Rain is in the forecast at all seven outdoor National Football League venues today. Heavy in Washington, Jacksonville, Buffalo and Tampa Bay. While the conditions are wet, they do not carry with them winter conditions that should greatly affect the play on the field.
Last night, the Los Angeles Rams beat the Arizona Cardinals, 13-9. Do they still have to win next week when they host the Seattle Seahawks to claim the NFC West title?
Get your slide rulers out, this is going to be tricky. While a Rams win next week would clinch the division title for Sean McVay’s squad, quite a turnaround from their one win and four losses to start the 2024 season, they could clinch the division title today.
How?
If coming into the week at least three of these teams won and at least one tied the Rams would win the West with their victory over the Cardinals. The six teams that are involved that could affect the Rams playoff possibilities are the Buffalo Bills, Cleveland Browns, Minnesota Vikings, Washington Commanders, San Francisco 49ers and Cincinnati Bengals.
The Bengals have already won, downing the Denver Broncos in overtime on Saturday afternoon. That leaves five teams to determine if the Seahawks, who won on Thursday night in Chicago over the Bears, are alive entering the final week of the season. If the five teams yet to play listed above pick up at least two wins and a tie, the Seahawks are eliminated, and the Rams are playoff bound.
Now, yesterday, some sideline calculations by the Broncos coaching staff based on clinching a playoff berth with a tie came into play. The Broncos rushing offense was denting holes in the Bengals defense most of the game. When they scored a touchdown on a long fourth quarter pass with seconds remaining on the game clock to pull to within one point, the obvious call for a team looking to win would have been to go for a two-point conversion to pull out the victory.
That is what Denver Quarterback Bo Nix was expecting his sideline to call, but what seemed to be a change of heart Broncos Head Coach Sean Payton sent in his kicker to boot the tying extra point and send the contest to overtime.
Why?
Was Payton, like me, laying three points in this game and needed to have the game end on a wider margin than one point?
No.
What he was advised is that the Broncos would earn a Wild Card berth with a tie or win and shouldn’t risk a loss with those two choices available. The Broncos played the overtime period like they were gunning for a tie, and it cost them when the Bengals scored the winning touchdown for a 30-24 decision. Now to earn a postseason bid, the Broncos need to beat the Kansas City Chiefs next week or have the Miami Dolphins and Indianapolis Colts lose at least one of their final two games and the Bengals lose in Pittsburgh next Sunday.
Got that?
Probably best to wait and see what happens and then find out who advances, and which teams are going to start next Monday with their draft preparation.
The public has checked in with their three favorite plays of the day beginning with the Washington Commanders (-3½) over the Atlanta Falcons. The public’s next two most favorite plays this week are the Detroit Lions (-3½) over the San Francisco 49ers on Monday night and the Indianapolis Colts (-8) over the New York Giants today.
The Qoxhi top pick for Week 17 is now posted on this site, and if a Bullet Play develops in the final hour leading up to the day’s first kickoff, that game will be added by 9:45 a.m. Pacific Time.