I'm hoping for a Bills/Vikings matchup as well. I think it's one of the likeliest outcomes, too.

I like the Vikings on Sunday. Detroit's defense has given up 30+ in three of the last four games. And in the game they didn't, they played the Bears. Either way, a 14-3 team going on the road in the first week of the playoffs is insane.

I think I might've picked Tampa to beat Green Bay. I wouldn't pick them against Minnesota or Detroit, though. That Bucs team is good.

I can't see the Rams beating anyone. They have a -14 point differential and whatever team they play in the playoffs will have at least a +122 point differential. To say they're smoke and mirrors would be understatement.

I think most of you long-time football Fwooshers probably know I grew up a big Ohio State fan. It was a good day for me.

Goddamn is the playoff committee terrible at ranking the teams, though. I think Ohio State would've blown Oregon off the field under any circumstances, but why were the Ducks rewarded for their undefeated season with a QF matchup against no worse than the third-best team in the country? How Penn State or Texas was ranked above them will remain a mystery to me.

I won't even mention the inclusion of SMU or Clemson. Horrendous.

Ohio State fans have been calling for Ryan Day's head (foolishly, in my opinion), but he'd do well to shut them up with a National Championship this year. They really should beat Texas and whoever reaches the final.

So while I detest Ohio State as my least favorite college football program  -  it used to be Alabama but then Saban left and Alabama lost 3 games this season and missed the playoffs so they slipped to number 2 on the "hated" list - but I totally agree that Ohio State was seeded way too low overall.   

It was too bad the rematch between Oregon and Ohio State came as early as it did.   I think it would have been nicer to see Ohio State boat race Boise State or Arizona State first and let Oregon shake off the rust against Notre Dame or even Penn State again.   I think Oregon beats either of those teams.    And then we get a good Semi-Final re-match between Ohio State and Oregon.   

As it is now Ohio State is going to beat the living shit out of Texas next week.   Texas isn't even that good.  And watching them have to go to double Overtime to beat Arizona State should have them worried.   OSU should be licking it's chops.

Hopefully for me Georgia beats the brakes off Notre Dame tonight (ND is another team I freaking hate) and then clobbers Penn State next week.    I definitely don't want an Ohio State Championship and the only team that has even a remote chance of beating them is Georgia.    I think OSU would still be favored in that match up,  but at least Georgia can play defense and maybe can duplicate a little of what Michigan did against them.    Alot of that would also depend on how ready Georgia's sophomore QB really is to take the reigns.   

If it pans out the way I laid out above it would be two two-loss teams playing each other for the national title,  something entirely unthinkable a decade ago.   

I kind of hate that this has sort of lined up perfectly for a 2 loss OSU team to win the title.    It has me longing for the old pre-playoff days when Oregon would have gone into the Rose Bowl undefeated and played Penn State (again) or Indiana (lol)...   and then just been crowned the champion by the writers and coaches because they were undefeated.   

Of course I only long for that because a team I hate is set to profit from the new format.   

On an entirely different note -  I am laughing out loud at the 49ers schedule for next year.   They could legitimately go 14-3 or better

They obviously have their 6 division games but I guarantee they don't go 1-5  (or 2-4, Josh Dobbs could beat Arizona on Sunday I guess) in the division again next season.   But their non-divisional opponents are laughable:

Home:  Falcons, Panthers, Jaguars, Titans, Bears

Road:   Saints, Buccaneers, Texans, Colts, Giants, Browns

That has to be one of the easiest schedules ever assembled for anyone.  The AFC and NFC south and then the Bears, Browns and Giants.     

As an Ohio State fan, I'm aware of the hate. I don't fully understand it, though. I get that dominant teams are always hated. I'm desperate for Pat Mahomes to replace Brady as the GOAT and even I'm sick of the Chiefs. While OSU has owned the Big 10, they only have two national championships since 2000. That's less than LSU. It's the same number as Florida and Florida State. They don't stack up against Alabama's six, Clemson's two in three years, or Georgia's back-to-backs.

