused on team healing going into the tournament.

As for the AFC South, Houston was the one team that you should feel bad for. The injuries are just so much and they still have 10 wins. Yates has done ok but he is still a late-round rookie quarterback. If they somehow could have run the table and gotten the one seed, then they would have at least gotten a chance. I don't think that they are going to go very far. If Houston wins out the No. 2 seed is their's.

That brings us to Denver in the AFC West. They kind of win by default here. They are going to win one of their next two and finish 9-7 here. Oakland doesn't have it in them.

For the Wild Card teams. We know Pittsburgh is going to be one of them. The Jets still feel like the other one. Even though we have them losing to the Giants, it's possible they can come out and run the ball down the throat of the G-Men. However, they can even lose to the Giants as long as they beat Miami in Week 17 and the Raiders lose one of their last two games and the Bengals lose to Baltimore in Week 17. So I'm still picking the Jets for the six seed. They will get crushed in Baltimore in round one. The Jets (or whoever is the six seed) desperately need Houston to lose one of their last two so that the Texans are the No. 3 seed instead of the Ravens.