NFL Playoffs 2015: Odds, Predictions for Divisional Round Bracket
The lesson of Wild Card Weekend: (Almost) always bet on the better quarterback. In three of the weekend's four games, the team with the more talented quarterback prevailed.
While there are mitigating circumstances in each case—most notably the Cardinals being down to third-stringer Ryan Lindley—the general rule reared its head.
Carolina's Cam Newton accounted for two touchdowns while Lindley turned in one of the worst playoff performances in history. Andrew Luck may have played the best game of his career as Andy Dalton suffered a fourth straight January failure. Tony Romo bucked narratives and in the process may have foisted them on Matthew Stafford, who turned the ball over three times in the second half.
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The lone outlier was Joe Flacco outperforming Ben Roethlisberger, which shouldn't be much of a surprise at this point. Flacco and John Harbaugh have an uncanny ability to win their first postseason game; they're 6-0 in such contests. By any objective measure, Roethlisberger is the better quarterback. But after years of regular-season and playoff battles, to see either of the Steelers or Ravens win against the other is far from a shock.
Heading into the Divisional Round, the quarterback theory gets a little more murky. Tom Brady vs. Flacco and Russell Wilson vs. Newton are calls most people would generally agree upon, and Aaron Rodgers would topple Romo in most seasons. But Luck vs. Peyton Manning? At this point it's hard to tell. And 2014 Romo vs. 2014 Rodgers? You're talking about the two most efficient quarterbacks in football.
It appears, unfortunately, that our analysis will need more nuance. [Grumbles under breath about all this extra WORK]
With that in mind, let's take a look at each matchup and give an early assessment.
Baltimore Ravens at New England Patriots (-7)
At the risk of looking like an imbecile a week from now, I don't see any scenarios in which the Patriots lose this game. Darrelle Revis and Brandon Browner give the Patriots a dimension on defense they haven't had since their Super Bowl heyday. And it's shown.
New England enters the postseason with Football Outsiders' No. 11 defense in DVOA, its best ranking since the 2007 undefeated campaign. The Pats are uncharacteristically steady against both the run and pass, and they've gotten better as the season went along. After posting the NFL's fifth-worst run defense during the first half, New England has been its second-best during the second, per Football Outsiders' premium database.
“I worked my tail off just to get back and play football like I know how to play, and I never take anything for granted,” defensive tackle Vince Wilfork, who re-emerged as a Pro Bowl caliber player as the season progressed, told The Associated Press. “It’s fun to come to work with the group of guys that I have in this locker room.”
The Patriots will take on a Baltimore offense that's been among the NFL's most underrated units all season. Flacco cut his interceptions by 10 from 2013 (22 to 12) and set a career-high in passing touchdowns (27) and QBR (67.3). The Ravens rank sixth in pass offense DVOA and have been a top-10 unit all season. You don't have to squint too hard to say Flacco has become...elite.
"Joe Flacco, what can you say," Harbaugh told reporters. "He's the best quarterback in football. We'll take him any day of the week, twice on Sunday or Saturday if that be the case."
Flacco is joined by the resurgent Justin Forsett and Steve Smith Sr., each of whom had their careers rejuvenated this season. Forsett was NFL flotsam before a combination of Ray Rice's exit and the ineffectiveness of his replacements propelled him into the starting lineup. The Panthers, in desperate need of receiving help, actually paid money for Smith not to play for them this season.
Statistically, this is a far more even matchup than anyone in Boston would like to hear. Baltimore is slightly better defensively thanks to its engulfing run defense. New England is a step better on the other side of the ball thanks to one Mr. Brady.
The seven-point spread seems overzealous, and I expect this game to be close. But you're asking someone to bet against Tom Brady and the best all-around Patriots team in more than half a decade playing at Gillette Stadium. Not happening in this space.
Score: Patriots 27, Ravens 24
Carolina Panthers at Seattle Seahawks (-11)
This almost feels like the Panthers are being put out to pasture in the cruelest way possible. In Seattle. In front of those fans. Against the best team in football. At night. The only way that place could possibly get any louder is if the NBA promised to bring the Sonics back with a Seahawks victory.
It will be by far the most difficult environment Newton has ever played in. And, yes, I'm including Newton's trip to Tuscaloosa during his storybook season at Auburn, SEC fans. This will be worse.
Much has been made both about the Panthers' 8-8-1 overall record and their five-game winning streak. Some use the overall record as evidence that this team didn't belong playing January football in the first place. Others use the recent run of wins as evidence that yada yada "any given Sunday."
I'd like to shift the conversation to the teams Carolina actually beat, which should give us more realistic expectations for Saturday night. The opponents in Carolina's five-game winning streak were a combined 33-47 during the regular season. Only one of those teams had a winning record, and it's entirely unfair to call the iteration of the Cardinals that showed up a "winning" team.