As far as the playoffs, we'll see. I think OSU should win the title, but ESPN's analytics model actually gives Texas a slight edge (50.8% chance) to win the game. I'm more concerned about Texas than Penn State or ND. I was also more worried about the Cardinals in 2015 than the Broncos, and we saw how that turned out. Worse yet, I can't stand PSU or ND. It'd be a dagger to the heart to lose to either of them.

That Niners schedule is absurd. The NFC and AFC South are probably the two weakest divisions in football.

So.. i'll acknowledge that my OSU hate is outsized and potentially irrational.   Chalk it up to family acquaintances from my youth who were OSU fans and were super obnoxious about it and then my absolute and total disgust for Urban Meyer    I hate that guy with a deep and fiery passion.   I cant watch any gameday program he's a part of and will root against any program foolish enough to bring him on as a coach in the future.  So it holds over.   And now they beat Oregon and took their best chance at a title away, so the hate persists.

And damnit.. Notre Dame took out Georgia.   So, I guess I have to root for Penn State now as the least awful of the remaining options.   Ugh... this is a final 4 from my nightmares.   It could only be worse if Alabama was there instead of Penn State.  

If OSU loses to Texas, I'll be rooting hard for Texas. I lump PSU in with Baylor as colleges that shouldn't have football programs anymore.

Yeah... it's hard to root for Penn State when you know what Paterno was covering up there... 

Like I said this is 4 programs I actively don't like left in the final 4 -  so it's a sophie's choice conundrum trying to pick a team to root for.   I guess I could root for Texas to win -  taking the Natty in it's first year in the SEC would be a big statement.    

That's why I really wanted Oregon to pull it off -  to win the Big 10  championship and the National Championship in their first season in the Big 10.     I feel like the Pac-12 got so little respect nationally for a long time.   So for Oregon to move to the Big 10 and win that conference immediately, and for Arizona State to move to the Big 12 and win that conference immediately  were big for me.    If Oregon could have not been rusty and beat Ohio State and if Arizona State could have pulled off that upset of Texas in triple overtime -  that would have been an even bigger, more amazing statement about the former Pac 12.    Sigh... 

Now instead I get my final 4 from hell.    Like I said, the only way it could be worse is if Alabama were in it too.   

And this Sunday I get to watch Josh Dobbs play against the Arizona Cardinals in a game that is fairly meaningless,  but in which we'll probably stumble into a stupid win that costs us like three or 4 draft spots... for real if we win and Indy and Dallas lose we drop from 11th to 14th on the draft board due to a harder strength of schedule.  So that's the stupid thing that's going to happen in a cursed year for my squad.

Lions/Vikings wound up being a battle of two top-five coaches. I never would've guessed that about Campbell when he was hired. I remember a lot of people (myself included) mocked the hire when it was made.

People will stick a fork in the Vikings now, but chances are they'll have another shot at Detroit in two weeks. They left a lot of points on the field, including several should-have-been-TDs and a pick-six. Not to mention KOC kicking a field goal instead of going for it on 4th and 3. I actually like their chances in a rematch.

For round one, I'll take:

LAC over HOU
BAL over PIT
BUF over DEN

MIN over LAR
TB over WAS
PHI over GB

First -  glad-ish that my prediction of the Niners winning a game they should lose didn't come to pass.   It was a little weird seeing the Cardinals play ALL of their starters for that entire game when the Niners were resting almost all of theirs.   The Cardinals played like they had the playoffs on the line in a game that was meaningless and they were lucky they didn't have any of their stars suffer major injury.

I think your picks in the AFC make sense.    I really like the Chargers, and Houston has looked like a hot mess for the back half of the season -  but I'll be honest,  the Texans post-season experience has me a little nervous.   Still of those match ups I think the Chargers are the only road team with a chance.

In the NFC the Vikings should beat the Rams -  but the Rams beat up on the Vikings already once this season handing Minnesota their only non-Detroit loss of the year.   So if anyone has the right game plan for that Minnesota defense it's McVay.     I am not 100% convinced Minnesota is a lock to go to LA and win.   

