NFL Picks Week 16: Could Kansas City Win the AFC West This Weekend?

The AFC West-leading Kansas City Chiefs return to Arrowhead Stadium this weekend to face the Tennessee Titans, a team that seems to have found a winning groove with the return of Kerry Collins.

For most, the winner of this game is already a foregone conclusion. The assumption is that Kansas City should pull away with this one.

This seems like a fair guess to me. The Kansas City Chiefs outclass the Titans in most aspects of the game, and they also need to win out in order to secure the AFC West title.

That having been said, though, don't expect this one to be totally one-sided (for the record, I'm picking Tennessee as the upset).

In any case, though, assuming that the Kansas City Chiefs do secure the victory against the Titans, does this essentially mean that they walk away with the AFC West?

Don't get too far ahead of yourself, but it certainly is possible.

Take a look at the remaining schedule for the Chiefs:

• vs. Tennessee (I'm picking Tennessee in a close one.)
• vs. Oakland (Oakland won in overtime in Oakland in the last meeting. It's hard to expect the same.)

Now, look at the schedule for the San Diego Chargers, the second place AFC West team:

• at Cincinnati
• at Denver

First of all, consider the difficulty of those two schedules. It's funny to think that this was assumed to be a balanced schedule at one point.

That aside, they are both very easy, right?

Don't quite get ahead of yourself.

Both Tennessee and Cincinnati have recently proved that they are capable of winning games, which adds an interesting flavor to the two big AFC West games this weekend.

The breaking point in all of this has to be Kansas City's game against Oakland in Week 17.

Beating the Titans can help, but Oakland has proven that it has the capabilities to beat the Chiefs, and the Raiders have shown steady improvement over this season.

So let's get down to answering the question at hand: Could Kansas City win the AFC West this weekend?

No.

In fact, considering all of the facts, it's quite possible that San Diego has the chance to jump into a late-season AFC West lead once again.