NFL Playoff Schedule 2015: Super Bowl Bracket, Predictions and TV Info
Marshawn Lynch personifies 2015 Championship Game Weekend.
Quiet off the field, which draws the ire of media, Lynch breaks free of his silence in brutal fashion on it via a sometimes Skittles-induced rage that often encourages defenders to run away from him rather than at him.
As they say, the quiet ones are dangerous. So too are the storylines surrounding the NFC and AFC Championship Games that seem to be under the rug with a new table parked on top.
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These storylines, akin to looking back on a draft class every few years, will make most smack their heads in hindsight.
Don't be the defender who shies away from Lynch barreling down the tracks.
2015 NFL NFC, AFC Championship Schedule, Odds and Super Bowl Bracket
| Green Bay Packers vs. Seattle Seahawks | Sunday, January 18, 3 p.m. | Fox | SEA -8 (47) | GB |
| Indianapolis Colts vs. New England Patriots | Sunday, January 18, 6:30 p.m. | CBS | NE -7 (54) | NE |
Odds courtesy of Odds Shark and accurate as of 9 p.m. ET on Jan. 17.
NFC Championship Game
Storyline Lost in the Shuffle: Rodgers' Non-Injury Woes
Aaron Rodgers is hurt. This is a major ordeal quite impossible to ignore as he prepares his Green Bay Packers for another encounter with the Seattle Seahawks.
The grandiose nature of the matchup itself makes it hard to focus on much else, really. After all, as NFL Network's Andrew Siciliano details, narratives such as this only come around every so often:
Lost, though, is Rodgers mediocrity when things become less than ideal.
Rodgers is elite. By the time he hangs up the cleats, he might just be the best ever. Last week, if not more injured than now, he welcomed a dangerous Dallas team to town in the divisional round and threw a trio of touchdowns.
But lost in the hype and injury chatter is one detail—he was at home. Scratch that, make it two details—he picked apart a mediocre defense, too.
As ESPN Stats & Info breaks down in visual form, Rodgers and the Green Bay offense struggles in an uncanny manner away from home and in the face of solid defenses:
Now the bad news begins to avalanche.
The Seattle defense ranks No. 1 against the pass and No. 3 against the rush. It limited Rodgers to 189 yards and a score in a 36-16 blowout earlier this year. The Packers needed every bit of Rodgers' three touchdown passes to compensate for a miserable defensive showing at home last week.
To top it all off, when Rodgers does take to the air against a defense that sacked him three times in their first encounter, his throws will not only be subjected to his injury, but to potential heavy winds.
Green Bay does not have the ammunition against a Richard Sherman-led defense to keep pace on the road. Forget the injury—Rodgers struggles in these situations when healthy.
Look for something close to a repeat of the first showdown between these two.
Prediction: Seahawks 34, Packers 23
AFC Championship Game
Storyline Lost in the Shuffle: Indianapolis' Run Defense
Where to start?
Some of the storylines surrounding the AFC showdown includes, but are not limited to the following:
- Andrew Luck's beard.
- Andrew Luck's ascension to top AFC quarterback after expelling Manning.
- Tom Brady's final hoo-rah.
- Bill Belichick, the mad scientist.
Quarterbacks make for high ratings. Andrew Luck is the next big thing, something the globe may be witnessing earlier than most anticipated. Tom Brady is one of the best ever, as is his coach.
Lost, though, is the fact that the ground game will decide the game outright.
Forget that the Colts start Daniel "Boom" Herron, a feel-good story for a team that refused for most of the season to admit publicly its Trent Richardson mistake.
This is about the Colts defense, as well as how Belichick will go about exploiting it.
He did just that in Week 11, a grisly 42-20 affair spearheaded by Jonas Gray, who rushed for 201 yards and four touchdowns—before going on to rush for 80 total yards over the course of the next seven games.
“The numbers speak for themselves, and if we don’t get that fixed and they’re able to run the ball the way that they’ve run it the last couple meetings, then we’re going to have a long, hard day,” coach Chuck Pagano said, per Kevin Bowen of Colts.com.
It matters little who gets the call for New England. Gray could re-debut. LeGarrette Blount, who bruised his way to 78 yards and two scores against a strong Detroit defense in November, could get the nod. Shane Vereen could receive more than eight carries in a game for the first time since the second day of November.
No matter what the Patriots decide to do, the Colts had better be game. It matters little if Luck is on fire or Herron keeps his fumbles down and produces well again. If the Patriots control the game in sloppy, rainy conditions, Brady will only be more effective going over the top.
Were this in Indianapolis, perhaps the final prediction would be a tad closer.
Then again, the Week 11 blowout was.
Prediction: Patriots 38, Colts 30
Stats courtesy of NFL.com. Advanced metrics via Pro Football Focus.
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