Tampa vs Washington should be fascinating.   I don't have a ton of trust in Tampa to win honestly.   The Commanders aren't great but they are winners of 5 straight including a big win over the Eagles in that stretch.    They lost to Tampa in the first game of the year so may want a little get back.     Tampa is weird -  they won a terrible division,  but they had impressive wins this season beating the Lions, Eagles and Chargers.    But they also had losses to the 49ers and Cowboys and twice to the Falcons...    It depends which of those Bucs teams shows up I guess.   

It's hard to imagine the Packers at Eagles being particularly close.    Green Bay had 11 wins this year but 8 of those were going 4-0 against the awful AFC South and the mediocre NFC West.   Their other 3 wins were the Bears, Saints and Dolphins.       Literally the only playoff team they beat all season long was the Rams - who were missing both Cooper Kupp and Puka Nakua in that game and the Texans - who they beat by 2 points.     The Packers aren't actually that good this year and I think the Eagles may embarrass them on Sunday.

Well... on the one hand it looks like it's shaping up to be two of my three least favorite college football programs playing for the national championship...  I guess at least it's not Alabama vs Ohio State.

On the other hand, it looks like I'll get to root for my dad's favorite college football team in that game and root for a black head coach to win the national championship for the first time in history.     

And of course I still get to root against Ohio State two more times, so at least there's something.

I can't believe there are real Ohio State fans who wanted Ryan Day fired. The guy is neurotic when it comes to Michigan, but he's clearly one of the best in the business.

I've hated Notre Dame my entire life. I hope OSU puts up 100.

Posted by: @tsi

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Lions/Vikings wound up being a battle of two top-five coaches. I never would've guessed that about Campbell when he was hired. I remember a lot of people (myself included) mocked the hire when it was made.

People will stick a fork in the Vikings now, but chances are they'll have another shot at Detroit in two weeks. They left a lot of points on the field, including several should-have-been-TDs and a pick-six. Not to mention KOC kicking a field goal instead of going for it on 4th and 3. I actually like their chances in a rematch.

For round one, I'll take:

LAC over HOU
BAL over PIT
BUF over DEN

MIN over LAR
TB over WAS
PHI over GB

So the top 4 seeds in the AFC are through.   Hopefully I can put the play of my Bills down to a tiny bit of rust since most of the starters rested the final game.   However that first half was not great.   Lucky for the Bills it was a team that just squeaked into the playoffs and a rookie quarterback.  It is going to be scary next week against Baltimore.

Now let's see how KC does after a long rest.  I don't have much hope for Houston, but the long rest may be the only thing that could work in their favour if KC is a bit slow to get started in the game.

Currently almost through the third quarter in the Philly/Green Bay and it could be a similar outcome to the other games so far.   Slow until the later part of the second half and now Philly might be picking up the pace on offense.

I think Tampa will beat Washington tonight and Minnesota will be the Rams tomorrow.

Adding another seed (often an undeserving one) hurt the quality of the Wild Card games. Most of them aren't competitive. I rarely look forward to watching any of them anymore.

Good coaching and QB play covered a lot of holes in that LAC roster all season. That said, Houston's d looked good. I think the Chiefs will struggle next week.

I think the Lions beat the stuffing out of the Commanders next week. That team isn't good.

Baltimore/Buffalo and Minnesota/Philly should be awesome games.

Posted by: @canprime

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 Hopefully I can put the play of my Bills down to a tiny bit of rust since most of the starters rested the final game.   However that first half was not great.   Lucky for the Bills it was a team that just squeaked into the playoffs and a rookie quarterback.  It is going to be scary next week against Baltimore.

It is legitimately hilarious to me that you are expressing concern about the Bills performance in a 31 to 7 blowout win in the playoffs against a Broncos defense that was legitimately very, very good.   

The Broncos allowed the 7th fewest total yards this season,  the second fewest touchdowns, were the third best red zone defense, the third best defense against the run, third best total scoring defense....  and the Bills put up 31 on them and you feel like that was disappointing?    Perhaps your expectations for your team are unrealistic.

The Broncos defense is better than the Ravens defense - that's the good news for the Bills.  The bad news is that the Ravens offense is much better than the Broncos offense and the Bills defense hasn't been great... although they have been much better after getting Milano back.

