NFL Playoff Picture: Wild Card Contenders in Massive Trouble

With only six weeks left until the end of the regular season, the playoff race in the NFL is starting to gain momentum.

We can safely assume that the Green Bay Packers and San Francisco 49ers are going to get in, but after that it is a crap-shoot. 

As of today, there are at least 18 teams in both conferences competing for the other 10 playoff spots that are available. There could be more than that if a few teams get their act together and start playing up to their potential. 

Some teams, though, appear to be in danger as we enter the final weeks of the season. They have either performed poorly, beaten up on bad teams, have a brutal schedule to close the year and/or seem to be regressing. 

Here are three teams that are in danger of losing their grasp on a Wild Card spot. 

Cincinnati Bengals (6-4)

The Bengals had a golden opportunity to take control of the AFC North with back-to-back games against the Steelers and Ravens, but after two losses they are on the outside looking in at those teams and clinging to a one-game Wild Card lead.

Considering that we are going into the final week of November, talking about the Bengals in the playoffs is a testament to the job that Marvin Lewis and his coaching staff have done. Unfortunately, their youth and inexperience is starting to catch up to them.

They finish the season with three more difficult games—at Pittsburgh, vs. Houston and Baltimore—which, if they lose all of those, would push them to seven losses. It is hard to make the playoffs in the AFC with a 9-7 record.

That hot start the Bengals got off to will be forgotten when they falter in December. 

Atlanta Falcons (6-4)

While the Falcons have finally started to win games, they are not doing so in a way that makes you believe that this is a playoff team. They are clawing out victories against inferior teams and losing to better competition.

That is how the Falcons won games last season, but that formula proved not to be so successful come playoff time.

This year, they will be lucky to hang around the playoff race in December. In addition to playing three road games against Houston, Carolina and New Orleans, they have to contend with better teams for the Wild Card spots.

The Bears, Lions, Cowboys and Giants are going to duke it out with the Falcons for the two Wild Card spots, and of that group, they are the least talented.

Their offense is pedestrian, and the defense still isn’t good enough to stop an opposing quarterback, so despite sitting relatively pretty now, the final month of the season will not be kind to the Dirty Birds. 

Chicago Bears (7-3)

How bad do the Bears feel today? 

It's not often that you think of Jay Cutler as the glue that holds a team together, but he was starting to play up to the potential that he had coming out of college. He wasn't great, by any means, but he was efficient, and that is all the team needed him to be. 

Now, with Cutler done for the rest of the regular season, Caleb Hanie gets thrown into the spotlight. I know he played pretty well in the NFC Championship Game last year, but that was a small sample size. 

The defense and special teams have been making a ton of plays for the last five weeks, and they will have to make even more to keep this team in the race without their starting quarterback. 

Games that looked like victories—Kansas City, Denver, Seattle, Minnesota—suddenly look a lot more dangerous. They can still get in, because the rest of the team around Cutler has improved, but it is going to be extremely difficult with a one-dimensional offense.