Who knew? If Rex Ryan's New York Jets score a win this Sunday, the AFC East will send two teams to the playoffs.
Shame on me for not giving the division I cover more credit. All along, from the dog days of summer until three days ago, I predicted a solitary AFC East team would make the playoffs. I was certain the only way to reach the postseason was the division title, and there wasn't much disagreement.
The New England Patriots were the clear favorite, Las Vegas' choice to win the Super Bowl. They won 11 games without Tom Brady the year before, and he played enough like his old self in training camp to make fans salivate.
Beyond that? The other divisions were more stacked. The wild cards were coming from the AFC North and AFC South. Each had sent two teams in 2008 and seemed even more competitive.
AFC East teams, meanwhile, had four of the league's seven toughest schedules based on last year's win-loss records. Compiling a record worthy of a wild card seemed impossible, and that was before the Cincinnati Bengals and Denver Broncos zoomed out of the blocks to make the wild-card scene even more crowded.
No comments:
Post a Comment