I feel a little bad for the Rams tonight -  already it was tough for them going against at 14 win Vikings team as the wild card but then to lose their home game and have it moved to Arizona is rough.    It's not like people in the LA area don't have other things on their mind right now,  and some of those people who could make a Monday night game in LA may not have the same ability to fly to Phoenix for a game on a weeknight.    

Still, I'm curious to see if the Sam Darnold that showed up for week 18 against the Lions is the one we see in the bright lights of a playoff game.   Darnold looked awful in what was an important game last weekend -  if he looks similarly awful tonight Minnesota is in trouble.    McVay and Stafford have been here before -  Darnold never has.   The Vikings could face plant this one and make the handoff to their new QB next year easier.      I remain intrigued.   

Honestly the Eagles offense was NOT impressive yesterday.  Barkley was fine  but Hurts was entirely underwhelming and if Jordan Love could take care of the football at all, maybe that game is closer.   Turning into an interception machine isn't a great look and ending your post season last year with a back breaking interception and then the multiple Int's to give it away yesterday... oof.    

I think the Eagles could be beatable - and honestly if Darnold can rebound and be good -  the Vikings defense is good enough they could give the Eagles problems.   The Rams are hard to predict.  Sometimes the defense is effective and sometimes they can't get out of their own way.   but I like Stafford's chances against Philly's rookie DB's, as good as they've been.     And I have to hope for that because I detest Siriani that much.

And I'm sorry TSI -  but I hope Notre Dame hangs that 100 on your Buckeyes instead.   I hope they beat Ohio State so badly Ryan Day resigns because he can't face coaching another game.   I hope Ohio State loses so badly they consider suspending their football program for a year just to shake off the bad mojo.   I don't expect any of that to happen and I'm afraid Ohio State will mud stomp Notre Dame the same way they have mud stomped everyone else in this playoff -  but I hope it's the opposite.   I hope Notre Dame channels that Michigan defense performance and keeps Ohio State out of the end zone entirely.   I would love Notre Dame to be blowing them out so badly that people are turning it off in the third quarter.    

Honest to god -  if it's an Ohio State National Championship followed by a Kansas City vs Philadelphia Super Bowl that might be one of the worst Football endings ever.    Gah.

@panthercult Well to be fair it wasn't a blow out until the 4th quarter.   At the half it was only 10-7 and the Broncos defense was doing pretty well against the Bills.   It also could have been 10-10 at the half if not for the "doink" off the uprights.  

Then it was still a one score game until 3 minutes left in the third.   Then it took a hell of a catch on a fourth down call that probably should have been a field goal to go up two scores.   So yeah they took the chance and got the touchdown.  However a couple of inches and they would have been looking at a one score game late in the third.  

The Bills also ran the ball a lot more than usual which is great.   However it took them a good while to get it in gear, and they were helped by a rookie QB, and team, who couldn't take advantage of opportunities, and had a number of dropped/missed passes.   They won't get as lucky against Baltimore and Lamar.

The good thing is the defense looked better than in previous weeks, and the game is in Buffalo.   So my expectations are "tempered" to say the least.   But yeah as a Bills fan I have to have some level of lowered expectations (hey a MADTV reference!!) because while they are good, and Allen is having a great year.   They have yet to get out of the conference with Allen and they are going up against the other MVP contender quarterback next week.

I agree about Philly.   Neither Love or Hurts looked particularly special in the game.  Now maybe it is nagging injuries, etc.   However Philly got the win and did look a bit better in the final stretch so, again, maybe just getting back into the groove?

I am not sure if I am really surprised by Tampa/Washington, but I did think Tampa would win.   Still it was a fun game, and nothing like ending a game on a field goal to win.

It will be interesting to see tonight.  I don't think the fires in LA are a huge motivator for performance, at least going off what happened with the Chargers.   And I agree that the travel to Arizona kills the home field advantage.  So it will probably come down to Darnold and Stafford.   I mean I got to see Stafford in all his glory against my Bills so I can't say that he can't do it.   Same with Darnold.   I mean a bad week against the Lions isn't necessarily indicative of performance, and the Vikings are 14-3 versus the Rams who are 10-7.   Also the Rams didn't end the season on a great note either against Seattle.   

Hopefully either way it is a good game.