The divisional playoffs. The second round. Some might say, "where the playoffs REALLY begin". Wild Card weekend is when the pretenders sort themselves out and whittle themselves down, and where the occasional anomaly amongst them suddenly gets hot, emerges from the pack, and goes on an unlikely deep playoff run. Last season we didn't see much of that, as only the San Diego Chargers could really be said to have been a Wild Card-caliber team that advanced past round one. Over in the NFC, the 49ers and Saints were technically Wild Cards, but they were both Super Bowl contenders, as both demonstrated in epic battles with the eventual Champion Seattle Seahawks. So last year went pretty much according to seeding form.
But in light of recent playoff history, going according to seeding form is the exception, and it looks like this year's playoffs are reverting to the usual chaos.
Okay, so the absence of Le'Veon Bell made a bigger difference to the Pittsburgh Steelers than I and the experts thought it would. It was like all the lugnuts on a wheel shot off all at once, like shrapnel. Without Bell, the Steelers couldn't run (only 68 yards); without a running game, Ben Roethlisberger (31 of 45, 334 yards, 1 TD, 2 picks) became a potted plant in the collapsing pocket (5 sacks), his receivers suddenly couldn't get open, and the league's #2 offense ground to a halt, putting pressure on their average-at-best defense. In retrospect, it's remarkable, even astounding, that Pittsburgh managed to win eleven games based upon the presence of a single player.
But that alone doesn't account for the Baltimore Ravens' 30-17 victory. Out went the pedestrian regular season play of quarterback Joe Flacco and back in came the Super Bowl XLVII MVP Joe Flacco (18 of 29, 259 yards, 2 TDs). Even more out of the clear blue sky came the LOB-esque play of a patchwork #23 secondary of also-rans, retreads, palookas, and tomato cans that suddenly suffocated the NFL's second-best passing attack like Saran Wrap. And the pass rush that hadn't been there was suddenly like a Chinese fire drill, led by Elvis Dumervil's two baggings of Roethlisberger. A team that barely scraped into the playoffs as the AFC's #6 seed suddenly looks, without rhyme or reason, like its 2012 counterpart that went all the way.
So how does one analyze today's matchup between the Ravens and the top-seeded, AFC East Champion New England Patriots at the Big Razor? Beats me. On paper Pats QB Tom Brady should pick apart and overwhelm Baltimore's also-rans, retreads, palookas, and tomato cans and that should be the end of it. But the way Team Intangible looked last week, it may be Joe Flacco and Steve Smith against the Patriots' #17 pass defense that is the more consequential matchup.
I'm a by-the-numbers as opposed to by-the-gut prognosticator, and the Pats, unlike the Steelers, don't have any key players missing, so I can't go against Bill Belichik and Tom Brady at home....
Baltimore
New England* (-7)
....but don't be surprised if this AFC divisional playoff unfolds eerily similar to how the '12 AFC Championship Game did.
This game is as much of a mismatch as it looks. The World Champions are four games better, #1 in rushing offense, total defense, passing defense, and second in rushing defense of the eight teams left in the playoffs, clearly superior in every category except passing offense, which will always be misleading because Seattle throws the ball less than any other team in the league. The Panthers are a young team that last week picked up its first playoff win since the 2005 NFC divisional playoffs, the next week after which they got blown out in the NFC title game at.....Seattle. Carolina is much improved defensively from where they were a couple of months ago but are still only "meh" against the run, and quarterback Cam Newton is what one writer described this week as "mercurial". Tonight's contest at CenturyLink Field should not be a pleasant experience for the visitors from Mayberry country.
And yet the past three years, while the Seahawks have won the trio of regular season meetings, they've all been low-scoring defensive struggles (16-12 in '12, 12-7 last year, 13-9 back in Week 8). And Carolina held second-half leads in each of those games, including a fourth-quarter lead this year that required the only touchdown drive of the game for Seattle late in the fourth quarter to pull out and escape Charlotte with the win. Similar to the St. Louis Rams, the Panthers are simply a tough matchup for the Champs, regardless of record.
But there are three very important differences today: the game is in Seattle, not back East; this is January (i.e. the playoffs), not September or October; and unlike the Panthers' last five consecutive victims, the Seahawks are neither a fellow NFC South dumpster fire nor a collapsing football team led by a fraud (Cleveland and Johnny Manziel) or a third-string Arena League-caliber quarterback (Arizona and Ryan Lindley). Carolina will be facing the World Champions at CenturyLink, the most intimidating building in the league where Cam Newton has never before played, in the highest-pressure situation he's ever experienced. And even though the Panthers are "playing with house money" this year as opposed to last, where the pressure got to them in a bad loss at home to the 49ers, I think that combination will be far too much for the tar-heeled visitors to overcome.
Carolina has had a nice run, and laid the foundation for a bounce-back season in 2015. But that run will come to a nominally competitive but nonetheless brutal end.
Carolina
Seattle* (-11)
This, of course, is why our game is not the marquis NFC game of the weekend. And that other NFC divisional playoff, in turn, may be the harbinger of bad tidings to come.
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