Arizona may have fielded the single worst playoff offense in NFL history last week. Lindley isn't an NFL quarterback. Kerwynn Williams isn't painting the town red with blazing speed or dumping a bucket on the world with his power. For all the "Poor Fitzgerald" sentiments that have been thrown around in recent years, he's 31 years old and hasn't gone over the 1,000-yard mark since 2011. Perhaps it's time we realize Larry Fitzgerald is much closer to a No. 2 option at this point in his career.
Factor in the shaky offensive line, and Carolina's waltz is entirely unsurprising. The Panthers turned the ball over three times, committed 80 yards' worth of penalties and had some truly deplorable special teams play and still won by two touchdowns.
This isn't a team that's proven itself equipped to handle the upper echelon of NFC competition. We could cite Seattle's rise to the best defense in football down the stretch, its continued efficiency on the offensive end or look at the recent history of playoff teams traveling to CenturyLink Field to make our pick. Or we could just realize that Carolina's in this spot in large part thanks to lucky schedule breaks and move on.
Score: Seahawks 20, Panthers 10
Dallas Cowboys at Green Bay Packers (-6.5)
First thing: The refereeing at the end of Sunday's Detroit-Dallas game was abysmal. No other word for it. While I find most officiating conspiracies stupid—it's far more likely for someone to lack competence than sinisterly affect a multi-billion-dollar business—the calls were strange enough where you can almost understand the craziness.
Anthony Hitchens committed some defensive violation on Brandon Pettigrew. Holding, pass interference, illegal contact—whatever. An infraction occurred on that play that deserved a flag. That a flag was thrown and then picked up is, well, [shrug emoji].
The positive for non-Lions fans, though, is that the Divisional Round was afforded a much better football game.
Cowboys-Packers packs (sorry) the narrative punch of two of the NFL's greatest offenses going head-to-head in a rematch of the Ice Bowl. Not since the 1967 classic has Dallas visited Green Bay for a playoff game. With temperatures expected to hover in the teens Sunday, per Weather.com, nostalgic fans won't have to look too hard to find an easy comparison.
The product on the field, though, will be a little different. Romo and Rodgers are the only acceptable MVP answers other than J.J. Watt. Rodgers leads the NFL in DVOA, Romo is second. Romo leads the NFL in QBR, Rodgers is second. Each player turned in one of the most statistically brilliant years of his career, with none comparable to 2014 for Romo and only Rodgers' 2011 eclipsing him this season.
Both are backed by good running games and possess top-five wide receivers. Separating the two starts with finding the differences, which begin on the defensive side. The Packers are far from an elite defense. They ranked 16th in DVOA and have been so bad against the run that they've positioned Clay Matthews inside at times to help.
They're still better than Dallas. One of the NFL's thinnest defensive teams to in the preseason, the Cowboys began showing their strain as the season went along. For three quarters, the Lions offense looked as good as it had all year on Sunday, with Stafford hitting a number of throws over the middle and Joique Bell and Reggie Bush having success on the ground.
Seeing as it's been since the Reagan administration since Rodgers has lost at home, the favorites feel like a good bet.
Score: Packers 34, Cowboys 28
Indianapolis Colts at Denver Broncos (-7)
How much stock does one put into an overall body of work versus recent trends? How much does one week of rest help a battered, aging roster pushing for a second straight Super Bowl run? How do you know when the league's future has finally toppled its past?
We'll get answers to some of those questions Sunday.
For a team that won five of its last six games, the Broncos were awful down the stretch. Peyton Manning's oft-maligned wobblers not only lacked velocity but dropped their trademark accuracy. Manning threw for under 300 yards in five of Denver's last six games, a prolonged down stretch that rivals anything he's done in his career.
Although one of those games featured a four-touchdown outing against Miami, something obviously isn't 100 percent right. He threw for five touchdowns against six interceptions following that Dolphins win. That stretch was the main cause of Denver dropping from the NFL's top offense in the first half to seventh in the second.
The difference between "great" and "very good" could be the Broncos' playoff livelihood. John Elway built this roster around Manning's short time frame, pushing salary-cap problems into the future to load the roster for right now. Demaryius Thomas, Emmanuel Sanders and Julius Thomas give him a Big Three of pass-catchers that rival anyone league-wide, and C.J. Anderson has emerged as a serviceable option in the backfield.
Elway also went out and purchased the finest possible defensive free agents money could buy, ostensibly giving Denver the balance it lacked one year ago.
On paper, we're probably looking at a matchup as one-sided as Carolina-Seattle. The Broncos boast boundless Pro Bowlers of past and present, while Luck is forced to make the best out of T.Y. Hilton (good), Daniel Herron (meh), a decomposing Reggie Wayne (nope) and Trent Richardson (HA!). On the defensive side, it's more of the same, with Indy boasting a few foundational stars and the rest in spare parts.
Doesn't matter. Call it a premonition or just recency bias; something is afoul with this Denver team. Look for the Colts to score enough and make key plays in crunch time to get Luck over his remaining hump in the leap to superstardom.
Score: Colts 34, Broncos 24
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Odds via Oddsshark
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