Houston Texans' Playoff Scenario Changes During Bye Week

The Texans didn’t play this past weekend so I decided to take a bye week as well.

The wife and I flew up to New York to visit some friends, do some touristy stuff, and eat and drink to dangerous levels.

I pretty much ignored football for the weekend and when I got back on Sunday and checked out what was going on, I realized that it only took a few days for my playoff scenarios from the previous week to change significantly. 

Awesome.

Really, though, the majority of the logic still holds.

I said before that one of the Wild Card teams is almost certainly going to come from the AFC North, and that hasn’t changed.  I just got the wrong one.  Maybe.

Cincinnati’s victory over Pittsburgh puts them in the driver’s seat to win the AFC North and their upcoming games are @ Oakland, vs. Cleveland, and vs. Detroit. 

Then they have two tough ones @ Minnesota and @ San Diego before another cakewalk at home against KC. That puts them at worst at 11-4 going into their last game against the Jets.

Pittsburgh has only a slightly tougher road with two games against Baltimore, one vs Green Bay and one at Miami.  The other games are @ KC, vs Oakland, and @ Cleveland. 

Currently sitting at 6-3, I can’t see them going any worse than 11-5 and more likely than not, they’ll be better than that.

None of that matters though because one of them will win the division and one will get the Wild Card.  The Texans would prefer to be competing with the Bengals for the wild card because they hold the tie breaker, but that won’t matter if Cincinnati has a better record.

With respect to Baltimore, although it wasn't pretty on Monday, the Ravens did win.

It’s easy to look at their recent performance and say that they’re spiraling in the wrong direction—I mean before last night’s ugly win against a pathetic Cleveland squad, they had lost four of five—but that might be a mistake as they’ve had a complete bitch of a schedule so far. 

Their only losses have been @ NE, two against Cincinnati, and @ Minnesota, so they may actually be better than their record shows.

Still, they have some tough games on the schedule including Indy at home, two against Pittsburgh, and a December trip to Lambeau.  While their schedule may work in our favor, we cannot write them off just yet.

Add all that up, and the AFC North is pretty much a lock for one of the Wild Card spots and a definite threat to steal both.

Shifting gears, it looks more and more like there’s only going to be one postseason representative from the East.  The Jets and Dolphins are both 4-5 and playing less than inspired ball right now.

The Jets have lost five of six, with their only win coming at Oakland, and they don’t get the benefit of the schedule doubt like Baltimore does. 

Miami, on the other hand, barely squeaked one out at home against a potentially-improving-but-still-bad Tampa Bay team.  In fact, Miami’s only wins on the season are two against the aforementioned Jets, the TB game last week, and a drubbing at home against Buffalo. 

Add in the fact that they may have lost Ronnie Brown for a while—probably their most important offensive player—and I’m just going to wrap up my AFC East discussion right here.

The AFC West only has two teams worth talking about, and they seem to be going in opposite directions.  Last week, I gave the division title to Denver while suggesting that San Diego might be our biggest competition for the Wild Card. 

Um… let’s go ahead and swap that.

Denver lost Kyle Orton last week to an ankle injury and it’s unclear when he might be able to come back.  That puts a major strain on their playoff chances.

Quick aside:  One year ago today, the Broncos were 6-4 and leading the division by two over a Chargers team that had just lost four of six and would lose their next two.  Jay Cutler was playing great and they were essentially a lock for the playoffs. 

What if I told you then that they would miss the playoffs, trade Cutler, and their 2009 playoff hopes would rest on the health of Kyle Orton’s ankle?  Would you try to scam money off of me or just call for an intervention?

Anyway, Denver’s struggling recently and just lost to the Redskins and now sit at 6-3.  They’ve got some tough games coming up against the Chargers, Giants, Colts, and Eagles, so the question may not be if they can finish strong and make the playoffs, but rather if their strong start is enough to hold on the a Wild Card spot?

Still, with two against KC and one against the Raiders, a 10-6 finish is still high in the realm of possibilities.  Then again, they did just lose to the Redskins.

The Texans and Broncos don’t play this year and the second Wild Card tie breaker is wins within the conference.  The Broncos currently lead that category 5-4, so we may need the Broncos to continue their struggles a little more.

That finally brings us to the AFC South.  Unlike some other teams who sit on their asses during their bye week and watch the rest of their division lose, all three of our division opponents won. 

Let’s work from the bottom up. 

The Titans are still pretty much out of the playoff race, but they really scare me right now.  It’s not so much that they’ve won recently against Jacksonville, SF, and Buffalo, it’s that they’ve won convincingly, causing Bud Adams give the quarter-million-dollar bird and forget that his team is still 3-6.

Jacksonville, however, is right in the thick of the playoff race.

And while Indy is pretty much uncatchable, their win against NE hurts; not so much because of division play, but because it makes it more likely that the Patriots final game of the season will be important for them.

Still, if we acknowledge that the AFC North is going to get at least one Wild Card spot and we hope to compete with the second place team in the west for the Wild Card, then the race for second within our division is absolutely critical.

We have our three remaining divisional games in the next three weeks, and at that point, we will pretty much either be in the absolute thick of the race or out of it altogether.

Winning this coming Monday against the Titans is a crucial start, and really this entire article is moot unless we win our games.

Last week, I suggested that we must go at least 2-0 against the Seahawks and Rams, 2-1 against the Titans, Jags, and Dolphins, and 1-1 against the Colts and Pats.

Losing this Monday to the Titans wouldn’t necessarily kill our playoff chances, but winning would really strengthen them.

It would put us at 2-2 within the division and 6-4 on the season.  It would also give us a little more wiggle room against Indianapolis and New England.

All in all, though, the Texans are pretty much in control of their own destiny although a little help will probably be necessary.

Still, this is all pretty much just a long winded way of saying, we have to win the games on our schedule. 

It’s fun to look at all the scenarios and see what needs to happen for us to make the playoffs, but if we don’t win our games, this will be a short-lived recurring article.

Besides, everything will probably just change this weekend anyway.